Chapter 7 Interrogations & Confessions review

What is interrogation?

Questioning and other actions intended to elicit information from a suspect

• The goal is to get an CONFESSION (EX: Miranda)

What is a confession

The most persuasive form of evidence at establishing guilt

Why do people confess

• Relieve a guilty conscience

• Persuasive police actions

• No point in denying the crime bc of the perceived evidence against him/her

The role of police deception in interrogations

Interrogations can use persuasion and deceit to get a person to confess

• EX: Lying

  • Sympathetic and understanding to gain rapport (trust)

  • Deceive suspect into believing there is a lot of evidence against him or her 

  • Technology (EX: polygraph) may be used to detect deception and its capabilities may be legally overstated 

  • Misrepresentation of the seriousness of the crime (downplaying)

The ingredients of a successful interrogation

• A plan

• A good understanding of the facts of the case

• Adequate time

• control of the conversation

• A familiarity with the suspects background

• build rapport

• a familiarity with persuasive themes, approaches, and tactics

Themes

lower the psychological hurdles. Examples include:

• Minimizing the seriousness of the crime

• Blaming the victim

• Decreasing the shamefulness of the act (EX: not calling a rapist, a rapist)

• Increasing guilty feelings (EX: how would your kid feel)

• Appealing to the suspects hope for the positive outcome

Rationalization, Projection, Minimization

Makes it easier for a person to confess

• Best used through a FEATHERING APPROACh where warmth, sincerity, and commitment to the truth are paramount over the slegde hammer approach

Rationalization

Best approached through making the suspect believe their actons were ratonial

Projection

Best approached by projecting the responsibility of the criminal behavior onto something else (Childhood upbringing or victim blaming)

Minimization

best approached by REDUCING the suspects role OR the SERIOUSNESS of the crime

Steps in the interrogation of suspects

• Confront the suspect directly with a statement that he or she commited the crime and then wait for a reaction

• Classify the suspect as emotional or NON emotional

• Denials beyond the initial one should be cut off

• Objections then take place (No)

• Make clear the intentions of just getting the truth

• Continue the theme by showing that a confession is the best course of action

• Force the suspect to answer a yes or no question regarding the incident that admits to come involvement

• Have the suspect orally relate to their involvement 

• Turn the oral confession into a written one

  • Recorded (audio)

  • Video

Emotional offenders

experience guilt and respond to emotional themes

Non emotional offenders

does NOT experience a conscience and respond to rational themes

• only care about themselves, not about what they did or who they did it to, or who it affects

False Confession

Where an innocent individual confesses to a crime or overstates their involvement of the crime

Why do people confess to crimes they did not commit?

• Stress Compliant false confessions (can be overwhelmed)

• Persuaded false confessions (leading cause of false confessions)

• Voluntary false confessions

What can be done about false confessions

• The police must be mindful that false confessions exist

• Recognize that a confession should not be the ultimate objective

• Recognize deception does not necessarily mean guilt of the crime in question

• Should not video-record the entirety of all investigations 

• Credibility of confessions should be Systematically evaluated 

Investigative tools in recognizing deception

• it is important to detect deception when obtaining information from people

• The basic theory is that under stressful situations, like an interrogation, suspects will try to repress FIGHT OR FLIGHT responses through physiological changes 

Kinesics

relate to the study of body movement and posture to convey meaning

• EX: twisting hair

Emblems

gestures that convey direct meaning

• Micro expressions (like squinting your eyes, or shoulders moving in sign of relief)

Illustrators

hand and arm displays that illustrate what is being said

• EX: talking with her hands

When truthful…

emblems and illustrators are CONGRUENT (equal) with what is being said

Non verbal behaviors

Facial expressions, body positioning and posture, and gestures (like manipulators or “created jobs”)

Verbal Behaviors

easier to control yet can still be indicators of deception

Verbal cues related to deception

• Use vague and confusing answers

• Provide conflicting statements 

• Provide explanations that do not make sense

• Use present tense to describe a past occurence

• presence of modifers

• eliminate or reduce self-references

• use unusally short, long, or complicated sentences

• complain frequently

• delay in answering questions

• overly helpful, polite, or respectful

• Claim to experience memory probelms or have too good of a memory

• Deny their involvement with strong denials ("I swear on my kids)

• Using "buy-out" statement ("what's going to happen to the person that actually did this")