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This paper describes the ideas related to forensic practice with people with learning disabilities through a study that explores the apparent ‘truths’ about people with learning disabilities who are detained in forensic settings (referred to here as ‘the men’) and the staff who work with them by an analysis the dialogue contained in retrospective data from interviews and focus groups.The men in these settings are subject to intense stigma and disadvantage; socially and legally. Not only are they categorised as having a learning disability, but also have the added stigma of being offenders, and commonly having mental health issues that expose them to the worst of myths surrounding learning disability; such as the possibility of being viewed as ‘dangerous monsters and sex fiends’ (French & Swain, 2008). Similarly, but to a lesser degree, forensic nurses are stigmatised and subject to strict laws, policies and practices and stereotyped as prison wardens and ‘tough guys’. These ideas may be exposed and challenged through studying the discourses in the dialogue. Therefore, the general research questions included the following.• What are the discourses related to learning disability and forensic practice?• What ideologies underpin and justify forensic practice?This paper is primarily concerned with the way that the staff and the men experience the medium secure unit (MSU) and their views as to the advantages and disadvantages of secure care.The findings generally suggest that the men and the staff are very positive about their lives.They report that the men have many attributes and talents, and view having a learning disability as an advantage at times; the staff enjoy their work and have good relationships with the men. Paradoxically1, there are also negative discourses identified, some of which permeate from macro ideologies into policy and practice to justify the men's treatment in the MSU.The analysis showed that despite the certainty that many feel about the justifications for holding men with learning disabilities in secure settings, many paradoxes exist in the discourses in this setting, which question the validity of official knowledge in this area ‐ this is essentially a Foucauldian idea (Foucault, 1975). Foucault's ideas on the way that knowledge and practice may be challenged are important to this paper.

Rising societal pressures for the Filipino urban poor population – precipitating increased crime – alongside widespread corruption, have led to many children being both lawfully and unlawfully detained in child rehabilitation centres. Far from rehabilitating, detained children live in prisonlike conditions, despite the illegality of child imprisonment in the country. Their human rights disregarded; they suffer from abuse, neglect and a multitude of health issues, with no access to healthcare. This study aims to explore the experiences and perceptions of formerly detained looked-after adolescents and their carers, on the priority health issues and key health determinants of detained Filipino children.

A qualitative study was conducted in June 2019 in a Filipino children’s home for previously detained children. In total, 18 semi-structured interviews, using photo-elicitation, were conducted to retrospectively explore the experiences of formerly detained children and their carers, who were purposively sampled. Data were transcribed and thematically analysed. Ethical approval was granted by the University of Leeds.

Adolescents and carers commonly reported eight key health issues in detained children, namely, most frequently skin disease, mental health issues and malnutrition, then additionally wounds, respiratory disease, dental problems, sexual health issues and gastrointestinal issues. Six determinants of health in detainment centres were identified as follows: hygiene, food, weather, overcrowding, facilities and safeguarding issues.

The illegality and corruption associated with child detention centres mean the situation of detained Filipino children is difficult to assess directly. This study combats this by exploring the experiences of formerly detained children and their carers, to retrospectively assess the health of illegally detained Filipino Children.

The purpose of this paper is to compare learning-disabled (LD) and non-LD offenders in terms of their relating styles and to examine the relationship between relating styles and offence types.

Two groups of male offenders completed the Person’s Relating to Others Questionnaire – Version 3 (PROQ3) and were compared using an independent groups design. An adapted version of the PROQ3 was given to the first group, which consisted of 18 LD offenders detained within a mental health hospital. The second group consisted of 30 offenders detained within a Category B prison in the UK. Offenders were assigned to one of four offence categories (violence, homicide, sexual and robbery) and compared in terms of their PROQ3 scores.

The findings suggest that the sample of LD offenders had increased relating deficits compared to the non-LD offenders. The LD offenders achieved higher scores on four of the eight PROQ3 subscales; Upper Neutral (UN), Upper Close (UC), Neutral Close (NC), Lower Distant, and the total score. Significant differences were found on the UN, NC, Neutral Distant (ND), Upper Distant (UD) subscales and the total score for the robbery offenders compared to the other offence categories. Violent offenders achieved higher scores on the UC and Lower Distant subscales.

The need for research to focus on evaluating the treatment needs of lower functioning offenders in order to aid the development of LD-specific interventions. The need to evaluate the appropriateness of adapting mainstream offence focussed programmes for the LD population, given that there are potentially different treatment needs between these two distinct groups.

The results indicate that cognitive functioning is associated with higher levels of interpersonal deficit, suggesting increased treatment needs for the LD offender population. The study also highlighted that different treatment needs exist between the LD and non-LD offenders.

This paper aims to analyze the COVID-19 pandemic response in prisons, focusing on the USA, which imprisons a higher percentage of its population than any other country in the world.

This paper evaluates the current pandemic response in prisons based on legal and ethical imperatives for providing health care to prisoners.

Themes of best practices identified include increasing rapid detection of new cases, reducing transmission and advocating for both short- and long-term ethical health care policies. Halting progress now could risk dire consequences and is unacceptable on legal, ethical and public health grounds.

