Procedural justice as a reward to the compliant: an ethnography of police–citizen interaction in police custody

ABSTRACT

This paper contributes to the literature on Procedural Justice Theory (PJT) by exploring its capacity to explain the dynamic interactions between police and citizens within the context of police detention. Analysis is based on observation and interviews in police custody suites (i.e. locations where arrested citizens are formally processed and held) within one of the larger metropolitan police forces in the UK. The qualitative thematic analysis highlights how, in order to adequately understand police–detainee interactions, it is critical that PJT properly recognises (a) the importance of context for framing ‘procedurally fair’ encounters, (b) the central role and consequences of categorisation, and (c) the role of power in shaping police–citizen encounters. The paper concludes by exploring the implications of this research for assumptions regarding the causal ordering often assumed in the PJT literature. Specifically, we suggest that procedural justice is more than merely a mechanistic route to achieving compliance but can also be conceptualised as a ‘reward’ by the powerful to those already willing to be subordinated and acquiescent.

KEYWORDS:

• Procedural justice
• legitimacy
• custody
• ethnography

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge the valuable discussions and contributions made by Matthew Muscat, Marcus Beale and Katherine Mycock in the development of ideas underpinning this work.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Brown (2020, p. 14) provides a useful description of the functions of custody suites within England and Wales:‘The police detain people in “custody suites”. Most custody suites are situated within large police stations, but some are in dedicated purpose- built buildings. A typical custody suite will consist of several individual cells, separate interview rooms and facilities to “book in” suspects and log relevant information about their arrest and detention’.

2 Other police functions observed included neighbourhood policing and offender management.

3 Liaison and Diversion (L&D) services identify people who have mental health, learning disability, substance misuse or other vulnerabilities when they first come into contact with the criminal justice system as suspects, defendants or offenders (NHS 2021).

4 Though it is important to acknowledge that the right to remain silent is not absolute. As the College of Policing outline (see: https://www.app.college.police.uk/app-content/investigations/investigative-interviewing/): ‘ Suspects have the right to remain silent, but they are warned during the police caution or during special cautions of possible adverse inferences being drawn should they choose to exercise that right. These may be in terms of failure or refusal to account for objects, substances or marks (Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 (CJPOA) sec. 36) or failure or refusal to account for presence at a particular place (CJPOA sec. 37)’.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Economic and Social Research Council, SeNSS Scholarship [Grant Number ES/R011397/1].