Aspies For Freedom

People involved in the administration of criminal justice must raise their awareness of autism and Asperger syndrome, a leading charity says.

Research by the National Autistic Society (NAS) shows that over 90% of police and solicitors have no training to help them to understand autism.

The result is that those who have the disability are often misunderstood.

The NAS is launching a campaign so that people with autism receive proper support from justice professionals.

It is estimated that more than half a million people in the UK have autism - a complex, lifelong disability that affects a person's ability to communicate and make sense of the world around them.

Lack of training

According to the NAS research, almost 80% of solicitors and more than 90% of police officers do not think that the legal profession has a high enough level of understanding of autism.

Over half of both groups thought that lack of training and resources were the main problem, and three-quarters of police officers felt that lack of training time also contributed.

"Through my work with families, I have experienced the deep impact that autism has on both the individual and the family unit as a whole," said Philip Moor QC, chairman of the Family Law Bar Association.

"It is important that barristers and the courts - as well as other criminal justice professionals - are informed of the condition in order that misunderstandings do not occur."

Howard Leftley - a solicitor who has considerable experience of representing clients with autism - says the problem arises where someone only has low level symptoms of autism or Asperger syndrome.

"In one case, a client was arrested more than 60 times in 12 months for offences that she did not commit," he said.

"She was an individual with Asperger's syndrome and the confusion over her actions arose from a lack of awareness about the condition."

Another of Mr Leftley's clients - a man in his thirties - was wrongly convicted of sexual offences against a young child after the man broke up a fight in a park.

Alert card

He was not represented by a solicitor when interviewed by police, and confirmed that he had helped the boy to rearrange his clothing following the fight.

This was what had led to the misunderstanding and subsequent conviction.

Photo of an Autism Alert card
A new card may help those with communication difficulties

"People like this can't conduct themselves well in the witness box and the jury tend to form a bad impression of them, especially because they don't make eye contact," said Mr Leftley.

"Those at the sharp end need much more training - lawyers included."

The NAS has recently produced a card that anyone with autism can carry in order to explain their condition.

The Autism Alert card was designed to help people to identify their needs in situations where they find communication difficult.

And the organisation has produced a information pack for criminal justice professionals which it hopes will improve their understanding of autism.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4354086.stm

"People like this can't conduct themselves well in the witness box and the jury tend to form a bad impression of them, especially because they don't make eye contact," said Mr Leftley."

I am also afraid that if someone found out my problems with face recognition that any "eye witness" account could be thrown out.  That would mean that if someone assaulted me and they came to court wearing different clothes and different haircut -  I might be accused of not being able to identify the assailent without resonable doubt.  

If people knew that they could trick me and rob me and get away with it, then they would.  I need to be protected.

The issue of prosopagnosia could certainly be held against us if we were the victim of a crime and had to identify the person, or if we witnessed a crime.

I could imagine the defence picking on the prosopagnosia issue to try and show that facial idenfication could be severely impaired.

Sounds like a great start. Hopefully something will come of that and hopefully we'll also see similar rises in awareness over AS and HFA in the employment/HR world as well. When I read this, I getting the impression that a lot could change for us for the better by 2010 or so.

We should make sure ppl know that not all autistics have prosopagnosia. I can remember most faces quite well - at least I know if I have seen somebody before or not and most times I can figure out where it was. My problem is remembering names that belong to faces and remembering names in general.

The training for police and justice is a good thing - when reading the book about the "dog incident" (don't know the correct english title) I thought that it's stupid that policemen and others aren't trained to treat people with something they call desease correctly! And it's not only aspergers/autism, it's shizophrenia and depressions and all that stuff as well.

Sibylle

I think I was quite 'lucky' in a way, in that when I was assaulted recently, the young lad who punched me was mixed race, but his skin was a lot, lot, paler than all the rest of the kids, they were more 'black' than mixed race looking, so he was very distinguishable by skin tone.  He was also a lot shorter and fatter than the others.  

There were perhaps around half a dozen or so other young lads who were all a similar darker shade, similar build, and more similar height.  I think I would have struggled to identify my assailant had he been one of the others.

What a distressing thing to happen, did they have a motive, mugging?
Did the police manage to do anything about it?

I tend to focus in on certain details about a person.  I might remember what colour their hair was or what they were wearing but not too many details all put together.