The Lawyer in the Dutch Interrogation Room: Influence on Police and Suspect

Abstract

In many European countries, providing a suspect in custody with legal aid before the first police interrogation is a heavily debated issue. In this paper, we report on an exploratory study on the use of coercion by the police and the use of the right to silence by suspects in 70 Dutch homicide cases and their relation to prior consultation and presence of a lawyer. Analysis of the data indicates that there is a relation between the presence of a lawyer in the interrogation room and the way in which police interrogators use coercion. To gain insight into whether the police use coercion and how this is achieved, we looked at the extent to which the interrogators make use of certain interrogation techniques and how the interrogation techniques are used to exert coercion. We found that legal advice from a lawyer before and during the interrogation corresponds with suspects more often using their right to silence. It also appears that the police are inclined to use 'hard coercion' when confronted with a silent suspect. The research thus raises the question as to whether the presence of a lawyer is an adequate way to prevent false confessions.

False Confessions in the Lab: A Review

“…Although knowing that a lawyer is present may positively affect the suspect and the interrogators, it remains to be seen whether the presence of a lawyer indeed protects the suspect from giving a false confession. 23 In conclusion, although false confessions are counterintuitive because of their self-inflicting nature, the experimental research suggests that innocent individuals are surprisingly easily seduced to falsely confess a crime. And these scientific data do construe a warning that confession evidence may not be as strong as our intuition dictates.…”

Overcoming Innocents' Naiveté: Pre‐interrogation Decision‐making Among Innocent Suspects

“…Such approaches unfairly, yet powerfully, influence suspects' willingness to waive their rights. Interrogation rights advocates, however, call for compulsory legal representation for suspects (e.g., Gudjonsson, ; Kassin et al, ; Verhoeven & Stevens, ). As demonstrated by the findings of this research and others (e.g., Gillard et al, ), an impartial and feasible approach would be to inform suspects that they have a choice of whether to waive or invoke their rights, rather than implying that a waiver will be given or inducing a similar expectation.…”

Persons at risk during interrogations in police custody

“…Still, it is stated in the Interrogation Manual the aim of the GIS is to build up so-called 'internal pressure', which is assumed to be 'the tension aroused in the mind of the suspect by the perceived incriminating power of the pieces of evidence at hand' (Hoekendijk & Van Beek, 2015, p. 4), and which is believed to be different from external pressure, described as 'everything that might be used to force the suspect to talk or confess' (Hoekendijk & Van Beek, 2015, p. 4). Nevertheless, 'internal pressure' is a form of pressure which aims to influence a suspect's statements, and it could thus be argued that there is actually little difference between internal and external pressure (Gudjonsson, 2003;Kortlever, 2011;Leo & Davis, 2010;Verhoeven & Stevens, 2012). Moreover, the Interrogation Manual mentions that it is allowed for police interrogators 'to incisively interrogate the suspect and thereby use a certain amount of pressure' (Van Amelsvoort et al, 2015, p. 340).…”

“…According to the GIS, the interrogation ends 'if the suspect's statement is in line with the tactical clues' (Van Amelsvoort et al, 2015, p. 456). This implies not only that police officers will continue to interrogate the suspect in case he or she provides a statement that is not in line with the tactical clues, but it also enhances the risk of confirmation bias and guilty bias in police officers (Duker & Stevens, 2009;Kortlever, 2011;Leo & Davis, 2010 Verhoeven & Stevens, 2012;Vrij, 2003).…”

“…Research on police interrogation in The Netherlands has demonstrated that police officers use inappropriate questions and tactics (e.g., maximisation, minimisation, accusation, or suggesting a particular scenario). Stevens and Verhoeven (2012) analysed…”