ABSTRACT
Police the world over collect evidence through interviews with suspects, sometimes audio-recorded, often not. If a decision is later taken to prosecute, (some of) this verbal evidence is later presented in Court. To paraphrase Orwell ‘who controls the interview record and how it is used, controls the evidence’. In this chapter I will look at the different ways in which police forces across the world record ‘what was said’, how the evidence can be unintentionally and intentionally modified, and how courts use and at times misuse the evidence. Following this analysis, I will end the chapter with recommendations for best practice.
