To tell you never to accept a caution?

[brasty]

Or at least not without legal advice.

The police often offer cautions in cases where they know there is not enough evidence to secure a conviction. So if you refuse a caution in these cases, the case will simply be dropped. The caution is offered so that the police can officially say the crime has been cleared and dealt with. But many people accept cautions when they are innocent, because of fear of going to court.

Just because it hasn't happened to you Glossy doesn't mean that being law abiding is a guarantee you'll never have any of those things happen. Duh.

I have had cause to intervene when vulnerable young people I work with have accepted cautions, in circumstances when they should not have been charged.

Once the boy didn’t even have adequate English and had no idea what he had signed.

With pro bono legal advice, two have been removed / overturned, but it is very hard.

People do not realise that a Caution is a conviction, and will show up on your DBS.

You've got to kind of admire MN as being not just a nest of vipers, but as a nest of the offensively naive. It's like history never happened. Only the bubble exists. The AIBU Matrix.

glossy well there is white privilege for you !

I grew up in the era of Section 44 of the anti-terrorism act (2001–2010), which meant that any police officer could stop and search anyone or any vehicle within a specific area for no specific reason.

The statistics showed that black people and Asians were between five and seven times more likely to be stopped under section 44 than white people. Yet of the many thousands of people stopped under this power, not one was subsequently convicted of a terrorism offence.

The act was thankfully repealed in 2010, but it's a good example of how the system can sometimes work against perfectly innocent people (and still does today, in myriad other ways).

As a young adult I was stopped by the police twice for walking down a road.

Just walking down a road.

If you are white and drive a newish car, you may never be pulled over

Try being black and driving a newish car!

I have both administered cautions and advised on whether to accept one. Advice from a duty solicitor should be sought to ensure that you are actually guilty of the charge they are alleging; and the police have sufficient evidence to warrant offering a caution.

Too many people are told or given the impression by police that the duty solicitor will take many hours but accepting a caution will allow them to leave the police station quickly. Given the lifelong consequences I don't think a caution should be given without first independent legal advice being provided. About one third of jobs are now covered by enhanced DBS checks and there is no limitation period.

One man I know was seriously assaulted and racially abused. He and the perpetrator were arrested. He did get a solicitor and refused a caution offered. The PC had lied (inexplicably) to his supervisor about what the bystanders had witnessed; so was treated as an offender rather than the victim. The police officer was later disciplined for gross misconduct. It happens-though thankfully rarely

I was once pulled over for having a brake light out AnUtterIdiot. Guess what, I thanked them, got it fixed and got on with my life. I was not offered a caution at any stage.

gin- to be honest, no I don't. However, I would question why an innocent person would accept a caution knowing full well that they were innocent.
It's an extremely common tactic, and when a person is trying to deal with what has happened to them, what is happening to their family and has been ground down by years of emotional and/or physical abuse, they're not always in a place where they can say no. They've frequently been 'trained' to follow the path of least resistance, so will accept a caution as perceived easier alternative than having to deal with an abusive ex in court.
You're lucky, that's all, yes you follow the law, but so do many others who have been cautioned despite innocence. Plain and simple luck.

cool - does being black mean that you will be automatically be stopped by the police? Are there any serving police officers here? Is this what you do? Wow just wow. How offensive is that?

I know I should be used to it by now but every time one of these threads starts I am utterly horrified by the number of apparently intelligent and well-educated people who genuinely think that because something's never happened to them personally it can't possibly happen to anyone at all.

It's unbelievable at times isn't it.

Absolutely AnUtter, see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.

Hurray for white privilege though - they politely told me that my light was out and sent me on my way with words of advice. If I'd been a 19 year old black man instead of a 41 year old white woman with a posh accent they'd have used it as an excuse to search my car.

Yeah of course....

Yeah user, that never happens, you've seen everything and you can categorically deny that that has ever happened. How very offensive to suggest it has, or even that it is borne out by stop and search statistics.

How offensive is that?

Pretty damn offensive, yes. And certainly not uncommon.

I think that the people dividing everything up into “criminal behaviour” and “innocent behaviour” are a bit naive. Some crimes are very fuzzy at the edges. Negligent criminal damage for example is an incredibly soft crime - anyone who’s ever overloaded a tray in a museum cafe or attempted to carry one drink more than is entirely sensible in a pub is one stumble away from criminal behaviour. What prevents us all from being put behind bars is the fact that the CPS wouldn’t touch such a case with a barge pole both because they have procedures in place to ensure prosecution is in the public interest and because it’s not worth the effort for them.

A lone police officer otoh with a different set of incentives might make a different call. (Although it may be that the bar and procedures for cautions has been raised - I see vicar is on the thread and could advise).

In particular there is no hard and fast definition of what constitutes child neglect, and as we know from a million AIBU threads, people’s opinions can vary widely. The police officer who encounters the scene may be unusually judgemental in response to a slightly iffy situation and suggest a caution for something that would never reach court in a million years.
Caution for neglect where a 14 year old was left in charge of a 3 year old for 30 minutes. Wasn’t there a thread a while ago where a mother accepted a caution for letting her toddler run ahead of her on the pavement without understanding that it meant she’d never be able to work in childcare ever again?

AnUtterIdiot- Fair enough. So, are you telling me that the police will often stop certain people for having a brake light out (your example)and give them a caution rather than words of advice? I have never heard of anyone getting a caution for having a brake light out. To any serving police officers, is this correct?