New Zealand
Prosecution in New Zealand
A Law-Officer model — the Attorney-General and Solicitor-General superintend prosecutions, serious cases go to private-practice Crown Solicitors, and the police prosecute lesser matters — rather than a single Director of Public Prosecutions.
Facts on this page were checked against their sources on .
New Zealand has no single Director of Public Prosecutions. Prosecution is superintended by the Crown's Law Officers — the Attorney-General (a Minister, the senior Law Officer) and the Solicitor-General (the junior Law Officer and chief executive of the Crown Law Office) — through Crown Law's Public Prosecutions Unit. Serious ("Crown") prosecutions are conducted by Crown Solicitors, private-practice lawyers holding the Crown warrant in each main centre; less serious matters are commonly prosecuted by the New Zealand Police.
The same idea, explained generally
- What does a prosecutor do?
A prosecutor decides whether a criminal case should be brought, on what charges, and presents it in court. This guide explains the tests applied, the duties owed, and how the role differs between systems.
- Why do justice systems need oversight?
Justice institutions hold coercive powers, often operate out of public view, and make decisions that are hard to reverse. This guide explains the oversight mechanisms built to detect and correct errors, and their limits.
Sources
Sources
Crown Law Office (Te Tari Ture o te Karauna) — about us
Crown Law Office (New Zealand) · Government publication · link verified 2026-07-27
The Crown Law Office's own site, read directly. Supports that the Attorney-General (a Minister, the senior Law Officer) and the Solicitor-General (the junior Law Officer and chief executive of Crown Law) superintend the prosecution process, that Crown Law's Public Prosecutions Unit oversees Crown and non-Crown prosecutions, and that serious ("Crown") prosecutions are conducted by Crown Solicitors — private-practice lawyers holding the Crown warrant in each main centre. Establishes that New Zealand has a Law-Officer prosecution model rather than a standalone Director of Public Prosecutions. (The verbatim "apolitical"/prosecutor-independence wording appears in the Solicitor-General's Prosecution Guidelines, not on this page.)