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Children in Police Custody
JUNIOR LAWYERS DIVISION
Children in Police Custody
A certain television series concerning police officers catching bent coppers will have filled many an evening during the past year. Through their exploits, we saw vulnerable suspects and even children being arrested and interviewed under caution. Representing suspects at the police station is of course a quintessential part of what criminal defence practitioners, with some specialising their practice in representing children. So when children get arrested and brought to the police station, should they be detained and kept in custody?
It goes without saying that a police station custody is no place for a child and depriving a child’s custody should be avoided as much as possible. Once a child suspect has been arrested and interviewed by the police, a decision will have to be taken as to whether the police will take no further action, release the child under investigation, bail or charge them.
So what happens if a child has been arrested and charged with an offence? The Concordat on Children in Custody published by the Home Office sets out key principles and practices as to how children should be dealt with at the police station. The starting point of this Concordat is that children who have been charged with a criminal offence should be granted bail whenever possible.
Of course this is not the only guidance that the police should be consider. Article 37(b) of the United Nations Convention on the Right of the Child states:
Unfortunately in spite of these supposed safeguards, things do often go wrong and even in cases where a child should be sent home they may have to spend the night in the police station before their first appearance at court.
But what happens to children at the pre-charge stage? At this point, the police will have insufficient evidence to charge but it might be that a young person is detained overnight in custody (rather than being sent home), interviewed in the morning and then either released under investigation or bailed to return back to the police station. It is particularly in these cases where a child’s detention should be off the cards. The argument would be that if the position is that children at the post-charge stage should not be detained, then the argument against detention at the pre-charge and interview stage is all the more relevant.
This is one of the areas that could benefit not only from strategic litigation but also through change in policy to make sure that children are not unnecessarily being detained and institutionalised. ■
Rishi Joshi
Solicitor in the Criminal Defence Team Hodge Jones & Allen
