Interpreter-mediated Investigative Interviews with Minors - Setting the Ground Rules

Eliciting information from children in a criminal context involves retrieving evidence from an apprentice in the art of communication. Both the ability and willingness of children to disclose is at stake in settings which are often highly sensitive. In law the communicative vulnerability of children is not least manifest in forensic protocols on how to interview children. These are designed to elicit information in a child aware fashion and thus not increase trauma as well as to produce evidence with sufficient integrity to stand up under the scrutiny applied to it as part of the criminal process.
This article will consider some of the added challenges of interpreter–mediated interviews for minors. Drawing on research into monolingual child interviewing and its application in specialised forensic interview formats, the article proposes how some of the interpreting related aspects of this challenge may be addressed through the adaptation of elements of reflexive coordination in the widely used NICHD child interviewing protocol. While focusing on minors, the article suggests that the adaption of institutional speech genres for bilingual use, may be a component of mainstreaming public service interpreting.