AIBU to be alarmed after a defendant contacted me?

I was going to say that you need to ring. Emails get buried these days.

Shocked

Someone should get in serious trouble for this, that's terrible!

I would contact the Office of the Police Commissioner too. Phone, don’t email. Whoever informed you that is not reportable is wrong.

Never mind emailing, OP, make phone calls, do not be fobbed off, and raise hell! This is serious.

This is not acceptable. Write to the Police and Crime Commissioner. Headlining it COMPLAINT with a copy to the Chief Constable. This is a serious breach of confidentiality. Also write, or better still, make an appt to see your MP when he/she holds a local surgery for their constituents and who will be able to take the matter up on your behalf. The case lead should give you the name of that person's solicitor and write a complaint letter to them also. It could have been them that gave your name and address.

We're you granted a Witness Anonymity Order?
If so, complain, complain, complain. Directly to the judge that granted the order if you have to.
If no order given, there's no anonymity given in the interest of a fair trial.

Not surprised tbh. I witnessed an attempted murder during Covid on the street a couple of houses from mine and as the only witness gave the police a statement and said that I would be happy to testify in court. I specified that I wanted it to be anonymous as it would be very easy to work out who I was and where I lived.

Fast forward a few months and the witness coordinator (not sure of the exact title) calls me to give details of the court date etc and I confirm that I’m still willing to go to court and reiterate the anonymity request. She replies not to worry as they’ve organised a screen for the court room. Great I say, and obviously I don’t want my name used either at which point there’s a silence and she informs me that they already have my name.

Because it was on the statement which is shared with their solicitor they have had it all along. I have a fairly generic name so if this has happened in a busy city centre I wouldn’t have been as worried but this happened outside my house There are literally a maximum of 6 houses I could live in and given the only time I saw this man in my life he was carrying a knife and trying to kill someone I decided to withdraw my willingness to testify.

Absolute joke of a system.

I did a very brief reply above, but to add, the poster above is correct that he could be charged with Perverting the course of justice as it is a current case. Contact Witness Protection and the Police again, this is a serious issue.

When my ExH was in prison, he was accidentally released when he was on remand (I know!) and he came straight for me (as I knew he would), and also tried to contact adult DD (a witness). He was fortunately rearrested very soon afterwards, but was initially charged with PCJ, and this was only dropped when the CPS were negotiating his guilty plea. The fact that he did it, added time to the Injunction preventing him from contacting us, it went from 10 years to 15 years.

Unfortunately with technology we have also had breeches like this caused by hackers and human errors.

This is shocking, sorry OP.

It would put me off ‘doing the right thing’

This.

I was coming on to say the same thing. Unless its for a loved one I would never be a witness where the defender is capable of violence. There is so much incompetence within the cps, police, and legal firms and this happens way to much, and then when it does the police do not protect you.

I would also advise against reporting aggressive neighbours to the council after a neighbour had petrol poured through her letterbox after making a noise complaint. The housing officer sent a letter to the offenders saying 'Debbie at number 53 has made a complaint'. I mean, how fucking stupid can you be? The police couldn't give a shit and the housing association won't move her as she doesn't meet the criteria.

Shows you how little the police care, if they say this is "unreportable".

I wonder if it is actually from the defendant or someone in his family that was able to write it and sign his name? Same thing, but might explain how it was able to happen.

I was a witness in an assault case and the police/CPS "accidentally" sent the unredacted version of my statement, complete with name, address and phone number to the defence solicitor.
Fortunately the defence solicitor picked up on it and phoned me to say they were returning it to the CPS.

This is really important.

Wow, it certainly makes you think twice about being a witness. The older I get, the more I believe the adage "no good deed goes unpunished".

This is well-beyond crap. I'd be ringing my MP immediately.

If you don’t get anywhere with complaints email your MP and their office will take up the case.

The information will have been included in the case materials which the client has access to.
Whoever prepared the documents might have included the witness details instead of redacting them.

so it’s incompetence rather than criminal

Sadly, this doesn't surprise me. I think it'll be sloppy practice, rather than deliberate. But that is no comfort to OP

OP, perhaps he wasn't committing a crime by writing to you (I don't know) but that's not the point. It's still a GDPR breach. Complain

That’s shocking 😮 how can that not be a criminal offence?

If he's not yet sentenced @ShapeofanLonmyforehead you need to contact the judge of the court case urgently to report this attempt to pervert the course of justice. The judge needs to know before passing sentence because the letter to you will not be the only attempt to do this, he will have offeres money elsewhere too, to people less honest than you. The court stewards will assist you in getting the information to the right place.

I suspect his defence team told him. This incident should remind everyone that you should never, ever be a witness. IME, the police are not capable of keeping everyone safe from intimidation from offenders.