Nicki Kennedy Voicecast: Conversations around voice, stories, sound and identity

Giving Voice To The Unheard; Forensics, Compassion, And Justice

• Nicki Kennedy • Season 1 • Episode 4

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We explore how a coroner balances rigorous fact-finding with compassion, and how sexual assault services restore control, belief, and choice. Dr Deryn Evans explains survival responses, the “golden minute,” and why flipping the investigative lens from victim to suspect strengthens justice.

• coronial duty to find who, when, where, how and why
• preventing future deaths through patterns and learning
• impartial investigation without blame while holding candour
• objectivity alongside humane care in sensitive cases
• the role of SARCs in belief, choice and stored forensics
• confirmation bias and compassion fatigue in policing
• the golden minute, clear language and rapport
• survival responses explaining lack of injuries
• national operating model focusing on suspect behaviour
• leadership culture, burnout and safeguarding teams
• communication support via intermediaries for fairness
• compassion for suspects, context and neurodifference


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Nicki :

Welcome to the fourth episode of VoiceCast, where we explore what it means to have a voice and use it. Today I'm delighted to welcome Dr. Deryn Evans to come and talk to me about having a voice and being heard from a particular angle. Darren is a forensic medical examiner in Jersey. She's the clinical director of Dewberry House, which is the sexual assault referral centre, and is also now Jersey's assistant coroner. She's dedicated her career to giving voice where it's most needed, from survivors of sexual assault to those who can no longer speak for themselves at all. She brings a unique combination of forensic medical expertise and advocacy for vulnerable people. And now, as Assistant Coroner for Jersey, a solemn responsibility to speak on behalf of the deceased. We'll be diving into how she brings humanity and compassion into what is essentially work that's built on science and impartiality, how she gathers objective evidence in highly sensitive spaces, and how she handles her role as a voice for those no longer with us with care, rigor, and humanity. This is VoiceCast with Nikki Kennedy, exploring voice in every sense, the sound you make, the story you tell, and the presence you bring. I'm Nikki Kennedy, your host, a classical singer, vocal health and rehabilitation specialist, and an executive coach. And my work is about helping people transform, find new directions, get unstuck, and express themselves in ways that feel authentic and true. Together we'll look at how your voice and your presence can shape change in work, in life and in yourself. Thank you so much for joining us.

Deryn:

Thank you, Nicki. I'm delighted to be here.

Nicki :

You said I'm committed to conducting thorough and compassionate investigations, ensuring the community receives care, respect and transparency in the most difficult of circumstances. And that really struck me, knowing you as I do, both socially and having heard you speak. It really struck me as encapsulating everything that you bring to whatever you do as a medical practitioner, as a forensic examiner, as a as and now of course as a coroner. And I wonder what being heard looks like to you.

Deryn:

Yes, thank you. I think it's a true honour to have been appointed as assistant coroner. It is a different role. I'm clinically trained, as you said. I am a doctor, and I was very fortunate to have the opportunity to become assistant coroner. In the UK, all the coroners now are legally trained because they have a medical examiner system, so they have that medical scrutiny of death by the medical examiners before cases get passed on to the coroner. So I was very honoured to be appointed. And it is a different role because it's a judicial role. So there's different responsibilities and the different requirements are on me legally compared to my clinical roles. But so many of the things that I've learned through my clinical work, caring and supporting people in the criminal justice system and people with vulnerability more widely, so my work in the homeless shelter has really given me some of the attributes and some of the skills that I hope I can take to the courtroom in my coronal role. I think what's powerful in this role is that we're advocating for those that are deceased. And our duty is primarily to that person that has died, but also to the family and the friends of the deceased. And we owe them that candor and that thoroughness and that robustness in investigation to fully understand why that person has died. And as a coroner, our job is to find out who, when, where, and how that person has died, and also to identify the cause of their death. And to do that takes a lot of investigation, but also that compassion. Every inquest I do, I've done two today. I'm really curious to find out more about that person that has died and learn a bit more about their life and who they were. And that's so important in these inquests is to understand who that person was, what life they've lived, so that we can honour them even in death and to understand why they died. And a wider part of that for society is understanding if there's a prevention of future deaths that we can identify. So part of the coronial role is to say, actually, this is the fourth accident we've had on this corner or on this part of the road that's ended up with the fatality, or you know, there's something that a process that's not happened as it should have done, and therefore we need to address that so that we can prevent any future deaths as well.

