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INFORMATION ABOUT CHILD, YOUNG AND VULNERABLE ADULT WITNESSES TO INFORM DECISION-MAKING IN THE LEGAL PROCESS GOOD PRACTICE GUIDANCE
CONTEXT OF THE INFORMATION
7 The police will often be the first point of contact with a child, young person or vulnerable adult victim or witness. This provides a key opportunity to capture and forward, at the earliest stage, information about the child, young or vulnerable adult witness. Procurators fiscal and children's reporters find this information invaluable in helping them to make decisions about a case and preparing those witnesses for court, and this will become even more essential with the need to identify child, young and vulnerable adult witnesses for the provision of special measures in court under the provisions of the Vulnerable Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2004.
8 However, it should be stressed that it is not the role of the police to assess whether a witness is vulnerable or not but, where possible, to record their observations of a witness in a way which could alert others to the need to make a proper assessment of vulnerability. The information is, therefore, not a substitute for a more in depth assessment of a child, young person or vulnerable adult's needs as a witness or in relation to any other needs that the child, young person or vulnerable adult may have. It is not intended to be a full assessment or to capture all the information required, but to capture some preliminary information, if readily available, as a matter of good practice. This is similar to information which is currently routinely collected on young offenders or accused under the age of 16.
9 The information must be about a child, young or vulnerable adult witness and directly related to the child's, young person's or vulnerable adult's role as a witness.
10 The information should consist of observations and key facts that an interviewer or questioner of the child, young person or vulnerable adult as a witness should be aware of and would indicate a need to put measures in place or take action.
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