Introducing Video Recording when Taking Statements for Investigations

Assoc Prof Jamus Jerome Lim asked the Minister for Home Affairs what is the progress on the introduction of video recording in taking statements for law enforcement investigations.

Video recording of interviews, or VRI, was first introduced in 2018 for rape cases. Last year, we updated Parliament that VRI has been expanded to include other offences, such as serious sexual offences like aggravated outrage of modesty and sexual assault by penetration, as well as child abuse, maid abuse and non-capital drug-related offences. We also updated that we have started expanding VRI to vulnerable suspects investigated for non-capital cases, specifically for young suspects where there is no Appropriate Adult in attendance, and offenders with mental disabilities.

Since then, we have expanded VRI further to cover trafficking in persons and more sexual offences, including the sexual penetration of minors, and procurement of sexual activity with person with mental disability or by deception. We have also completed the expansion of VRI to all non-capital cases involving the vulnerable suspects I mentioned earlier.

Moving forward, we are carefully studying how we can expand VRI to more cases, including capital cases and interviews with victims or witnesses.

One issue is that VRI is resource-intensive. With VRI, there is no written signed statement. Transcripts have to be prepared to facilitate investigation and Court processes. They have to be checked against the video footage for accuracy. This means that officers have to review the whole duration of the video recorded, and each interview can be a few hours long.

There are also additional administrative procedures involved, such as setting up and ensuring functionality of the VRI facilities, replaying the VRI footages for the interviewee, sending the footages for transcribing and so on. We have streamlined some of these processes, but the fact remains that conducting VRI takes up far more of the investigation officer’s time compared to a written statement.

The speed of transcription is another consideration, and even the fastest turnaround time takes days. This is not ideal for time-sensitive cases, such as capital cases, where officers need to review the transcripts quickly to conduct follow-up investigations. While technology, such as speech-to-text transcription, can help augment manual transcription, it is not yet at the accuracy that avoids the need for time-consuming verification against the interview footage. We are reviewing whether we should develop in-house transcription capability to better support the expansion of VRI.

We remain committed to expanding the use of VRI, at a pace that is supported by adequate infrastructure, resources and technology.