Although social workers have a part in preventing crime, their often ambiguous or even hostile relationship with police stymies their crime prevention work. Moreover, police and social worker ignorance of each other's work and goals makes matters worse. However, police work and social work are often closely related in that police refer a sizeable portion of their clients to social workers. The Prevention Program Police/Social Worker (PPS) model, now operating in West Germany, encourages social workers to intervene in crises to prevent further crime and to report offenses to the police without delay. Better cooperation is encouraged between social workers and police by providing police with social work training and social workers with police training and to assuring police of access to social services when needed. A key element in the new cooperation, however, is assuring that police work and social work are kept separate, that neither side interferes with the other. PPS goals include improving services to victims and thei0 families, recognizing and discouraging incipient criminals, and improving communication between police and social work agencies, as well as improving police-social work cooperation. PPS presently employs six social workers in the Hannover Police Department, where they are exposed to police problems. Other issues PPS addresses include social worker-citizen cooperation, crisis intervention, research into new crime prevention methods, and recent increases in police/social worker cooperation.