Nicki :

You see, that to me, that all really moves me. That that feeling that somebody is approaching this work, and and I'm thank you for explaining what it is that a coroner does, because that was going to be my next question. You know, I I think you know perhaps it's a little unclear to a lot of us actually what that role would be. But there's something very, very moving and very reassuring to me to hear you talk about that depth of humanity, that desire to understand who is this person, that you're dealing with an individual human life, and that it's not a statistic, it's not a number. So I think that's really kind of speaks loud and clear in your work. And if we stay with that coroner role, you also mentioned transparency in that interview, you know, respect, care, transparency too, and I think that must be challenging sometimes.

Deryn:

It is incredibly challenging and relatively new to the role, but we have a duty of candor and and a duty of care to people even after death, and to investigate a death. It's not our job to find failings or to apportion blame, but in in part of our investigation, we might identify things that indicate or suggest there perhaps has been something that's not gone as well as it should have done, or there might be a failing in care. And how you manage that is very difficult because, as I said, it's not our role to apportion blame. But we want to make sure that the same failings might not happen to someone else. And I'm also conscious for the families as well when we're looking into some how someone has died. Yes. And just to explain, every death that is unexplained or unnatural gets referred to the coroner. So a death where we know someone has died doesn't have to be investigated. Um, but it's any death that we feel is unnatural or unexplained would come across our desk and then we would look at it and make decisions as to whether we need to go to inquest.

Nicki :

That's something I do find quite interesting in your work. It's maintaining that relative impartiality, the clinical objectivity, but in quite sensitive spaces. So that would have ref I mean referring also to the sexual assault style of what you do. How do you how do you manage that yourself?

Deryn:

That's a good question. I think I always come down to science. I am a scientist at heart, but I feel medicine is a real fusion of art and science. I think it's it's both. And I think that if you stick to the facts and to your role, then it makes it easier. So if I think about the coronial role, obviously I'm quite new to that, but my job is it's a judicial role. I'm an investigator. I need to find the facts, I need to explore what's happened so that I can come to a conclusion as to on the balance of probabilities, when, where, and how that person has died. So I think if I focus on those facts, I remind myself it's an inquisitorial court, not an adversarial court. So we're inquisitorial, so it means we're looking, investigating the fact, but we're not apportioning blame helps. And I keep having to remind myself of that balance in the role. Conversely, with sexual assault, sexual trauma, working in my forensic role, my role is twofold. So one would be forensic, so looking at forensic opportunity to gather evidence that might support the police in an investigation. Um, but twofold it's therapeutic. So actually, then it's looking at how has this impacted that person and also what are the wider health impacts of that. So looking at pregnancy risk, STI risk, are they injured, and how do we support them emotionally and psychologically following the trauma? So I think if I keep it very clear in my head that these are my roles, it then makes it a little easier for me to know what I'm doing and why I'm doing it.

Nicki :

And so you keep in a fairly well-defined lane as much as you can whilst dealing with these quite sometimes they must be very difficult for you as well. You must see some traumatic and difficult things.

Deryn:

Absolutely, you hear and you see incredibly traumatic things, but I'm always left with thinking how powerful that person is to have come forward and asked for help in the arena of sexual assault. And then obviously in the deceased, it's it's different again, it's the there's a real sadness. But I would hope that through my role I can give some answers and closure to the family and friends of the person that's died, but also honour that person in death and bringing it back to where we are, it's giving that person that's died a voice.

Nicki :

We're going to take a short break now, and when we come back, we're really going to unpick some of what Darren's work really involves in terms of therapeutic listening and believing and being there for victims of sexual assault, being there for the deceased, and what this really means, and how this can present challenges to the police, to the criminal justice system, and to the public as a whole. Today's news is full of information that's been coming into the police, uh to the BBC, I should say, in the UK. Following an undercover investigation by Panorama into a particularly busy police station. And what has come out of that investigation has been some pretty challenging evidence of misogyny, racism, and other things. And hearing the testimonials of the women who have come forward and who have spoken to the BBC. I've got, I wrote one down here. Um, there was a woman who had been beaten by her husband, and she described her ordeal at the police as making it ten times worse. She said it took so much to go there in the first place, and then I wished I hadn't. And another one another woman who had undergone assault was asked why she thought he was doing this to her, as if she was the problem, and as if she'd brought it on herself. And reading these testimonies, I wonder how often you've come across people who haven't been believed, who have been blamed, or who feel that they're carrying blame in these situations, and how you manage that.

