Overview

The vulnerability of juvenile suspects concerns all phases of proceedings but is probably greatest during interrogations in the investigation stage. These early interrogations often constitute the juvenile suspects' first contact with law enforcement authorities during which they are confronted with many difficult questions and decisions. Therefore, the juvenile suspect should already at this stage be provided with an adequate level of procedural protection. The research project 'Protecting Young Suspects in Interrogations' underlying this volume, sprung from the observation that the knowledge of the existing level of procedural protection of juvenile suspects throughout the European Union is limited. More specifically, there is very little knowledge of what actually happens when juvenile suspects are being interrogated. The research project aims to fill at least part of this gap by shedding more light on the existing procedural rights for juveniles during interrogations in five EU Member States representing different systems of juvenile justice (Belgium, England and Wales, Italy, Poland and the Netherlands). In doing so, it intends to identify legal and empirical patterns to improve the effective protection of the juvenile suspect. The project is a joint effort of Maastricht University, Warwick University, Antwerp University, Jagiellonian University and Macerata University in cooperation with Defence for Children and PLOT Limburg.The present volume contains the results of the first part of the research project: a legal comparative study into existing legal procedural safeguards for juvenile suspects during interrogation in the five selected Member States. The country reports incorporated in this volume provide for an in-depth analysis of the existing rules and safeguards applicable during the interrogation of juvenile suspects. On the basis of these findings a transversal analysis is carried out in the final chapter, which is dedicated to the identification of common patterns with a view to harmonising the systems and improving the protection of juvenile suspects' rights. Part 2 and 3 of the research project (empirical research consisting of observations of recorded interrogations and focus group interviews) and a final merging of the legal and empirical findings resulting in a proposal for European minimum rules and best practice on the protection of juvenile suspects during interrogation will be published in a separate, second volume ('Interrogating Young Suspects: Procedural Safeguards from an Empirical Perspective').The book is intended for academics, researchers, practitioners and policy-makers working in the area of juvenile justice and interrogation.

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Michele Panzavolta is Associate Professor of Criminal Law at the University of Leuven (Belgium) and part-time Assistant Professor at the University of Maastricht (the Netherlands), where he was a Marie-Curie Fellow for a research on intelligence. He graduated from the University of Bologna (Italy) and obtained his doctorate at the University of Urbino (Italy). He was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Bologna and a visiting scholar at the University of Cambridge. He is a qualified attorney at the Bar of Bologna and has experience as a practicing criminal lawyer in Italy. He specialises in European and international criminal law and in comparative studies on criminal law and procedure. Besides juvenile criminal justice, his research interests are in intelligence-related topics (surveillance, intelligence analysis, relationship between police and judicial bodies and intelligence services, cybercrime, et cetera), financial crime and asset recovery and, more generally, the protection of individual rights in criminal matters. Marc van Oosterhout holds two degrees in law (criminal law and forensics) from Maastricht University (the Netherlands). His main research interests are in the fields of (European) criminal procedure and fundamental (suspects') rights, police proceedings and interrogation. During the course of this research project, he was a researcher at the Department of Criminal Law and Criminology at Maastricht University. Before that he had been appointed as a researcher and tutor at the same institution. Earlier he was involved in another European project studying rights of suspects in police detention during which he conducted fieldwork in the Netherlands and Scotland. Besides empirical research, he was involved in the daily operational tasks that are required in large-scale research projects. Due to his research and operational skills, Marc has conducted legal and empirical research in the Netherlands and Belgium and is part of the project management team. He has also been responsible for social media (project website, LinkedIn and Twitter account) during the project. At present, he is a project manager at AMBER Alert Netherlands where he is responsible for further local embedding of AMBER Alert, organizing and analysing an EU regional police cooperation pilot and various other projects. Miet Vanderhallen holds a degree in criminology and a PhD from KU Leuven. Since 2008 Miet has been appointed as assistant professor at Maastricht University, dept. Criminal law and Criminology, teaching in various criminological courses. Besides, she is appointed as a professor at Antwerp University, faculty of Law, where she teaches psychology and law courses.

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