Informing about rights – the monitoring conducted by the Special Preventive Group in the reporting period showed that, similar to the previous years, informing an arrested person by the police about his/her rights remains a problem. Despite the fact that, under Article 174 of the Criminal Procedure Code, the arresting authority is obliged to notify the arrested person in an understandable manner about his/her right to a lawyer, right to silence and not to incriminate himself and that anything he/she says may be used against him/her in a court of law. Special Preventive Group established through interviewing arrested persons that in most cases during arrest and bringing arrested persons to the police station, police does not explain these rights verbally at all or they give incomplete information. Arrested persons have their rights explained mostly when placed in a TDI where they are given a list of their duties and rights including procedural rights which they confirm with their signature. It should be noted that informing about the right to silence, right not to incriminate oneself and right to counsel is particularly important at the early stage of arrest, namely, during arrest and/or immediately upon being brought to a police station.136 From a police station, arrested persons are taken to a TDI, in numerous cases with a considerable delay. Unlike TDIs, police stations are not supplied with brochures on procedural rights of arrested persons; also, no posters are posted in police stations to inform arrested persons. Access to a lawyer and informing family – In practice it is problematic to exercise the right to immediate access to a lawyer, whereas the arrested person is most vulnerable in the very first hours of detention in terms of pressure and ill-treatment on the part of police. According to the data processed by the Special Preventive Group by using the Statistical Program (SPSS), similar to the last year, the low indicator of involvement of a lawyer in criminal proceedings have not changed considerably in 2018.137 Besides, the trend continues that persons arrested in administrative proceedings rarely use a lawyer’s assistance. During the meetings organised in the regions local lawyers told the Special Preventive 136 Report to the Lithuanian Government on the visit to Lithuania carried out by the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) from 5 to 15 September 2016, para. 23, available at: https://rm.coe.int/pdf/16807843ca, (accessed 04.03.2019). The CPT called upon the Lithuanian authorities to ensure without further delay that all persons detained by the police – for whatever reason – are fully informed of their rights from the very outset of their deprivation of liberty (that is, from the very moment when they are obliged to remain with the police). This should be ensured by providing clear verbal information upon apprehension, to be supplemented at the earliest opportunity (that is, immediately upon first entry into police premises) by provision of a written form setting out the detained person’s rights in a straightforward manner. This form should be made available in an appropriate range of languages. Moreover, particular care should be taken to ensure that detained persons are actually able to understand their rights; it is incumbent on police officers to ascertain that this is the case. Report to the Government of Cyprus on the visit to Cyprus carried out by the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) from 2 to 9 February 2017, para. 42, available at: https://rm.coe.int/16807bf7b4, (accessed 04.03.2019). The CPT recommended that the Cypriot authorities introduce a single form for recording the rights offered to detained persons as part of the custody records. 137 In 2018, in 11.9 % out of examined cases, a lawyer joined the proceedings within 24 hours and in 2017, lawyers joined the proceedings within 24 hours in 15% out of the examined cases. 53