Deryn:

Sadly, all too often that's that's a story that we hear, and it's a real barrier to people coming forward, the fear that they won't be believed. I think what's helped is the development of sexual assault referral centres. So there are 55 across the whole of the UK, and these centres are generally open 24-7 and allow people to come in and access support with trained professionals. They would be offered a forensic examination if it's appropriate, but also that wider holistic support and that support in navigating the criminal justice system. I think unfortunately, in all areas, you know, we've had Harold Shipman in medicine, there's no profession where everybody adheres to the professional standards that they should, unfortunately. And it's just really sad when people who perhaps aren't adhering to the standards we would hope in whatever profession it is, whether it's policing or teaching or in the church, that that it casts a negative light on the whole of that profession for a time. And I really feel for the police, I see the police in Jersey in the main doing a really, really good job trying really hard, but obviously nothing's ever perfect. And I think we've always got to think what's it like to walk in those shoes. And I think sometimes if you're dealing with things day in, day out as a police officer, you could probably get compassion fatigued. You might make assumptions, and I think having thought about what I would like to share with you today, I think that's one of the really key things is to never assume anything. And that's something that my job has taught me is that if you make assumptions, you make mistakes. And I think if you make assumptions, you don't listen because you think you're fitting a narrative to fit your assumptions. And I see that quite often in policing, is they might think they've solved the case and therefore everything else they try and fit to their own narrative and not listen to what's actually in front of them. I think very sadly, with the whole onset of VAWG, so, Violence Against Women and Girls, there are attitudinal issues, and I fear that very often women are perhaps minimized and not truly believed or listened to.

Nicki :

So you're really referring to what we might call a confirmation bias, that people have come to a conclusion, and then their bias around that means that they bring everything into that conclusion and see things through that lens and prove their own point. So, how can you listen?

Deryn:

I think when I started my GP training many years ago, obviously you only have ten minutes with a patient, and one of the first things they taught us in consultation styles was the golden minute. And that you would task to not speak. Obviously, introduce yourself, allow the patient to sit down. How can I help you today? And then just wait. And as you referred to in some of your previous podcasts, that silence can be uncomfortable in certain settings. And actually waiting a whole minute out of ten feels like you're wasting time. But actually, the first thing about listening is giving that person space and time to speak. And once you give them that space and time, they know you're listening and then maybe they will share. If they don't feel you're listening, they're probably not going to want to share. So I think that golden minute was really powerful. The other thing that I learned in my GP training many years ago was also the comment walking out the door. And so often the patient would wait that whole 10 minutes, maybe longer, maybe shorter, and it wasn't till they were walking out the door they'd say, Oh, by the way. And often it takes people a lot of courage to say things. So it's giving them the space and the time, but also building a rapport. So good eye contact if that's what they're comfortable with, not if they're not. Making sure that they can hear you, making sure that you're speaking in a language that they can comprehend, making sure they don't have an underlying learning disability. I remember being taught at one conference that a lady with a learning disability had come to the police to talk about a sexual assault that she'd experienced. And the police said to her, we have a small window to take forensic. And this lady started looking around for a small window. Because of her learning disability, she didn't understand the term a small window in forensic terminology. So I think it's so important that we establish firstly where is that person's level of understanding at to help me to support them to communicate.

Nicki :

Yeah, so you're meeting your patient really where they are. There's a lot there about non-verbal communication, isn't there? There's a huge amount about perhaps somebody's body language, what isn't being said. I mean, you refer to the what I call the door handle moment. I'm I'm pretty familiar with that. Uh, when people come when they've got difficulties with their voice, quite often it's really halfway through the consultation in an hour, an hour-long session, that there will be relevant facts that are starting to surface that either haven't been noticed before because the person themselves they haven't had the space, the time, the opportunity to connect dots that actually need to be connected, or because there's been that reticence to share that information. So that opening of a consultation and the closing of the consultation, the bookends, if you like, that golden minute, and then allowing the space for them to speak. We're going to take another short break now, and when we come back, we're going to talk a little bit around assumptions around physical assault. And we're also going to unpack something around the compassion that Darren brings to her role, not just for victims or survivors of assault, but also for perpetrators and for the people who are working so hard in the criminal justice system to get this right. And so, in in let's take Dewberry House, for example, how do you work with your team of other people there around that listening to make sure that people can find the safety to come forward?

