Women Homicide Offenders and Police Interrogation (From Issues in Criminal Justice Administration, P 53-82, 1983, Mark Findlay et al, eds. See NCJ-92907)

• NCJ Number: 92911
• Author(s): W Bacon; R Lansdowne
• Date Published: 1983
• Length: 30 pages
• Sale Source: George Allen and Unwin
• Language: English
• Country: Australia
• Note: Earlier version published in Criminal Injustice System, Australian Legal Workers Groups (NSW) and Legal Service Bulletin Co-operative Ltd, 1982, 4-33.

Annotation

This Australian study examined the legal aspects of the police interrogation of women accused of homicide in New South Wales between July 1979 and March 1980.

Abstract

Overall, the study found that the police do not adhere to their own standards of conduct for interrogation or to the principles established by the courts. The findings also suggest that existing standards and principles of interrogation offer inadequate protection to an accused person and that many cases are built on questionable or false assumptions. These findings were derived from interviews with the 36 female offenders after their trials, supplemented by and compared with information contained in the trial transcript, the court exhibits (in most cases including a record of interview), and the attorney's case file. In some cases, defense attorneys were interviewed. This study report considers the law pertaining to admissions or confessions, the significance of the record of interview, whether the alleged admissions were actually made, the coerciveness of the interaction with the police, lack of knowledge of rights, physical and mental state, voluntariness, and the reliability of the information given to the police by the accused. Other aspects or interrogation considered are the police use of questions of intent, the police attempt to establish motive, and exaggeration by the accused under interrogation.