Published on 12, July, 2020
just want to know how does legal justice deal with someone with autism. say someone with autism had commited a crime because they were very traumatised and depressed. will they still get send to prison or will there be other treatment for them?
Autistic Adrian said:just want to know how does legal justice deal with someone with autism. say someone with autism had commited a crime because they were very traumatised and depressed. will they still get send to prison or will there be other treatment for them?
Refer to the following:
All criminal justice professionals may come into contact with people on the autism spectrum, many of whom may be undiagnosed or misdiagnosed. Here you will find information about autistic people, tips for initial police contact, interviews and court appearances, ways that parents and carers can help, and where to find further information and training.
Autistic people are more likely to be victims and witnesses of crime than offenders. They experience difficulties with social communication, social interaction and social imagination. They may have sensory difficulties and some coordination problems. Their behaviour may appear odd and can sometimes draw unnecessary attention, but in general autism is a hidden disability and it may not be immediately obvious to other people that the person has a disability.
When autistic people commit offences, it may be for the following reasons.
Initial police contact can exacerbate a difficult situation. The use of handcuffs and restraint may be extremely frightening for someone who does not understand what is happening and may not be able to communicate their fears in an appropriate way. This, coupled with the use of loud sirens, may result in sensory overload, causing the person to try to run away or hit out at people, including the police. The very presence of the police may cause great anxiety to a law-abiding autistic person who has no comprehension of the crime they may have committed.
An autistic person has the right to an appropriate adult.
If the person refuses a solicitor, it may be because they do not understand their role and will feel even more confused when another stranger becomes involved.
When the custody officer asks the person whether they have a disability, most autistic people will say no because the question it is not specific enough.
If the custody officer suspects that the person may have a disability, and contacts the Force Medical Officer, be aware that they may have only limited autism knowledge, and may not recognise that someone has the condition. This could also be true of any social worker who is called. We would advise that a specialist in the field of autism, such as a clinical psychologist or psychiatrist, be contacted.
Due to the difficulties autistic people have with communication and social interaction, a police interview can be extremely difficult. The person may appear very able, with a good or even exceptional vocabulary, and there may be no reason for an interviewing police officer to suspect that the interviewee requires additional help.
However, the officer may later find they receive blunt answers, the subject is changed and the individual is reluctant to make direct eye contact. The literal way in which a person on the autism spectrum might interpret language can lead to them giving incorrect answers or becoming anxious.
All these things contribute to an assumption of guilt. Indeed, some of the interrogation techniques used by interviewers could inadvertently elicit false confessions from an autistic person.
Here are some suggestions for interviewing autistic people to help elicit the correct response.
The person may need frequent breaks. Explain clearly that he or she is going to have a break for a specified amount of time and what will happen next. Signs that they are becoming anxious and in need of a break may include repetitive speech, hand-flapping or other repetitive movements, self-injury such as hand biting, shouting or physical behaviour.
If the solicitor recognises that their client has autism or a mental health condition, they might ask to delay proceedings until a psychiatric report can be obtained. In the International Classification of Diseases, autism comes under the heading of 'Mental and behavioural disorders', and under the sub-group of 'Disorders of psychological development'. This offers the magistrate the option to proceed under mental health rather than criminal legislation.
A defendant on the autism spectrum should be assessed for their capacity to understand the proceedings. Some autistic people are unfit to plead in court. The judge or jury can decide on a person's fitness to plead and can draw on as many psychiatric reports as necessary in order to do this.
It is essential to have a report from a specialist in the autism field. Details of a small number of specialists able to act in court cases are available from our Autism Helpline. Sometimes it is easier to obtain a specialist medical report after obtaining medical reports from the person's GP. In some cases, a court may make a hospital order for 28 days for assessment. This will usually be at the local psychiatric unit, where there may not necessarily be an autism specialist.
Witnesses who are on the autism spectrum may need special measures and/or a Registered Intermediary who can help the judge and the lawyers to phrase their questions in a way that the person will understand. At the discretion of the judge, these things can also be put in place for a vulnerable defendant.
Police or the Crown Prosecution Service can request a Registered Intermediary through the Witness Intermediary Scheme by contacting the National Crime Agency Specialist Operations Centre (SOC) at soc@nca.x.gsi.gov.uk or on 0845 000 5463. This is for criminal cases only, and SOC can only take requests from the police or CPS, not from individuals.
https://www.autism.org.uk/professionals/others/criminal-justice.aspx
say if an autistic person got bullied physically and he got a temper tantrum and push the bully back and run away, how would it be dealt with if a police got involved?