Deryn:

Well, we have a fabulous team of crisis workers who man the phone line 24-7. So there's always someone on the end of the phone, so anyone can phone at any time. And if someone who needs to be seen, then we would have a 30-minute, 40-minute response time so that we could have someone in the building ready to meet someone within 30-40 minutes. We pride ourselves on being a really responsive service. I think going back to being believed, and that is a a a really powerful thing, that if you are not believed, then how are you ever going to come forward and talk about what's happened to you? And I think that's a sad thing that we've perhaps seen with some of the panorama and the wider complaints now against the police, is that they're not feeling believed. But I think it's important that we get people in and we we tell them that we believe them and and we mean it that we believe them. Otherwise we can't begin to support them through that that journey and that process. I think the other thing that's really important in sexual assault is especially, but in all manner of assaults or traumatic events, is if someone's been raped or sexually assaulted, they've lost control. So something has happened to them against their will. And it might be that they've tried to communicate that. It might be that their amygdala in the brain has taken over and they aren't able to communicate. They don't want the the thing happening to them to happen. So what's so important in our service is that we empower them and we give them back that control. We can educate them, we can talk about what our service can offer, but ultimately it's their choice what they choose to do with that. And if they don't want to take it anywhere, they don't have to do that, and we can just sit with them. If they don't want to talk about it, they don't have to talk about it. But if we can identify anything that we can do as a service to support them and help them in recovery, then that's what we will do.

Nicki :

Those two things, the first is to be believed. That's so powerful, what you said, and I think that really when I heard you speaking uh recently, which is what prompted me to invite you to come and be on the podcast, that really stayed with me. Even if it's difficult to believe somebody, you must believe them and give them that absolute safety to go ahead and speak if they want to speak about something. But what you also say about the choice, I find that very fascinating too, because there must be times when you desperately want somebody to take it further. You desperately want a perpetrator to be given justice. But you're saying that that survivor has every right to have the control over whether they take that thing any further at all.

Deryn:

They need to choose what their justice is. And we it's not for us to tell them what we think justice is. They have to decide what is justice for me and how do I recover and move on from this. And the whole point of the Sexual Assault Referral Centre is that people can come and have a forensic examination if something's happened reasonably recently, and we can store their forensic samples independently of the police, and they don't have to report to the police. But in a year or two, if they feel then they have the strength to come forward and report to the police, then we've we've got that forensic evidence stored for them. So it's, I would hope our service is something that empowers people and keeps their options open. And a lot of people might feel that actually at that moment in time they're still just processing the event or whatever's happened to them and they're not ready to face that police investigation and scrutiny, which unfortunately it is. There's a lot of scrutiny on people if they have been in a situation like this. There's a lot of investigation that goes on to understand things. One of the more powerful things that's come out more recently is something called a national operating model, which came from an operation called Obseteria, which was a big basically a project rolled out by the police to look at why we were having such poor prosecution rates in rape and sexual assault. And what the national operating model is, is it flipped things on its head. So previously we would look at the complainant or the victim and say, Well, it's usually a she, unfortunately. She went to a bar, she drank lots of alcohol, she went home with this person. And we're looking at her journey through that offending. And what the national operating model has is flipped it on its head. So investigators now will look at that suspect and they will say, Well, he was in the bar, he persuaded her to stay for another drink, he bought her another four drinks, he said, Don't worry, you can share a taxi home with me. Oh, we'll just pop to my house first. And actually, flipping it around to look at that perpetrating behaviour can be much more powerful. And if you present it like that to a jury, you're far more likely to get a prosecution than if you look at the complainant or the victim and say, Well, they did this, they did that. What you've talked about with the police, unfortunately, I've seen it happen in court as well. So I've seen defence advocates say to complainants, say, You're making this up. This didn't happen, or you've got a personality disorder, or you've got a mental health issue, or you've got a substance use issue, and they're trying anything to detract from the case and the allegation. And I I see it across the board in criminal justice, unfortunately, that that person is attacked for who they are, and that's so wrong.

