Managed as offenders, ignored as survivors: Modern slavery, criminalisation, and the gaps in practice provision

This paper explores how people encounter the criminal justice system, as well as related support services for those victims of modern slavery who also have a history of offending. Drawing on a focus group with three participants, the study examines how moral complexity, bureaucratic rigidity, and systemic misunderstanding shape processes of rehabilitation and engagement with UK modern slavery support and criminal justice systems. Participants described deep frustration at being simultaneously managed as offenders and overlooked as survivors, highlighting the limitations of current trauma-informed approaches when faced with non-stereotypical victim–offender identities. The paper situates these findings within contemporary debates on trauma-informed care, responsivity, and desistance, and argues for reforms that embed lived experience more deeply in system design, strengthen cross-sector continuity of care, and position probation as a relational and reparative form of rehabilitation.