Criminal Cases Adult - Areas of Specialism - Typical Cases
Assessments of Mental Vulnerability & Impairment
- Intellectual assessments carried out on parents called as "appropriate adults" under PACE, and evaluation of their children and their role as laid down in the codes of practice.
- Assessment of whether a young woman was a "mental defective" for the purposes of the Sexual Offences Act, and whether there were any good reasons why a defendant accused of rape (where consent is not a defence) should have known her status given the circumstances of their encounter.
- Assessment of the capacity of people with severe hearing disability to understand charges and give valid instructions in civil and criminal proceedings.
- Specialist work for H.M. Customs & Excise rebutting defence of low intelligence and suggestibility in a case of drug smuggling.
Evaluations of Disputed Confessions
- Assessment of a disputed confession obtained after prolonged police questioning, and the manifestation of signs of psychological disorder late in the series of interviews.
- Assessment of general levels of intellectual functioning and suggestibility of adults interviewed by police without appropriate adults being called, and being charged with arson and murder after making self incriminating statements.
- Assessment as to whether a "Personality Disorder" could contribute to a false confession where attempts to gain hospital admission by other presented histories had failed.
- Whether the conduct of a senior police officer in procuring a confession from a suspected arsonist was so unjustifiable that a newspaper report was not liable.
Credibility of Testimony of Children in Cases of Alleged Sexual Abuse by Adults
- Assessment of the credibility of multiple allegations of sexual abuse by children against a Local Authority teacher, particularly addressing the techniques of interviewing used on the children and the as to whether those techniques could have jeopardised the veracity of the children's testimony.
- Research based expert testimony given before a Scottish Court on how a children's memories and developments of accounts of ritualised and organised abuse developed over months of questioning and carried few characteristics of real memory process.
- Assessment, disentangling questionable recovered false memories, aided by psychotherapy and family intensive questioning on the part of the alleged adult victim of childhood sexual abuse.
Pre-sentence Reports
- Assessment of psychological factors of mitigation present in a case of arson committed as a "crime passionelle" by a French homosexual man.
- Assesment of Whether persistent pickpocketing could fit a "kleptomania" diagnosis in a manner similar to shoplifting.
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