How “Vulnerability” Manifests as an Interactional Asymmetry in Police Interviews with Adolescent Suspects and Intellectually Impaired Witnesses

Vulnerable suspects and witnesses who interact with the criminal justice system in England and Wales are entitled to legal affordances designed to protect them. We present novel evidence of how categorizations of vulnerability are (re)produced and negotiated to manage institutionally relevant matters during police interviews. We use conversation analysis to examine 30 police interviews with vulnerable suspects ( n = 10) and witnesses ( n = 20). Our findings challenge the notion of vulnerability as an internal and stable phenomenon, providing new insights into vulnerability in policing as an interactional concern that allows interlocutors to negotiate interactional asymmetry.