This paper does not involve primary research with prisoners; rather it focuses on reviewing the pandemic response in prisons. Although it may be possible to translate findings in this study to similar environments (e.g. jails and detainment centers), there are unique characteristics pertaining to each that deserve separate, focused analyses.

Outbreaks that occur within prisons are likely to spread to the community and vice versa. Analyses based on ethics, law and public health point to the same conclusion: preventing significant outbreaks within prisons will benefit not only prisoners but also the general public. Furthermore, even though the scientific understanding of the pandemic may change with future research, the ethical and legal principles highlighted in this paper will continue to be foundational when considering just care for prisoners.

The purpose of this article is to examine reasons given by Mental Health Review Tribunals for discharging patients from detention and the effect the length of detainment had on the immediate outcome of discharged patients and to examine the effect on outcome from quality of reports and sources of evidence presented to the MHRTs.

All documentation pertaining to MHRTs heard in the Cambridge area over a 12‐month period were reviewed.

A quarter of tribunals heard were discharged, as they did not fulfil the legal criteria for detention. RMO non‐attendance was significant in this group. Unfavourable short‐term outcomes suggest that half of these discharges were premature. Improved aftercare compliance was associated with longer duration on a Section of the Mental Health Act prior to MHRT discharge.

This study reflects practice in the service (with a relatively small number of in‐patient sections) and may not be generalisable to other populations.

Improvement in the quality of evidence including risk assessments provided at tribunals should prevent premature discharges whilst maintaining the balance between civil liberties and good clinical care.

This paper highlights the need for improvement in clinical practice and training. Whilst it is primarily of interest to doctors, all professionals involved in MHRTs can learn from it.

This paper aims to explore the impact of stressors and the strategies staff use to cope with these at a detention facility. It documents through case studies some of the triggers of trauma, possible coping mechanisms that might assist in navigating the associated stressors in a workplace and recommendations as to what might assist staff.

A naturalist approach was used in this research, using an ethnographic qualitative methodology. Grounded theory assisted in the analysis of the data to capture naturalistically the subjective experience of the participants of the study. Conversations occurred with staff who had worked in a detention facility using face to face semi-structured interviews. The structure was open-ended to allow the staff to discuss and share their experiences freely.

Stressors that impacted staff working in a detention facility resulted from areas such as heightened reactions from detainees because of the length of their detainment, detainee self-harm, dealing with the effects of an increase of substance abuse through detainees obtaining contraband and the associated violent reactions that can occur as a result. Adverse symptoms noted within the lives of staff included acute anxiety, sleeplessness, depression and tension within impersonal relationships, including family. What compounded the issue was staffs’ reluctance to talk about work stressors.

The research used nine participants for case studies of staff who had formerly experienced various adverse impacts of stressors. This is not a comprehensive study, however, of the broader experiences of staff at an Australian detention facility. It does provide, however, a snapshot of the experiences of a small group who had significantly been impacted by the stressors of the workplace.

This paper provides fresh perspectives or initiatives that are needed to assist staff to navigate the changing environment of working in a detention facility. In particular, some support mechanisms and protective factors that could be put in place to curb the negative impact of stressors in the workplace and to mitigate against long term stress disorders developing in the personal lives of staff.

Many staff are not getting the help they need to cope with the emotional distress they experience in their workplace. However, there are practical interventions to support staff in managing the stressors they face. These will be outlined in this article.

This study was carried out with the goal of giving staff a voice and to capture their former experiences in their vocational responsibilities in a venue that has had very limited research attention. This study has presented the challenges staff faced in a unique venue of working in a detention facility. It has documented some of the common stressors staff faced, the impact of such and some coping mechanisms used to handle them.

Archive footage is now a staple of much cinematic and broadcast production. This chapter explores some of the ways in which archival material has been recycled and considers some of the tensions between filmmakers, archivists, and audiences throughout the process of research, production, and screening. It considers some of the controversies associated with the repositioning of material in short-form, narrative and documentary filmmaking, particularly in relation to content that was never intended for exhibition in the public sphere. Drawing upon Benjaminian ideas of accessing authenticity in a form that has been reproduced, it considers the responsibility of both filmmaker and viewer in critiquing moving image content that has borrowed, self-consciously or surreptitiously, from earlier filmic forms. It concludes by making recommendations for an ethical approach to recycling archival material in research contexts that are pertinent to the burgeoning field of academic creative practice, with a particular focus on the stakeholders involved and a reasonable contextual positioning of the source material in its remediated form.

This study aims to explore the family experiences of delinquent adolescents and uses a descriptive phenomenological research design.

The study explores the family experiences of delinquent adolescents and uses a descriptive phenomenological research design. Eight adolescents that were under detainment in a rehabilitation centre in Malaysia participated in the study. Data were gathered through semi-structured interviews and reflective journals.

Five themes common to the participants’ experience were inductively identified from the analysis. These were: life without guidance, alienation and isolation, conflict on how the family is managed; I am still a little child and prisoners at home.