Autistic Adrian said:say if an autistic person got bullied physically and he got a temper tantrum and push the bully back and run away, how would it be dealt with if a police got involved?
Well at bare minimum recalling that two wrongs do not make a right, and providing no one is actually hurt, cautions would be given to both people involved with the non autistic person getting the more severe cautioning.
If the non-autistic person that started the bullying came to some serious harm though, such as having fallen over due to being pushed and having as a result broken a bone or even died, then the autistic person would be charged and sentenced accordingly if premeditated or not, but if there was 'premeditation' (a plan to retaliate) the charge and sentencing will be more severe.
Autistic Adrian said:base on this quote "Well autism is not a free pass for 'anything' in that it it requires 'special' or 'particular' consideration regarding 'social interaction and communication difficulties', ", then that's even a big torture to them. why do they need to be slaved to be interacting like other. why cant they interact the way they interact with other. autism should be another world for them to be comfortable. well i take autism as a freepass on anything as long as everyone is safe.
Unfortunately you have misquoted and misunderstood me ~ being that I stated:
Deepthought said:Well autism is not a free pass for 'anything' in that it it requires 'special' or 'particular' consideration regarding 'social interaction, imagination and communication difficulties', and of course 'overindulging' in anything is problematic as every behavior or activity requires to be moderated in a reasonable law abiding way.
Meaning that it is not an even greater ‘torture’ for you or anyone else with autism, but that more ‘consideration’ is required from non-autistic people about autistic people’s social interaction, communication and imagination difficulties ~ as according to the 2010 Equality Act involving reasonable adjustments.
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Being that autistic people’s emotional development can tend to be about half that of their mental and physical age, it may be that your emotional and mental development is in part being well done by way of playing Disney and fairytale games as you do with those younger children ~ providing of course their parents continue to approve as responsible adults that watch over you too.
Responsible adult / parental observation is important in this respect given that although you are coming to the end of your teenage years physically ~ you are perhaps just starting to become a teenager mentally and emotionally.
As such then your parents and therapist and other parents have to be aware of this ~ given that most people start having sexual drives during their teenage years, and this is so for most whether they are late developers or not. Hence your therapist is working with you to help you engage with people who are of a similar physical age ~ in order to allow for such developments to occur if they are going to, and in order to prevent you from getting into possibly very serious difficulties if they occur with children who are not then sixteen.
This way of doing things is a natural order of society that everybody must live with and must follow as a essential routine. Just because you may never get into problems with the law regarding interactions with children involving your special interests in Disney characters and fairytale themed games, people cannot get used to letting their guard down because you are lovely and mean no harm whatsoever. There are too many people who accidentally get involved with or purposefully take advantage of vulnerable children and adults, and your safety as much as everyone else’s is really, really important. Keep this very much in mind ~ your safety is as much important as anyone else’s.
Perhaps then discuss with your therapist that it is reasonable that you share your special interest with children when their parents permit you do so, and in terms of having interactions with people that are of a similar age to yourself and in fact much older ~ you are doing so here, which at very least should be reasonable to your therapist and worth as such you being congratulated upon.
It should though in my opinion be considered unreasonable to entirely stop you from interacting with children who enjoy your imaginative company and whose parents appreciate it also, so maybe as such check that you have not misunderstood the request made of you by your therapist, and clarify that what she has asked of your involves that you need to have and develop more mature friendships as a balance also ~ as time goes on little by little and bit by bit. It is unreasonable to ask you to just stop living your life as you have been, and yet more unreasonable to expect you to start living a life that you are not yet ready for.
It might help for instance if you ask your therapist to write out for you what the treatment plan for you actually is; so that you may better understand it, and if she is discriminating against you unawares ~ you can seek further guidance from the NAS or any other Autistic advisory service, or else even get in touch with an advocacy service to act on your behalf to help your therapist to help you more, or to find one better suited to helping you.
base on this quote "Well autism is not a free pass for 'anything' in that it it requires 'special' or 'particular' consideration regarding 'social interaction and communication difficulties', ", then that's even a big torture to them. why do they need to be slaved to be interacting like other. why cant they interact the way they interact with other. autism should be another world for them to be comfortable. well i take autism as a freepass on anything as long as everyone is safe.