The Criminal Cases Review Commission has launched a recruitment drive to help manage a growing caseload, recruiting four new case review managers.
The CCRC said it usually expects to receive around 1,500 applications in a year from people appealing their conviction, but it has received more than this in recent years. In 2023-24, the body received a record 1,629 applications, while it received 1,541 applications in 2024-25. And the CCRC said in the first months of 2025-26, application numbers are 15% above where they would usually be.
The body is seeking a “small, immediate expansion of the team, replacing two case review managers who are moving on to other roles, and adding two more”.
The roles are based in Birmingham and a salary of £40,005 is on offer. Potential applicants can see the full job description here.
Interim chair Dame Vera Baird said: “We need people with a sense of mission and a high level of skill to tackle cases where people have already appealed without success and assert, with reason, that they have been wrongly convicted.
“The test for us to refer cases to the Court of Appeal is that there is a real possibility that the court of appeal will not uphold the conviction due to a new argument of evidence which we can put forward.
“Increasing our casework team is essential to ensuring our reviews are completed thoroughly and in a timely manner. We must not let applicants down.”
Baird was appointed interim chair in June after Helen Pitcher resigned in January amid an attempt from the justice secretary, Shabana Mahmood, to remove her from the role. Mahmood had described Pitcher as “unfit to fulfil her duties” after a review found the commission failed a man who was wrongly jailed for 17 years.
When taking applications, CCRC considers whether, as a result of new evidence or argument, there is a real possibility that the conviction would not be upheld were a reference to be made. Applicants should usually have appealed first. A case can be referred in the absence of new evidence or argument or an earlier appeal only if there are “exceptional circumstances”.
Case review managers investigate whether there is a real possibility a conviction would be quashed or a sentence reduced if a case were sent back to the courts. Commissioners make the final decision.
The press release says the key requirement for the new case managers “will be a total commitment to investigating and rooting out miscarriages of justice so that the Commission can refer them to the appeal courts for serious reconsideration”.
Since starting work in 1997, the CCRC has referred around 3% of applications to the appeal courts. If a case is referred, it is then for the appeal court to decide whether the conviction is unsafe.