About

Dr Vicky Kemp is an experienced researcher working on projects relating to youth justice, criminal legal aid and access to justice in the criminal process. Having received her doctorate from the Institute of Criminology, University of Cambridge, she is now Principal Research Fellow at the University of Nottingham, in the School of Law.

Vicky has experience of the criminal justice system as a paralegal, legal aid policy adviser and as a government social scientist. With her expertise in criminal legal aid, she was a member of the Lord Chancellor’s Expert and Advisory Panel on the Criminal Legal Aid Review. In conducting empirical research, she adopts an interdisciplinary approach and seeks to have an impact by engaging with policy makers, practitioners and academics. This is not only when trying to improve efficiencies and to achieve cost savings but also to enhance procedural safeguards.

Having examined the impact of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 on the detention and questioning of child suspects (see project report), she is currently working with Dr Miranda Bevan and Dr Hope Kent on a Nuffield funded study to pilot ‘Child First‘ approaches in police custody. The research includes engaging with children about their legal rights while held in police detention, research interviews with practitioners when dealing with children, examining recorded police interviews and analysis of electronic custody records. Overseeing the important ethical issues arising is a Research Advisory Group, chaired by Professor Loraine Gelsthorpe, Director of the Institute of Criminology, University of Cambridge, and comprising senior academics who have experience of dealing with children and vulnerable people in the criminal process. There is also a Steering Group, chaired by Lord Carlile KC, and comprising national policy makers and practitioners involved with young suspects in the criminal justice system.

As part of Vicky’s research with children, together with Dr Miranda Bevan, she has created a series of short animations that help explain what happens when children are interviewed by the police as a suspect – including when detained for questioning in police custody and when asked to attend a voluntary interview. Launched at the 5th World Congress on See her Know my Rights website for access to these animations created to help inform children what happens when interviewed by the police.