Asked to a police interview
The police want to interview you: what to do first
If the police have asked you to attend an interview about your clinical work, call us on 07356 071 193 before you agree a date or say anything. A voluntary interview is still an interview under caution, and the GMC case will follow it.
Today
What to do, and what not to do
Do
- Call us as soon as the police make contact, and tell us any interview date in your first message.
- Take free and independent legal advice before the interview, with a solicitor present in the room.
- Remember that a voluntary interview is still an interview under caution, and the police record every word.
- Keep the records connected with the events safe and unaltered.
Do not
- Give an informal account to an officer by telephone or at work.
- Attend an interview without advice.
- Contact the patient, the family or colleagues who are likely to be witnesses about the events.
- Add to or amend the clinical record.
- Discuss the case in messaging groups, because private messages may become public.
What happens next
Disclosure, the interview and the GMC
Before the interview your representative asks the police what they will disclose about the allegation. Whether you answer questions, hand in a prepared statement or decline to comment is a decision you make with your representative after that disclosure. Our guide to the police interview under caution explains the caution, disclosure and the role of your lawyer in the room.
The GMC case often runs alongside. Good medical practice requires you to tell the GMC without delay if you accept a caution, are charged or are found guilty of a criminal offence. An interview on its own is not on that list, but assume the GMC will read your interview one day. Our guide to what you must tell the GMC covers that duty.
After the interview, if the police are considering a charge, written representations can set out why a prosecution should not follow.
How we help
One strategy for the police and the GMC
Eloquia is not a law firm. Our criminal defence partner firm represents you at the police station, and we run the regulatory side alongside it so that one strategy covers both cases. Police interview and pre charge representations cost a fixed £15,000 plus VAT, which includes a specialist barrister from the outset.
See police interviews and criminal allegations for how we run the two cases together, and fees and funding for the full menu.
Every fee is stated plus VAT and includes a specialist barrister, whom we involve from the outset to give you additional support and advice. Fees do not include additional expenses such as expert fees, which we quote separately. The police interview and pre charge fee is the criminal defence partner firm's fee for its own work. It is agreed with that firm and paid to it, and Eloquia takes no share of it and pays nothing for the introduction.
Read more
Guides on this subject
Police and criminal
When the complainant is a colleague or employee
How a complaint from a colleague can run through your employer, the GMC and an employment tribunal at once.
Police and criminal
How often do police investigations into doctors end without charge?
How rarely a police investigation of a doctor ends in a charge, and what the published evidence means for you.
Police and criminal
Allegations of a sexual nature by patients
How a patient's allegation of sexual misconduct runs on parallel police and GMC tracks. Why your records decide more of these cases than you expect.
Arrange a confidential conversation
Call 07356 071 193 or email hello@eloquia.co.uk. Your first conversation may be with our AI assistant, which tells you at the start that it is an AI assistant, not a person or a lawyer, and gives no legal advice. It takes your details and a short questionnaire for Saqib Khan, and where we can help we arrange an appointment with him at a time that suits you both. Our privacy notice explains how what you tell us is handled.