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

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... Mehr ...