Code of conduct

Good practice for forensic practitioners

CRFP is the Council for the Registration of Forensic Practitioners.

CRFP is an independent regulatory body. Our objective is to promote public confidence in forensic practice in the UK. We are achieving this by:

• publishing a register of competent forensic practitioners;
• ensuring through periodic revalidation that forensic practitioners keep up to date and maintain competence;
• dealing with registered practitioners who fail to meet the necessary standards.

Registration carries with it both privileges and responsibilities. The public accept registration as proof of your competence. Your responsibility is, in return, to maintain and develop professional performance, adhering at all times to the standards in this code.

As a registered forensic practitioner you must:

1. Recognise that your overriding duty is to the court and to the administration of justice: it is your duty to present your findings and evidence, whether written or oral, in a fair and impartial manner.

2. Act with honesty, integrity, objectivity and impartiality

3. Not discriminate on grounds of race, beliefs, gender, language, sexual orientation, social status, age, lifestyle or political persuasion.

4. Comply with the code of conduct of any professional body of which you are a member.

5. Provide expert advice and evidence only within the limits of your professional competence and only when fit to do so.

6. Inform a suitable person or authority, in confidence where appropriate, if you have good grounds for believing there is a situation which may result in a miscarriage of justice.

In all aspects of your work as a provider of forensic advice and evidence you must:

7. Take all reasonable steps to maintain and develop your professional competence, taking account of material research and developments within the relevant field and practising techniques of quality assurance.

8. Declare to your client, patient or employer if you have one, any prior involvement or personal interest which gives, or may give, rise to a conflict of interest, real or perceived; and act in such a case only with their explicit written consent.

9. Take all reasonable steps to ensure access to all available evidential materials which are relevant to the examinations requested; to establish, so far as reasonably practicable, whether any may have been compromised before coming into your possession; and to ensure their integrity and security are maintained whilst in your possession.

10. Accept responsibility for all work done under your supervision, direct or indirect.

11. Conduct all work in accordance with the established principles of your profession, using methods of proven validity and appropriate equipment and materials.

12. Make and retain full, contemporaneous, clear and accurate records of the examinations you conduct, your methods and your results, in sufficient detail for another forensic practitioner competent in the same area of work to review your work independently.

13. Report clearly, comprehensively and impartially, setting out or stating:

a. your terms of reference and the source of your instructions;
b. the material upon which you based your investigation and conclusions;
c. summaries of your and your team's work, results and conclusions;
d. any ways in which your investigations or conclusions were limited by external factors, especially if your access to relevant material was restricted; or if you believe unreasonable limitations on your time, or on the human, physical or financial resources available to you, have significantly compromised the quality of your work;
e. that you have carried out your work and prepared your report in accordance with this Code.

14. Reconsider and, if necessary, be prepared to change your conclusions, opinions or advice and to reinterpret your findings in the light of new information or new developments in the relevant field; and take the initiative in informing your client or employer promptly of any such change.

15. Preserve confidentiality unless:

a. the client or patient explicitly authorises you to disclose something;
b. a court or tribunal orders disclosure;
c. the law obliges disclosure; or
d. your overriding duty to the court and to the administration of justice demand disclosure.

16. Preserve legal professional privilege: only the client may waive this. It protects communications, oral and written, between professional legal advisers and their clients; and between those advisers and expert witnesses in connection with the giving of legal advice, or in connection with, or in contemplation of, legal proceedings and for the purposes of those proceedings.

When you register with us, you accept these as the principles that must govern your professional practice. They are the standards against which we would judge any information that called into question your fitness to stay on the register. You must therefore always be prepared to justify, in the light of this code, the actions and decisions you take in the course of your professional work.

In considering a complaint against a registered forensic practitioner, we will be guided primarily by the provisions of this code. But we reserve the right to take action where a practitioner's fitness to practice is questioned for other reasons. This would include circumstances such as a criminal conviction or an allegation of behaviour which, while not specifically addressed in this code, might be regarded as bringing forensic practice into disrepute.