Published
July 22, 2026The interview is usually the first formal step in a prosecution, and it is the only step in which the person under investigation participates voluntarily. Everything else — the charge, the brief, the hearing — happens to them. The interview is the one moment they contribute to the case, for better or worse, and the contribution is permanent.
Three things are worth understanding before attending any interview.
First, the caution means what it says. A person is not obliged to answer questions beyond identifying themselves, and in Victoria no adverse inference is drawn at trial from a decision to remain silent in an interview. Silence is not evidence. An inaccurate answer, given under stress and from imperfect memory, is — and it will be measured months later against telephone records, CCTV, and the accounts of others, by people with unlimited time to compare them.
Second, the decision whether to answer is not a matter of principle but of position, and it differs from case to case. There are matters in which an early account serves the person well. There are many more in which it forecloses defences that were available on the evidence. Which kind of matter this is cannot be judged from inside it. It requires advice from someone who has read prosecutions of the same kind, knows what the investigators are likely to hold, and can assess what an account would do to the shape of a later defence.
Third, the interview can often be managed before it occurs. A person asked to attend voluntarily is entitled to obtain advice first, and their lawyer may communicate with the investigators about timing, scope, and whether attendance is warranted at all. That conversation, conducted early, frequently does more for the outcome than anything said in the interview room.
The firm advises before interviews conducted by Victoria Police and Commonwealth agencies, and attends where appropriate. The right time to call is when contact is first made — before a time is agreed, and well before a caution is read.
