Police interrogation of the suspect – a power play

Abstract

Police interrogation is a decisive step in criminal justice. The police officer who interrogates the sus-pect tries to find out what happened and, if possible, to procure a confession. Once the suspect has made a confession “the cat is out of the bag” and the case will most likely end with a conviction.In the past, the suspect was exposed to police interrogation without any protection, so the police could turn their questioning into an aggressive power play. In the western world the philosophy of Enlight-enment, Natural Law thinking and the introduction of constitutionally protected individual rights have led to the developing of safeguards to shield the suspect from interrogation methods that were no longer considered acceptable. This development has not yet come to an end.Today, the most important safeguard of the suspect is the privilege against self-incrimination. The privilege has been interpreted to require warnings to be given to the suspect before interrogation can start. The warnings include, among other things, information as to the right to silence and the right to have counsel. To enforce these requirements exclusionary rules have been developed. Equally im-portant is the question whether interrogation must cease once a suspect wishes to remain silent or to have counsel. In addition a number of interrogation methods interfering with the suspect's freedom to determine and exercise his or her will have been outlawed. Finally, there is the question whether in-ferences may be drawn from the suspect's silence.In spite of these safeguards police interrogation must, still today, be considered a kind of power play. The important question is how to develop further rules and how to enforce them to turn interrogation into a fair play.A Chinese translation of the article was published in the December 2015 issue of the Journal of Southwest University for National Minorities - Science Edition.