Understanding of the current police caution (England and Wales) among suspects in police detention

Abstract

The current police caution (England and Wales) provides information about the right to silence to suspects in police detention. Though earlier studies, involving other populations, suggest that the caution would be too complex for detainees to understand fully, the issue has not previously been investigated directly among police detainees. Comprehension of the caution was investigated among two groups, police station suspects (N ¼ 30) and individuals (N ¼ 24) attending a job centre in the same area, matched for intellectual ability. In both groups, understanding was very limited and did not relate either to their situation at the time of testing or to self-reported experience of the criminal justice system. Even under optimal experimental conditions, only 11% (six) of the participants were able to demonstrate full understanding of its meaning. Worryingly, though more than 96% (52) claimed to have understood the caution fully after it had been presented to them as it would be by the police, none of them did so. We suggest practical measures to ameliorate the difficulties, but the importance of devising a new, simplified, version of the current caution cannot be overemphasized; otherwise, miscarriages of justice are likely to occur.

Awareness and comprehension of the right to silence in Queensland, Australia

“…Our findings add weight to the argument that the current mode of delivery in Queensland is not appropriate if understanding of the police caution is to be maximised. This was also found to be the case by Clare et al, (1998), Fenner et al, (2002), Eastwood and Snook (2009 and Roe and Moston (2009). Moreover, as the QPS caution is lengthier than the caution used in other Australian jurisdictions, it might be expected that general levels of comprehension of the caution in Queensland would be lower than in other states.…”

“…Moreover, given that standard QPS procedure is to read the caution aloud to suspects, it seems worthwhile to investigate differences in suspects' understanding depending upon the mode of delivery of the caution. It could be expected, for example, that those who were read aloud the police caution and shown it in writing would better understand and comprehend the caution, compared with suspects who were read the police caution alone (see also Clare et al, 1998;Eastwood & Snook, 2009;Fenner et al, 2002;and Roe & Moston, 2009). …”

“…Utilising an ecologically valid participant population, Fenner, Gudjonsson and Clare (2002) compared understanding and comprehension of the UK police cautioning statement between 30 police suspects and an intellectually matched group of 24 nonsuspects. When the caution was read in full, 96% of the participants reported that they understood the caution.…”

Safeguarding Youth Interrogation Rights: The Effect of Grade Level and Reading Complexity of Youth Waiver Forms on the Comprehension of Legal Rights

“…This finding held true even for those who reported hearing a waiver form previously, suggesting that prior exposure does not lead to increased comprehension (see Fenner et al, 2002, for similar results with an adult caution). Despite the stark deficits in comprehension, however, youths reported almost uniformly that they understood the information in the waiver forms-which is consistent with the findings from Eastwood et al (2012) and research using adult participants Fenner et al, 2002). Although there was a positive correlation between reported comprehension and two of the dependent variables, suggesting a certain level of insight into their comprehension, the effect was small, and claimed comprehension was still well below actual comprehension.…”

“…Results showed that the students recalled, on average, 40% of their legal rights, and only 22% of the youths comprehended more than 50% of their rights. It should be noted that this issue is not unique to youth populations, as similar low levels of comprehension have been discovered with adult cautions as well (Cloud, Shepherd, NodvinBarkoff, & Shur, 2002: Eastwood, Snook, & Chaulk, 2010Fenner, Gudjonsson, & Clare, 2002;Gudjonsson, 1991).…”