News

Jackie Hodgson contributed to the Handbook on Comparative Criminal Procedure edited by Jacqueline E. Ross and Stephen C. Thaman and soon to be published by Edward Elgar Publishing.

This Handbook presents cutting-edge research that compares different criminal procedure systems by focusing on the mechanisms by which legal systems seek to avoid error, protect rights, ground their legitimacy, expand lay participation in the criminal process, and develop alternatives to criminal trials, such as plea bargaining, as well as alternatives to the criminal process as a whole, such as intelligence operations. The criminal procedures examined in this book include those of the United States, Germany, France, Spain, Russia, India, Latin America, Taiwan, and Japan, among others.

Jackie's own contribution is entitled 'From the Domestic to the European: An Empirical Approach to Comparative Custodial Legal Advice'.

CJC member Kim Brownlee will take part to the Forum for European Philosophy public discussion on Tuesday 15th March 2016. The public discussion is hosted by the London School of Economics and Political Science and will discuss the following topic: 'What Are Prisons For?'.

In this time of austerity, many of those who want a small state are also committed to a highly expensive criminal justice apparatus that has little demonstrable deterrent effect. But are there other, more direct arguments against the use of imprisonment as a dominant form of punishment? If so, what are they? Why do they so often fall on deaf ears? And does the current economic climate make it more likely that those in power will listen?

Other speakers include Dr Christopher Bennett (University of Sheffield) and Andrew Neilson (The Howard League for Penal Reform). More details are available here: http://www.lse.ac.uk/publicEvents/events/2016/03/20160315t1830vSZT.aspx

The Forum for European Philosophy (@ForumPhilosophy) is an educational charity that organises a full and varied programme of philosophy and interdisciplinary events in the UK.

Next week, Jackie Hodgson - with the assistance of her PhD student, Divya Sukumar - will be training over 80 officers from Greater Manchester Police on safeguards for young suspects during police interrogation. This training session flows from Jackie's participation in a large-scale, EU-funded research project in collaboration with colleagues from four other jurisdictions.

More information on the research project is available on the Criminal Justice Centre website.

The second volume on safeguards for young suspects has been published. It is the result of a large-scale research project funded by the European Union and with the participation of researchers from five jurisdictions, including Prof Jackie Hodgson. The project consists of a comparative empirical study of the different legal procedural safeguards in place in Belgium, England and Wales, Italy, Poland and the Netherlands.

The first part of the research project resulted in the publication of 'Interrogating Young Suspects - Procedural Safeguards from a Legal Perspective' (Panzavolta, M., de Vocht, D., Van Oosterhout, M. and Vanderhallen, M. (eds) (2015) Intersentia). The second volume has now been published: 'Interrogating Young Suspects: Procedural Safeguards from an Empirical Perspective' (Panzavolta, M., de Vocht, D., Van Oosterhout, M. and Vanderhallen, M. (eds) (2016) Intersentia). This second volume contains the results of the empirical research conducted in the five Member States consisting of focus group interviews and observations of recorded interrogations. These country reports are followed by an integrated analysis and a set of guidelines.

Both volumes are available on the project website under project publications http://youngsuspects.eu