Abstract
Trends in large-scale historical data reveal continuities and changes in the prosecution process that might otherwise pass unnoticed. A significant trend emerging from the Prosecution Project database is the dramatic acceleration of early guilty pleas in Queensland's Supreme Court from the late 1940s. An examination of detectives’ testimony provides unique evidence of the police investigation and interrogation practices underpinning this phenomenon. Confession evidence dominated the police prosecution case during this period, specifically verbal confessions. A close reading of these texts suggests that some Queensland police engaged in police ‘verballing’ practices much earlier than identified by the Fitzgerald Inquiry into police corruption. I argue that process corruption had tangible results by transforming the prosecution process from an adversarial to a guilty plea system.
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