Richard Rogers - Conducting Miranda Evaluations: Applications of Psychological Expertise and Science within the Forensic Context

Forensic mental health services do not occur in a vacuum. Instead, they should be conceptualized as an often complex system that interfaces law, criminal justice, and specialties of forensic psychology and psychiatry .

When we conduct clinical evaluations or psychotherapy, be it in a hospital, in a school, or in the privacy of our own offices, wein collaboration with our patients/clientsare the professionals running the show. Stated in simple terms, we find out what may be wrong, and we try to make it better. Yes, there are laws that shape what we do and how we should do it. Ethical codes (e.g., American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law ) provide mandatory standards for professional comportment . Guild-driven guidelines set aspirational goals we wish we could always attain. As long as we keep it within the navigational beacons, how we succeed is left up to us.

Forensic mental health services are about solving other professionals referral issues , generally on terms they devise, concerning issues they find important, consistent with their own behavioral assumptions. As mental health professionals who function in the legal arena, we still obey the law, adhere to our ethical codes, and pursue our guidelines. While it is true that we have been afforded considerable freedom in how we perform our forensic duties, if we fail to discern and deliver what the criminal justice system thinks it needs from us, we are literally wasting their time and ours.

Fortunately, figuring out the expectations of other professionals is a rational and intuitive process for which we are uniquely skilled, given our clinical expertise. Moreover, we do not have to look far to find our data set. As it turns out, the criminal justice system has found a way to share this information in a direct fashion information for centuries : the appellate decision. In these written opinions, senior judges settle interpretive disputes about all manner of legal issues. They take great pains to explain their reasoning, overtly communicating both their objectives and their assumptions so that trial judgesand we as forensic practitionersmay get it right in future cases.

The vast, intricate realm of Miranda jurisprudence burst into public consciousness with a high-profile and controversial appellate decision over half a century ago, drawing from several decades worth of prior opinions and spawning a series of consequential new rulings that debut periodically to the present day. What has endured throughout all of these appellate decisions, essentially unscathed, is the fundamental notion that when law enforcement professionals take someone into custody, certain warnings must be provided if they want to use that persons statements as evidence. Is it really that simple? The Supreme Court of the United States (the Court) has been telling us so for a long time now, but apparently legal and mental health professionals alike are still not getting it right.