On Friday 6th July 2018 Dr Ana Aliverti and Dr Alice Gerlach met with members of the West Midlands Police (WMP), Home Office’s Immigration Compliance and Enforcement team (ICE) and other stakeholders. The purpose of the workshop was to discuss the findings of an evaluation of the regional joint enforcement operation between the West Midlands Police and the ICE team, ‘Operation Nexus.’ Operation Nexus is an enforcement initiative which was first rolled out in London in 2012 by the Metropolitan Police and has now been expanded nationwide. Nexus aims to bring together operational and intelligence capabilities and resources in the police and immigration services to deal effectively with offending by foreigners, reduce costs involved in pursuing them through the criminal justice system, and enhance public security.

The research project received funding from the University of Warwick’s Impact Fund and aims to influence the processes and practices of Operation Nexus and shape the public debate on this aspect of policing at the regional level. More specifically, the evaluation aimed to answer the following:

1) How does interagency cooperation between the WMP and ICE work in practice? 2) How are the identity and nationality of individuals arrested determined?

3) What are the considerations taken into account by police officers when making a decision on cases involving FN suspects?

4) Are the vulnerabilities of FN individuals brought into custody appropriately identified and handled?

Dr Ana Aliverti used a mixed method design which combined the analysis of custody data (on individuals arrested by the WMP between 1 January and 31 December 2017), ethnographic observations of custody processes, and semi-structured interviews. Observations were conducted by a researcher between 1 September and 15 December 2017 in the two custody superblocks (Perry Barr and Oldbury). An additional period of observation was conducted in January and February 2016 at Steel House (Birmingham Central) and Smethick. Observations entailed the shadowing of embedded immigration officers and the observation of the custody booking, police and immigration interviews, and decision-making processes. Detailed notes were taken and transcribed for analysis. Quantitative methods were also employed by Dr Alice Gerlach, using custody record data to build a demographic profile and analysis of the population of foreign nationals held in custody during 2017.

The workshop held at the West Midlands Police’s headquarters brought together members of WMP, ICE and other stakeholders including national bodies (ACRO, Home Office), and members of other police forces who are also interested in utilising academic research to help shape their Nexus policy. Discussions followed the key findings of the project. Recommendations were provided to the group by the researchers and strategies were discussed which would allow WMP and ICE to learn from the evaluation and make changes to their policies and practices as a result. The workshop was well attended and the results presented by the researchers proved insightful to the WMP and ICE, who hope to work towards fulfilling the recommendations provided in the future.

The Early Career Scholars’ Day 2018 and the 10th Conference on the Future of Adversarial and Inquisitorial Systems will be taking place on 25 April 2018 at the Faculty of Law, University of Basel. The theme of the conference is "Accountability of Criminal Justice Systems: Formation, Application and Enforcement of Law in Changing Circumstances".

Accountability in criminal justice has many dimensions: We expect accurate outcomes, procedural fairness, protections of civil liberties, and respectful treatment of all participants in the criminal justice system to the extent possible. Traditionally, we have accorded great power and influence to expert practitioners in the system − be they police, judges, prosecutors, or defense counsel. As victims, defendants and ordinary citizens increase their ability to tell their stories in new ways, their concerns have changed the way that scholars and politicians think about what it means to be accountable. Whether we start with an inquisitorial or adversarial model, increased transparency in the digital age has led to a corresponding increase in pressure on all of the participants in the system. Competing priorities inevitably lead to tradeoffs between incommensurable interests. Maintaining a legitimate system requires thoughtful engagement to manage potential conflicts, and to rebalance the approaches the participants adopt in light of new information.

In this session, we will hear presentations from early-career scholars writing about accountability in criminal justice from comparative and national law perspectives. We welcome authors interested in critiquing the system from a descriptive or normative perspective, or in proposing new methods, approaches or perspectives that will further the conversation on defining and achieving accountability in criminal justice.

The application should encompass:

− maximum 5 pages of the research subject you would like to present

− CV with full contact details

Application deadline: 15 February 2018

Applications should be sent to the conference coordinator, Professor Sabine Gless, to the following address: sabine.gless@unibas.ch. The selected students will give a presentation of their work in front of their peers. Then, discussants will include the members of the 10th Conference on the Future of the Adversarial and Inquisitorial Systems, among them Prof Jackie Hodgson (University of Warwick), Prof Richard Myers (University of North-Carolina at Chapel Hill), Prof Michele Caianiello (University of Bologna), Prof Sabine Gless (University of Basel). The floor will be open to debates. Travel expenses linked to the participation at the Ph.D. seminar, unfortunately, cannot be covered.

A workshop titled "The (un)forgotten: Looking back in hope and anger at juvenile LWOP offenders in the US, an archaeology of hope in the shadow of prison" with Sarah Colvin (Cambridge) and Evi Girling (Keele) shall be held tomorrow (Wednesday) 24 January 2018 from 1.00 – 3.00pm at the Wolfson Research Exchange. Lunch will be provided. Those interested are requested to register, including dietary requirements by contacting Tracy Smith at t.smith.2@warwick.ac.uk.

CJC Members Divya Sukumar, Dr. Kimberley Wade, and Professor Jacqueline Hodgson have co-authored a paper titled Truth-tellers stand the test of time and contradict evidence less than liars, even months after a crime in Law and Human Behavior. This paper looks at the impact of the phased disclosure of evidence to truth-tellers and liars, over time. This 'law-psychology' collaboration, with Ms. Sukumar’s doctoral research at its heart, has produced new and exciting insights, drawing on both disciplines, as well as a number of inter-disciplinary publications which in the past have been published in Criminal Law Review, Psychology Public Policy and Law, and the International Journal of Evidence and Proof.