When police apprehend one offender of a group offence, this person must assist the police in finding the others. Aboriginal people are likely to have low literacy and numeracy skills and a limited understanding of English. They may have significant linguistic and social disadvantages, including gratuitous concurrence, which means that they will say “yes” or appear to agree with a proposition when they have no understanding of what has
been said, or they will remain silent. In Silence, joint enterprise and the legal trap, Hulley and
Young describe how the so-called wall of silence put up by peers in joint enterprise presents a threat to successful police investigations and criminal trials.
Street narratives include distrust in the police and a no-snitching culture. Drawing on a study of severe multi-handed violence and joint enterprise as a legal response, this article highlights the role of the law and law enforcement in generating silence among young suspects whose primary concern is the legal risks of talking and the protection of their peers. These young people face a dangerous trap, as their silence can be interpreted as guilt. The article concludes that to avoid overcharging, structural change is needed. The system must reverse the legal rules regarding silence and reform the law on secondary liability to reduce the legal risks of talking.
Gratuitous concurrence, the tendency to say ‘yes’ to any question or ‘no’ to any negative question regardless of whether the person agrees with the question or even understands it, is a characteristic Aboriginal strategy or dealing with interviews, particularly in situations of
serious power imbalance, according to D. Eades in Cross-examination of Aboriginal children: The Pinkenba case, and may result in false confessions.
Image: Sound on Sound
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