Nicki :

Yeah, that's a very strong argument, actually, that idea of flipping something around so that you change the narrative because we perhaps have got completely stuck in a narrative that is around that survivor, victim, their experience and what led to it. To come back to something you said before, but when you talked about control and you talked about you mentioned the amygdala, which is is that part of the brain which deals with the fear response and throws out the fight, flight, freeze, and flop response. You talked about that at the talk that I heard you give, and I found that really fascinating because again, it dug into the expectations people might have of what sexual assault or any other kind of assault looks like. Would you like to say something about that? Yes, absolutely.

Deryn:

I I think uh often the media will portray a a rape as someone being dragged up an alleyway, kicking and fighting and screaming with a stranger raping them. But in reality, people are generally raped by someone they know. And it isn't that violent assault that the media often depicts. And when something like that happens, whenever we're under threat, the brain will go into what we call a survival mode. So most of the time we walk around, we've got our conscious thought running through our head, and we're able to navigate situations quite freely with our conscious thought, giving us choices and ability to communicate and say, Oh, I don't want that, no thank you. Do you want a cup of tea? I hope most people have seen the cup of tea YouTube campaign, which is all about consent and that saying that if I offer you a cup of tea today and you say yes, doesn't mean to say that tomorrow you want a cup of tea. That's quite a powerful campaign. But when our day-to-day lives, we can make those decisions quite freely. When we're under threat, our body goes into survival mode, and that's when our amygdala, which is in the in the brain, takes over. And when the amygdala takes over, we just literally go into survival mode. So what we see is we call it the five F's. So it might be start with friends. So you might say, Oh, oh, not today, I'm tired, or you know, I've I've got to go. And you'd be friendly and you'd smile and you'd try and persuade your potential assailant that you what might happen trying to avert it. And then we get our fight and our flight, which we've all probably heard of from GCSE biology, that our body goes into a fight-flight. So suddenly our blood is going to our muscles, we're getting ready to run, we're getting ready to go. And then unfortunately, if we can't escape, which is often the case, then we go into sorts of what's called a freeze mode. And when we go into freeze, we literally, I think that's where the phrase frozen in fear comes from, we cannot move, we cannot do anything because we are so scared that we think if we keep completely still, we might survive whatever's about to happen. If the threat persists past that freeze mode, we go into what's called a flop mode and become very passive. And I often talk to people in Jubri House, the Sexual Assault Referral Center, about a woodlouse. And I don't know if you've ever found a woodlouse, if you're moving stones or you're gardening and you touch the woodlouse, they go into a little ball. And I often think that's what our brain does when we're under threat. Our brain will effectively go into a ball and just shuts down so that we can survive. We don't want to get harmed, we want to survive, we want to live. And so our body goes into a very passive state because then we're more likely to come out of it unscathed, unharmed. The consequence of that is many fold. Firstly, it might be that you don't recognise what's happened to you as rape. You think, well, I lay there, I let it happen. And so, unless you understand the psychology of rape and what's happened to you, you can't understand that actually that was a very normal response. And the number of times I've sat with complainants and they've said, I just froze, I just feel for them. But then at least I can explain the psychology so they can understand the context and why they didn't kick and fight. Because actually, when their conscious thought kicks back in, they think, well, why the heck didn't I knee them in the balls and run away? And so they can't understand their own behaviour. So it's really important that we educate people to say actually this is really normal response when you're under threat. But then, secondly, juries love injuries. So injuries are evidence. So if someone lies there very passively, they're far less likely to get hurt, which is the whole point of the survival response. But consequently, they're less likely to sustain injuries. And therefore, when you get to court and our jury and even maybe some of the judicial system are thinking, well, they should be fighting and kicking and screaming. Why haven't they got injuries? Then actually that doesn't help because we need to educate juries and people within the judicial system about everything that I've just said, so that they can understand the context of perhaps not having many injuries.

Nicki :

That's hugely important, isn't it? That idea that again it's a bias, isn't it? It's a sort of idea of what it should look like and what should have happened, what from coming from people who not necessarily experienced that. And and of course, that whole system of um fight, um, fight, flight, fear, freeze, flop, all of all of the F's, yes, that's there to protect us and it's there to help us to survive. So it's incredibly important, but it it doesn't allow us to fight off something that's much, much stronger than us because actually you might not win that fight. No. So if there was just one thing you could change about society's ability to listen and hear people and give them the time and space and believe them, what would it be?

