Abstract
There is a high prevalence of people with intellectual disability (ID) among those in police custody. Consequently, law enforcement officers (LEOs) at the frontline of the criminal justice system are commonly required to interact with people who have ID. Notwithstanding the frequency of these interactions, research indicates that police exchanges with persons with ID frequently take place against a backdrop of tenuously-resourced disability awareness training. At the time of writing, a paucity of research data exists with respect to the experiences of LEOs operating within this training vacuum at an international level. A better understanding of their experiences could meaningfully inform research, training and improve support programmes for LEO's. We systematically reviewed six databases to identify studies published up to 1st December 2019 reporting the experience of LEOs interfacing with suspects who have an ID. Following a review of 670 abstracts, 16 studies were identified from five countries involving 983 LEOs. LEOs identified 1) a need for specialised training; 2) challenges in identifying people with ID; 3) a need to improve safeguards and 4) challenges in supporting/communicating with individuals who have ID through the investigation process.
Highlights
People with intellectual disabilities (ID) are over-represented in all parts of the criminal justice system, including police custody (Gulati et al, 2018; Mue Murphy, 2019; Young, Goodwin, Sedgwick, & Gudjonsson, 2013)
In the United Kingdom (UK), the Bradley review (Bradley, 2009) reported that the prevalence of ID in police custody ranged from 0.5% to 9% of detainees
Reasons for exclusion included studies with no primary qualitative data (n = 25), studies pertaining to mental illness or “mental disorder” rather than ID (n = 20) and data relating to interactions in the criminal justice system other than with frontline Law Enforcement Officers (LEOs) (n = 6)
Summary
People with intellectual disabilities (ID) are over-represented in all parts of the criminal justice system, including police custody (Gulati et al, 2018; Mue Murphy, 2019; Young, Goodwin, Sedgwick, & Gudjonsson, 2013). In the United Kingdom (UK), the Bradley review (Bradley, 2009) reported that the prevalence of ID in police custody ranged from 0.5% to 9% of detainees. This compares to a community prevalence of 2.16% of adults in the UK (MENCAP, 2020). It is acknowledged generally that many individuals falling within this classification encounter significant communicative, as well as cognitive, challenges in responding to allegations of criminal wrongdoing (Clare, 2003; Cusack, 2020a; Morrison, Forrester-Jones, Bradshaw, & Murphy, 2019)
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