THE man at the centre of an election leaflet row in Offenham may not have escaped prosecution, it emerged this week.

The Crown Prosecution Service has already announced it will not prosecute Paul Charman, even though he has publicly admitted producing anonymous leaflets containing false information about two parish councillors and distributing them the night before the election in May.

Now Wychavon District Council has written to the Director of Public Prosecutions, Sir Ken McDonald QC, strongly criticising the decision and calling for it to be reviewed.

The council's managing director and returning officer Jack Hergarty has confirmed that a private prosecution by the council could not be ruled out if the response received was negative.

The leaflet, which was delivered to homes throughout the village at up to 5am on the morning before the election, claimed that two current parish councillors had complaints lodged against them with the Standards Board of England.

In his letter to the DPP, Ian Marshall, Wychavon's monitoring officer, said the leaflet was in breach of two sections of the Representation of the People Act 1983.

He told Sir Ken: "I should be very grateful if you would look into this matter. Our view is that this was an appalling case and there should have been an early decision by the CPS to prosecute."

He added: "We do feel that this case raises some important isssues and that we have been badly let down by the CPS.

"The failure to prosecute, and to do so promptly, damages the integrity of the electoral process and seriously undermines public confidence."

The two named councillors, former chairman Jon England and Rod Canning, came bottom in the resultant poll, losing their seats.

Both have since written to the Electoral Commission having heard the decision of the CPS not to prosecute.

Letters of complaint about the two men were eventually received and rejected by the Standards Board of England. Dated April 30, they were not received until May 10, a full week after the election.