Deryn:

I think it would be to to believe people, and that's your starting point. I know that there are but a very small number of people that make false allegations, and we need to acknowledge that. But they are really, really in the minority, and there is normally a a a reason for that as well. And I think that's probably what I would say is always ask why. Always ask why is this person saying what they're saying, and what's the context behind that? I think it takes a huge amount of courage to A, even come to a sexual assault referral centre, let alone go to the police. Know that your phone is probably going to be trawled through, your medical history is going to be trawled through. It's such an exposing process. And then to stand in court and to have a defence lawyer tell you that you're making it up. So I think we need to start with a a place of compassion and belief. And I think certainly bring it back to the complaints the BBC have have received. If those police officers had started at a point of believing and listening, we might not have had those complaints.

Nicki :

We're going to take our last short break now, and when we come back, we're going to look at what brought Darren to this place in her career, but also a final reflection on the levels of compassion that we could and should be bringing into our conversations, not just for the survivors and victims of abuse and assault, but also for the perpetrators and their stories, and for those people who are doing their very best to work in the criminal justice system and in the police to try to retain a sense of fairness, justice, and compassion for the people that they're dealing with against some pretty difficult odds. So, one question I'm sure listeners have got at the front of their minds is what has actually brought you into this work? What have you found in yourself here in this space that's really captured you?

Deryn:

I went into general practice initially, and although I enjoyed it, I just felt it wasn't really the correct fit for me. And I've always been drawn to perhaps people with more vulnerability and trying to empower them and give them a voice. So when I moved back to Jersey, grew up over here, moved back to Jersey in 2014, there was an advert for a forensic medical examiner. My sister, who works in customs and immigration, had always said to me, Oh, you should look at this role, I can see you doing it. And growing up, I always had a fascination with crime and with people's lives. So I'm just a naturally curious person. But I also want to help people and make things better, which actually you have to accept. Sometimes there are limitations. And I've learned that through my career, sadly, that there's only certain things that you can influence change. And you have to accept that sometimes the system or people are so resistant to change or they've experienced such trauma that they're so damaged that they're never going to make the changes you would want for them. But you have to be accepting of that and think that actually sometimes just the little bit can make a big difference. So I think it's a mixture of things of my own personality, being an empath, wanting to make people's lives better, but also a fascination with medicine and the human body and the science behind that, but then a fascination of the criminal justice system and crime and what makes people tick and that criminal psychology and how people respond to trauma and how we help them recover.

Nicki :

So that absolutely just resonated with you. It just sort of picked out all those parts of you somehow.

Deryn:

Yes, I think I just thought, oh, this sounds really interesting. And I perhaps didn't realise what a good fit it was for me at the time. I just thought this is something exciting, different, and new. But actually, as I've taken on that career, I have just embraced every part of it. I have absolutely loved it. And to now have the opportunity to be assistant current, I feel I've been given so many opportunities. And I'm so humbled in my career to have had time with my patients and who have experienced such horrific things and been willing to share that with me has been a real honour. And I take that honour into my coronial role and feel very humbled that I can advocate for those that have died and give them that voice in death.

Nicki :

There's something there about how people end up in the perfect fit in roles that are right for them. And there's something you said there that really interested me that you didn't necessarily know at the time that it was going to be such a good fit, but there was something in the constellations that the opportunity came up and you were open to that opportunity. Yes. And I think that's a really wonderful thing, being open to risk and change. And when something just resonates, it's picking up more than one thread for you, of what you were interested in, and you were able to just make that move. And it's been such a good move for you, but also for our community here. I have to say that. Thank you.

Deryn:

And I think I have a passion for justice. I think that that sits at my core is justice, whatever that looked like. And like I said, justice for individuals might be different, but that drives me. I think things need to be fair and just. And my father was a really fair man. And I think I try and emulate what he was. Um, and my mother's quite powerful and and vocal. So I guess that fusion of of those that parenting was just the perfect mix for this career.

Nicki :

Isn't it? That powerful, the powerful voice and the advocacy and the and the sense of fairness and justice, absolutely. So I'm guessing that you don't enjoy board games with cheaters.

Deryn:

Not good with my children. Yes. No, I I can tolerate that because it stakes on so high on the but yes, I I this injustice infuriates me. And that drives me. And that passion, you need something in a career that is a long career. You need that passion to keep burning. And I I fear, and and hearing the complaints of the police, I see compassion fatigue, I see burnout. And it's so important that we protect ourselves against that vicarious trauma and against getting burnt out because then we're no use to anyone.

