Netherlands Police Academy students practice together with mentally disabled target group

During a police interview, it is vital that the facts and details of a crime become clear. So what if the witness is a child or a mentally disabled person? This would pose a challenge to the interviewer. This is why a group of interviewing skills students of the Police Academy meet up with a group of Spelderholt Academy students at Parc Spelderholt in Beekbergen (NL), where they practice talking with a vulnerable target group. The collaboration dates back to 2012 and is still very valuable for both parties.

‘Welcome to Parc Spelderholt.’ Two young men in blue shirts and beige aprons receive us at the hotel entrance. They take us to a room where coffee and tea and six more young people await us. These young people have mild mental disabilities, such as Down syndrome, autism or Williams-Beuren syndrome.

The eighty students of Spelderholt Academy live, work, and study at the Parc. They are participating in a four-year development course to increase their independence and self-sufficiency. The students have another thing in common: they are all slightly anxious about the police coming to visit them.

Interviewing in a child-friendly studio

‘The Police Academy students feel the tension too,’ knows lecturer Imke Rispens. ‘Not everyone has an equal degree of experience with this target group. They don’t know the young people, don’t know exactly what level of development they have/what their level of development is, and whether they will manage to strike up a conversation. The disability may cause unexpected responses, which could be quite complicated for the students conducting the interview.’ Rispens is investigations psychologist and lecturer for the special interviewing courses of the Police Academy. Her and her colleague José Coenraads’ students are taking the “Interviewing vulnerable witnesses in vice cases” course (in Dutch). After their training, they start work as studio interviewers.

‘The interviews that the students will conduct as part of their everyday practice will all take place in a child-friendly studio’, Rispens continues. ‘This is a separate room at a police station with coloured walls, photo wallpaper, colouring pages and games. Sometimes, a witness needs some time to get used to the interviewer to be able to talk freely about the (alleged) offence. In the meantime, they can colour a picture together or play a game. Or they can choose to conduct the entire interview while colouring pictures. This often enables a child to keep going for a longer time, as such interviews last an hour and a half on average, which may otherwise exhaust its concentration.’

‘About ninety percent of the interviews conducted in child-friendly studios involve vice cases,’ Rispens explains. ‘The students already work as vice investigators and follow this training as a specialization that enables them to interview vulnerable witnesses, such as children between four and twelve years old and adults with a mental disability or, for instance, autism or ADHD. In addition, elderly people with brain damage or brain diseases may also be vulnerable in an interview situation.’

Five conversation instructions for interviewing vulnerable witnesses

During their training, Police Academy students have already gotten acquainted with the five “conversation instructions”. Rispens: ‘These are conversation rules the interviewer informs the vulnerable witness about. One of these is: if I ask a question that you don’t know the answer to, just say that you don’t know. We always practice this to check whether the witness really follows the instruction. For instance by asking: do you know in what year your teacher was born? In most cases, the answer will be no, I don’t know. You then explain that they could not know this and that you yourself do not know the answer either. This gives them the confidence to be honest about it if they don’t know an answer during the interview. And it lowers the threshold for actually saying so.’

During their training, students were also taught to ask simple, brief and concrete questions. With this knowledge and skills, they go to Parc Spelderholt to get acquainted with the target group. ‘One of the students’ practical exercises is to question someone in detail about a recent event to find out step by step what happened, almost like constructing video footage. This is what they will have to do during real interviews. In the one-on-one conversations with the young people they will experience which questions work and which ones don’t,’ Rispens explains.

‘Why don’t you just tell me all about it’

The Parc Lounge of Parc Spelderholt is filled with friendly conversation. At one of the tables sits Tygo, a Spelderholt Academy student. Interviewing student Lenny sits across from him. ‘I don’t know exactly how it works here, so you’ll have to tell me. I don’t find anything strange or weird. And if I ask you something later that you don’t know the answer to, just say so. Also tell me if I use a difficult word,’ Lenny starts the conversation. Tygo is good at spelling, so according to him everything will be all right. He likes to receive guests at Parc Spelderholt and show them around, which he did recently. ‘Why don’t you just tell me all about it,’ Lenny says.

Tygo effortlessly talks about his work and music, his favourite hobby. He also indicates things that he would rather not talk about and offers Lenny a glimpse into his way of thinking. ‘If I start something new, I often feel mega tense, but then I think: simply keep on breathing and then I’ll get there. In the end, things often turn out not to be so difficult.’

Diverse target group with major differences

During the conversation, a student of the Police Academy and a student of Spelderholt Academy are listening in. After the first 30-minute round, all couples conclude the conversation. The Spelderholt Academy students and their trainee counsellor go to another room to discuss how they felt about the interview. The Police Academy students also discuss what stood out, what went well, what did not work, and what questions were too difficult.

Lenny had difficulty assessing Tygo’s level, because he had no trouble understanding many of her questions. So to what extent does he know what he is saying? Or is he, for instance, using language he borrowed from his parents? Contrary to this, another interview student was faced with a very shy and barely audible conversation partner. ‘All these young people are mentally disabled, but it is a diverse target group with major differences. It is a good thing that our students experience this during the exercise,’ according to Rispens.

‘In general, this target group is sensitive to compliance. They tend to display socially desirable behaviour and avoid conflict with someone in authority, in this case the interviewer. This is why careful questioning is required. Another challenge is that many types of questions are too complicated. Questions about frequency, dates, and times are difficult, and general and abstract ‘how questions’ may not be understood. Often their stories jump from one subject to another. It is a challenge to extract detailed information, because they often move away from the subject and associate. This is why I teach students to repeat a fragment or word to keep the attention focused on the story. We call this “continuing the slide show”.

Added value for both parties

The feedback Lenny received from Tygo was that she made him feel safe during the interview. He was happy that she allowed him to indicate his boundaries. Indicating boundaries is one of the learning objectives for some Spelderholt Academy students. Collaboration with added value for both parties, both Rispens and Spelderholt’s trainee counsellor feel. ‘For our young people this is useful practical training in receiving guests. They are also challenged by the interaction with strangers,’ the trainee counsellor adds.

According to Rispens, the origin of this collaboration dates back to 2012. ‘At the time, I had just completed a training course in Wales, together with a former colleague. This course involved interviewing children and vulnerable witnesses. As part of this course, we went to an institution to practice with mentally disabled persons to find out about any characteristics and how to recognize them. We also learned about potential pitfalls. All these things can be trained with the aid of actors, which we do too. But gaining practical experience by talking with mentally disabled people provides added value. This is how we came up with the idea here.’

‘We then contacted Parc Spelderholt in Beekbergen. They immediately spotted the benefits of collaboration, as the students learn from one another during their conversations. In addition, Spelderholt Academy students also learn how to receive guests. So it is a win-win situation.’