Does anyone know where I may read upto date information regarding the following;-
1) refusing to attend an interview under caution
2) Can Fraud Officers caution when there is no intention to interview (is this an abuse of powers/intimidation etc)

Thu 28-Oct-04 09:56 AM by ken

I'm not sure if the following "extracts for guidance" from the PACE Act 1984 may be useful to you -

http://www.rightsnet.org.uk/pdfs/PACE_ACT_1984_extracts_for_guidance.pdf

Couple of thoughts on your questions:
1) As LA investigators we have no powers to compell anyone to attend IUC, we would normally send 2 or 3 letters probably hand delivering the last one. Some Fraud section's use the police to arrest and then interview at police station but I do not think this is a common practice. Even if the person does not respond or attend this does not stop the LA taking the case forward and at times all the way to court. Of course the LA should have suffcient evidence to do this.

2) Not sure what you mean by this, as the link to the PACE guidelines say, we have to caution a person where we suspect an offence has been committed. We may be interviewing a person informally at home and they tell us some thing that indicates an offence has been committed, we must under PACE caution them. In this LA we would then suspend that interview and arrange for them to attend the office for formal IUC. To caution without an intention to proceed with questions under caution or arranging for further IUC would in my view be at least bad/sloppy practice.

Hope this helps...as always more info may help.