Despite many studies on delinquent adolescents were conducted in Malaysia, no study has been conducted so far to explore and understand the experience of female adolescents in their families.

This paper stems from a 12-month collaborative enquiry between a group of Syrian academics in exile in Turkey and academics from the University of Cambridge into the state of Syrian Higher Education after the onset of the conflict in 2011. The purpose of this paper is to draw on 19 open-ended interviews with exiled Syrian academics; two focus groups; mapping and timeline exercises; and 117 interviews collected remotely by collaborating Syrian academics with former colleagues and students who were still living inside Syria at the time of data collection. The findings of the research suggest that Syrian HE after 2011 was fragmented across regions; in some cases non-existent, and in others deemed to be in a state of reform in order to meet student needs. Key issues that emerged from this work are human rights’ abuses directed against academics and students including the detainment, purging and kidnapping of academics, an increased militarisation of university life and a substantive loss of academic and human capital.

The overall design involved two workshops held in Turkey (in June and July, 2017) at which the Cambridge team explained the stages of undertaking qualitative research and planned the collaborative enquiry with Syrian co-researchers. The first workshop addressed the nature of qualitative research and explored the proposed methods of interviewing, using timelines and mapping. The instruments for interviewing were constructed in groups together and mapping was undertaken with the 21 Syrian academics in exile who attended the workshop. Syrian academics also built their own research plans as a way of expanding the consultation dimension of this project inside Syria, engaged in survey and interview protocol planning and discussed ways to access needed documentation which could be drawn upon to enrich the project. The Syrian co-researchers interviewed remotely HE staff and students who had remained in, or recently left, Syria; the key criterion for group or participant selection was that they had recent and relevant experience of Syrian HE. The second workshop focused on data analysis and writing up. There was also wide consultation with participants inside and outside Syria. As part of the research, the Cambridge team conducted open-ended interviews with 19 Syrian academics and students living in exile in Turkey. This involved interviewing Syrian scholars about their experiences of HE, policy changes over time and their experiences of displacement. The researchers developed this protocol prior to the capacity-building workshops based on previous research experience on academic and student displacement, alongside extensive preparation on the conditions of Syrian HE, conflict and displacement. In addition to interviewing, a pivotal element of methodological rigour was that the authors sought to member check what participants were learning through mapping and timeline exercises and extensive note-taking throughout both workshops. The major issues that the authors confronted were ethical concerns around confidentiality, the need to ensure rigourously the protection of all participants’ anonymity and to be extremely mindful of the political sensitivity of issues when interviewing participants who may not feel able to fully trust “outsider” researchers. Issues of social trust have been reported in the literature as one of the most significant drawbacks in conducting research in “conflict environments” (see Cohen and Arieli, 2011) where academics and students have been working and/or studying in autocratic regimes or were operating within political contexts where being open or critical of any form of institutional life such as university work or the nation could cost them their jobs or their lives.

The accounts of Syrian academics and students emerging from this work point to some of the state-building expressions of HE manifested in the shaping of professional and personal experiences, the condition and status of HE, its spatial arrangements and their associated power formations, and resulting in feelings of intense personal and professional insecurity among Syrian scholars and students since 2011. While acknowledging that the Syrian situation is deemed one of the worst humanitarian crises in the region in recent decades, these accounts resonate, if in different ways, with other studies of academics and students who have experienced highly centralised and autocratic states and tightly regulated HE governance regimes (Barakat and Milton, 2015; Mazawi, 2011).

Currently, there is virtually no research on the status and conditions of higher education in Syria as a consequence of the war, which commenced in 2011. This work presents a first-person perspective from Syrian academics and students on the state of HE since the onset of the conflict. The major contribution of this work is the identification of key factors shaping conflict and division in HE, alongside the political economies of HE destruction which are unique to the Syrian war and longstanding forms of authoritarian state governance.

The paper uses archival materials, interviews, and secondary scholarship to examine debates among Indian coalitional activists on legal argumentation against India’s national sodomy law in Naz Foundation v. Government of NCT of Delhi in particular, and in their mobilization activities in general. At the heart of activists’ debates was whether “rights to privacy” was the appropriate legal justification with which to argue the unconstitutionality of the sodomy law. Activists warned against uncritically advancing the notion that the sodomy law was an unlawful intrusion into an individual’s privacy, understood in spatial terms as existing within the bounds of a physical home or area, instead highlighting how gender and class shaped queer citizens’ engagements with private space. The paper argues that activists’ critical examinations of private and public space in the Indian context problematize canonical foundations of queer theory and sociological approaches to sexual citizenship, much of which assumes that all queer life moves from an inner sanctum of private secrecy, experienced as shameful, to an outer realm of equality vis-à-vis the state, the public, and the economy through declarative acts of embodiment. Drawing on critical queer studies scholarship, the paper argues that the legal debates in Naz and Indian queer activism reveal the unstated Western liberalism in prevailing scholarship on the promise of law for queer communities in contexts where core differences exist in material and social realities, and, consequently, in the meanings that individuals attach to space, privacy, embodiment, and visibility.