How we help Female Diversionary Scheme Female Out of Court Diversionary Scheme The Footprints Project works with Dorset Police to run a diversionary service specifically for women, helping them to avoid repeating unhelpful or dangerous activities and stopping them from potentially progressing to a prosecution and court. Under the diversionary service, police issue a conditional caution to women who are classified as vulnerable, are perhaps on the verge of engaging in unhelfpul or criminal behaviour for the first time or have been known to the police before but have not offended for some time. Women on the diversionary service scheme meet our specialist staff regularly for 18 weeks and we then offer ongoing volunteer support. We currently provide support for around 100 women a year with around 93% of those we help remaining crime-free after working with The Footprints Project. This service has been highly successful since its launch in 2019 and in 2020 was awarded a prestigious commendation from the Howard League for Penal Reform. We have just had this year's evaluation by Dorset Police which has been our most successful with 94% of women on the scheme remaining crime free after support The scheme was awarded a commendation from the Howard League for Penal Reform community awards, women's section in 2020. Manage Cookie Preferences