{{Unreferenced, date=June 2011 West Midlands Police - Birmingham Central Custody

A custody suite is an area within a

police station A police station is a facility operated by police or a similar law enforcement agency that serves to accommodate police officers and other law enforcement personnel. The role served by a police station varies by agency, type, and jurisdiction, ...

in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

designed and adapted to process and detain those who have been

arrest An arrest is the act of apprehending and taking a person into custody (legal protection or control), usually because the person has been suspected of or observed committing a crime. After being taken into custody, the person can be question ...

ed, or who are there for purposes such as answering

bail Bail is a set of pre-trial restrictions that are imposed on a suspect to ensure that they will not hamper the judicial process. Court bail may be offered to secure the conditional release of a defendant with the promise to appear in court when ...

. Historically, all police stations had a small number of individual cells where offenders could be detained. However, in recent years most detainees are more likely to be taken to a large police station which are designated to hold

prisoner A prisoner, also known as an inmate or detainee, is a person who is deprived of liberty against their will. This can be by confinement or captivity in a prison or physical restraint. The term usually applies to one serving a Sentence (law), se ...

Facilities

There are numerous facilities contained within a police custody suite, which most commonly include: * A holding cell where officers wait with detainees awaiting entry to the suite. * A number of cells to hold detainees, often split into

male Male (Planet symbols, symbol: ♂) is the sex of an organism that produces the gamete (sex cell) known as sperm, which fuses with the larger female gamete, or Egg cell, ovum, in the process of fertilisation. A male organism cannot sexual repro ...

female An organism's sex is female ( symbol: ♀) if it produces the ovum (egg cell), the type of gamete (sex cell) that fuses with the male gamete (sperm cell) during sexual reproduction. A female has larger gametes than a male. Females and ...

and juvenile groups of cells. * A prisoner processing area where custody officers (most commonly uniformed sergeants) process the detainees presented to them by

police officer A police officer (also called policeman or policewoman, cop, officer or constable) is a Warrant (law), warranted law employee of a police, police force. In most countries, ''police officer'' is a generic term not specifying a particular rank. ...

s * Designated

interview An interview is a structured conversation where one participant asks questions, and the other provides answers.Merriam Webster DictionaryInterview Dictionary definition, Retrieved February 16, 2016 In common parlance, the word "interview" re ...

rooms, holding equipment used to conduct and record interviews with suspects for use as

evidence Evidence for a proposition is what supports the proposition. It is usually understood as an indication that the proposition is truth, true. The exact definition and role of evidence vary across different fields. In epistemology, evidence is what J ...

. * A medical room for use by police medical staff * Consultation rooms where detained persons can consult with their legal representatives. * Rooms used for video identification parades or similar. * A room officers can complete the necessary arrest documentation after detainees have been legally and formally logged in as held in custody.

Procedure

Upon arrival at the suite, the police officer who has made an arrest presents the suspect at a desk before the custody officer explaining the reason and details of the arrest and evidence gained. If the custody officer is satisfied that the person has been lawfully detained, they will authorise further detention of the person. The detainee would then be asked a series of questions regarding their personal details and informed of their rights whilst in custody under the

Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (c. 60) (PACE) is an act of Parliament which instituted a legislative framework for the powers of police officers in England and Wales to combat crime, and provided codes of practice for the exercise of t ...

or Criminal Procedure (Legal Assistance, Detention and Appeals) (Scotland) Act 2010 in Scotland. Before being allocated a cell and a record being made of the time detained, the detainee is usually searched with any item they are carrying removed and in some cases if

forensic evidence Forensic identification is the application of forensic science, or "forensics", and technology to identify specific objects from the trace evidence they leave, often at a crime scene or the scene of an accident. Forensic means "for the courts". Hu ...

has to be preserved. All items of clothing and personal items taken from the detainee are logged and held in a secure place until the detainee's departure. The arresting officer will then complete the necessary documentation for the arrest and may conduct brief further enquiries (including a tape recorded interview with the suspect) before the suspect is brought before the custody officer again for disposal. This disposal could take numerous forms, the most common being that the person is charged with an offence, given police

in order for further investigation to be carried out, or released without any charge. Independent custody visitors may make unannounced visits to custody suites to ensure that people being detained are treated properly.

External links

Brief description of the Custody Suite
Police stations in the United Kingdom Law enforcement in the United Kingdom Imprisonment and detention