POOR progress in court resulted in the Crown Prosecution Service being publicly criticised by the chairman of a bench of magistrates.

Pam Homer, of Weymouth magistrates, made her comments after an error-strewn start to court proceedings in the town.

Files went missing, disclosure documents could not be found and prosecution applications were served late causing delays and complicating cases.

Mrs Homer spoke out and, while stressing that the disrupted proceedings were not the fault of prosecutor Emma Martin, she was critical of the service.

She added: "We are very dissatisfied with the way the Crown Prosecution Service is behaving.

"We will be making representations ourselves at the end of the day."

Several solicitors were also unhappy at the disjointed proceedings and variously described them as a mess' and a complete dog's dinner'.

The Crown Court and Trial Unit Head for the CPS Roger Hall said: "Our agent was an experienced prosecutor who has prosecuted for many CPS areas.

"However it was the first time she had prosecuted in Weymouth Magistrates' Court.

"It was unfortunate that due to major road works and bad weather, our agent had not arrived at court in time to read and digest the cases."

Mr Hall added: "All files for that day were at court. Unfortunately some files were in the court next door. The other court was being prosecuted by a CPS designated caseworker. This person was unable to deal with a couple of these cases including a youth remand case and these were transferred to our agent's court.

"It is not yet possible to comment on the specific complaints. We acknowledge that there were problems on a few cases and for that we apologise."