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This paper examines police compliance with the law on pre-charge bail and Release Under Investigation (RUI) in England and Wales. Empirical data from two studies is explored to understand how police decisions reacted to two legal changes in quick succession, which had diametrically opposed aims. Pre-charge bail and RUI were used in proportions that responded to changes in the legal architecture. How and when the police used these options, and how police officers justified their actions, are examined through the lens of compliance theories and techniques of neutralisation, neither of which have been used previously in this context. Evidence of normative compliance, capitulation, creative compliance and game-playing was uncovered as responses to legal change. Changes to the law were also met with defiance resulting in police decision-making continuing unchanged. Police decisions were explained with reference to legal, cultural and instrumental factors and techniques of neutralisation, particularly high workloads, were deployed by the police to rationalise their decisions. The paper also demonstrates the dynamic nature of officers’ compliance, emphasising how focusing exclusively on decisions made in the heavily regulated environment of police custody obscures understanding of the interplay between law and police practice.
Anthea Hucklesby (Tue,) studied this question.