Criminalisation of Seafarers
The Requirement to Submit to Questioning vs The Right Against Self-Incrimination
(This article was originally published in the Shipping Australia Limited magazine).
Increasingly, prosecuting authorities are charging individual seafarers as well as vessel Owners in response to marine pollution incidents. It is now almost inevitable that individual seafarers as well as the corporate shipowners will be subjected to criminal investigation and potentially prosecution in response to any marine pollution incident. Where responses given in such investigations are increasingly used in evidence against seafarers in criminal prosecutions, it is alarming to realise that in many cases, potential criminal suspects are interviewed without first being 'read their rights'.
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