17th August 2024
“I had a parole hearing recently and the first question I was asked was how have I managed to reconcile my relationship with my mum due to the trauma that I suffered as a child.”
The client who wrote this is a child lifer: he received an indeterminate sentence for public protection when he was a young teen. I have worked with him continuously for over a decade – he is now over 30 years old. I know the details of his case in depth: I have read the social services files chronicling his abuse as a child and I remember the day I went to see him in prison to describe their content and the empty feeling I had when he left the tiny visits room with paper thin walls to return to his cell and I left to catch a long-distance train home. When the question he describes landed just a few minutes into his evidence at his parole hearing, I felt the sting of it sharply. Why would a person presiding over the liberty of another human being start with a question that could not do anything other than shock and disturb them? How, after that, would he be able to continue to share the kind of information that you need to share at a Parole hearing – his deepest thoughts about his own crimes, his plans and hopes for the future?
He later told me:
“This question completely caught me off guard as I have never been asked this question at a parole hearing before it felt like at the time that the panel member was trying to trigger me and it was very uncomfortable and unpleasant to be in that situation as it brought back a lot of unpleasant and changing memories which are hard enough to deal with on a normal day let alone on the day when I am fighting for my future trying to get released later on that day when I went back to the wing it continued to play on my mind for the rest of the night as them thoughts and feelings are something that I have tried incredibly hard to put them to bed and they were all brought back to the surface again when being asked this question.”
The first time I ever commissioned an independent forensic adolescent psychiatrist to attend a parole hearing as a witness, immediately after the hearing, he said to me: “that was abusive”. I hadn’t thought about it that way: as lawyers you sadly become used to legal processes that are anything but usual for most people.
But I have thought about it a lot since.
There are obvious examples, like the recent one.
But in fact, it took me several more years to realise how stressful any contact with the law and lawyers, whether it is a letter in the post, a call from your solicitor or a formal hearing can be. I now start all my calls (if I can) with the reassurance that my call is “nothing to worry about” and there is always a sigh of relief when I say that because for most people, a call from a lawyer is a stressful event.
I was struck, when I started practising in mental health, by just how much professionals’ meetings and Mental Health Tribunals are acknowledged as inherently stressful things, and that the care team need to be mindful of when monitoring a person’s anxiety levels and behavioural interactions. Yet in almost every other sphere of legal life, the legal show goes on in parallel to other processes and there is very little scope to adapt interactions or increase support to acknowledge the inherent stress of legal processes.
I am getting (sadly) used now to the inevitable unravelling that so often accompanies the build-up to a legal event, especially criminal cases, police interviews and parole hearings: they can include self-harm, self-sabotage and general anxiety.
The same of course applies to victims who also suffer from a severe lack of information about the cases that concern them, much of which could easily be resolved with some decent legal education and better communication. I represent the family of a person who was the victim of a horrific, fatal, offence, which resulted in the loss of a beloved family member decades ago. For years, they have had to navigate the complex parole process in the dark, having to learn about the system through their own research. One member told me:
“I feel the parole and probation process should provide more information to victims so families can make more informed submissions rather than hope for perpetrators to never see the light of day, which is the only other option. The absence of such information caused us great stress and worry, which might have otherwise been rendered unnecessary if in receipt of particular facts.”
As well as the obvious anxiety for all concerned caused by the lack of clear information about how legal processes work, there are small, careless decisions and throw away comments that can have a disproportionate impact in a legal case:
- A hearing listed on a painful anniversary
- A refusal to call a young adult by their first name
- A refusal to wait two minutes for an officer to attend a video link with a client facing a sentence appeal that would determine whether or not she would risk separation from her child
I could go on…
The trauma within legal processes ripples out to lawyers representing their clients too. Should I have stepped in or challenged that first question? I didn’t. I was shocked by the question. I didn’t have instructions. And, as my client later confirmed, he wouldn’t have wanted me to for fear of annoying the judge. In fact, he answered the question in a straightforward and honest way, and to his credit. But I could tell the aftershock of it affected some of the later evidence he gave. There are numerous other examples of cases where the stress of the process was just too much and resulted in long term problems, including triggering PTSD.
I wonder how much better the lives of those involved in the justice system would be if we could only find a way to create a kinder justice system that minimises rather than magnifies the harm.
Research on the impact of legal processes is well overdue, and would be a useful first step in creating a kinder, less harmful justice system for defendants, claimants, victims and lawyers alike.
I have set up a short survey for practitioners to showcase good and bad practice. There are only two substantive questions, so please take a few minutes to share your experiences.