Nicki :

From a coaching perspective, as an executive coach, and part of my work is helping people to make transformation by again using the skills of very active listening, but um helping people to get out of a rut of thinking and assumptions about how they need to live and helping them to open the doors to a much bigger vista so that they can change what they do. And I think there's something in what you've just said there that I really love about being able to really pursue the thing that you're passionate about, to really find it and to commit to that. But the flip side of that is something I hadn't really thought about in quite such concrete terms, that the risk to the public, actually, of people who are not remaining committed in their work is huge, especially in public services.

Deryn:

Huge, it's massive. And I think with the police, I'm not talking locally, but more widely, as we've discussed in the UK, that that risk of compassion fatigue and that perhaps lack of leadership uh from the top. I think it's got to be emulated from the top, and the people have to be looking out for their really hardworking force to say, are we checking in with these people? They're seeing tough things day in, day out. And I can understand how some officers perhaps have become fatigued or they've just seen one too many rapes or sexual assaults, and maybe their coping mechanism is to minimize or to try and brush it off so they don't have to investigate it. And it's wrong, and we need to be better identifying when that's happening. But actually, it goes back to looking at that person, and it might be you're looking at the police officer who's being dismissive, and you've got to ask why. How has that police officer come to that point that they're saying things like that? So, what's their journey to that point? And I think coming at it from compassion from whatever angle, rather than recrimination and blame, we're going to be a better society.

Nicki :

Absolutely, a hundred percent. And I do think that you commented down the leadership and it coming from the top. And I think the surrounding culture is always the place to look. And I feel that we're in a very busy system, and it's the same in the health service, it's the same in all of the most pressured public services, that it feels as though there isn't time to do that work with a team of people to help them to feel that their voice matters. Most of the people that you're describing are perhaps people who feel that their voice doesn't matter themselves for some reason, you know, that they that they are just a number of a seat sometimes.

Deryn:

And how do we, as leaders, um, I say that in a generic term, how do we support people to see them, but really see them and really understand them and be there for them and empower them? And it's Richard Branson's adage, isn't it? If you look after your staff, they'll look after the rest. And I really think that's so important and so powerful. And actually, if we can get that ethos of leadership that Susie touched on in the prison, there's a ripple effect, isn't there? And that's really powerful.

Nicki :

And it's value, isn't it, of every single person in an organization having having their story, having the place that they're coming from? And hearing them, going back to that listening, it all comes into that. So what next, Deryn? What's uh what are you hoping to change or develop in your new role as assistant coroner or uh at Dewberry House or as a forensic medical examiner? What are your hopes and dreams for these roles?

Deryn:

I think with regard to sexual trauma, I would like to focus more on the suspects. Um I'm very honoured in that I do a lot of work in police custody as well. So I also see the suspects and people who are arrested on suspicion of crime. And that listening and that believing is also so important in that arena. So you see very vulnerable people who are committing crimes, and it goes back to why. And every person has a story and has a journey, and so many people have experienced horrific traumatic events that lead them up to that point in their life, even with offending behaviour. And I just think there needs to be more compassion throughout the whole of the criminal justice system. I work with an amazing lady called Laura Osmond who champions victim care, and she's done a lot of work in ensuring we have an intermediary on the island. So we have an amazing lady called Nikki who comes for a week every month. And the purpose of an intermediary is to assess someone in communication and identify ways that they might need more support in communication, be they a suspect or a complainant. And so Nikki comes and she'll make an assessment about someone's comprehension, about their language, about their communication, their communication styles, whether they understand the difference between right and wrong. And if we can identify what supports people in communication through the criminal justice system, that's a start. But understanding their backstory, their context, do they have, I don't really like the word neurodiversity, but a neurodifference, are their communication styles different? Have they got an undiagnosed learning disability? Are they impulsive because they've got ADHD? Have they had significant childhood trauma themselves? So I think in life and in death, it's again being curious about that whole person, what makes them who they are? And even when I've seen people who are arrested on suspicion of murder, it's so important that we see more than just that, that they are a person. There's a person behind that, and there might be a very valid reason or a story that leads them to that point in their life.

Nicki :

Thank you so much.