Deception by the Investigating Officer
NAME
AJS/532
August 5, 2013
Margery Melvin

Deception by the Investigating Officer
There are three sides to every story: the suspect’s version, the police’s version, and somewhere in the middle lies the truth. Humans by nature will instinctively do anything to ensure the security of his or her survival. Regardless if an individual is guilty or not the possibility of meeting consequences for his or her actions will almost always sway the individual to deny said actions to prevent the consequences from happening. Law enforcement personnel walk a fine line with regard to the use of deception, to find the truth. This paper will analyze the code of ethics in comparison to law enforcement procedure, and the role of nonverbal communication play with regard to detecting deception.
The Ethics of Deception
Ethical and moral behaviors are characteristics that individuals have but not all individuals have the same degree of moral ground. Everyone has the right to free choice and free-thinking, which are the foundation of the pursuit of happiness, life, and liberty. Within the context of free choice, humans have the choice of telling the truth or lying. Truth is usually only given freely when the foreseen benefit exists; otherwise most individuals will resort to a lie. By nature, humans do not want to experience pain, harm, or anything that may restrict individual freedoms. For individuals who violate laws, social norms, or otherwise commit an act, which will resort in a consequence, lying is a rational choice to prevent said consequences.
People who lie often have an increasing sense about his or her surroundings, non-verbal communication presence, and internal thought process. These actions by individuals make it increasingly harder for law enforcement personnel to extract the truth from a suspect. The use of deception techniques in interviews and interrogation are required to find the hidden truth but teeter the fence of ethical behavior. In earlier years, the use of torture to extract the truth was a common method. Studies show that under the pressure of torture, any human will do whatever is necessary to ensure survival and therefore say whatever he or she has to for the pain to stop. Multiple examples have been shown with the use of torture in Guantanamo Bay where bad information was given to interrogators because the suspects gave whatever information he or she thought would stop the torture. Police brutality in the early 1900s is also an example of techniques that previously incorporated to extract information. Because of ethical practices, more specifically deontological ethics, a transformation of interrogation techniques has become more prevalent. According to Skolnick and Leo, (1992), “Since the 1960s, and especially since Miranda, police brutality during interrogation has virtually disappeared in America. Although one occasionally reads about or hears reports of physical violence during custodial questioning, police observers and critics agree that the use of physical coercion during interrogation is now exceptional” (para. 1). Deontological ethics bases the ethics of morals with regard to rules and duty. It does not matter what good can come from an act if the act itself violates the rules of the governing body. Essentially, there are actions of right and wrong, and it does not matter what the intentions are behind said acts. Torture is a wrong act and violates the rules set forth by the United States Constitution. Therefore, law enforcement personnel needed to adapt a new way of extracting the truth without violating the rules. Interrogators use psychological procedures to present a situation in which the suspect will give the truth voluntarily versus physical coercion. Much like a magician diverts and distracts the audience in one direction so that no one pays attention to what really is happening.
Scholars and critics agree that John E. Reid is the father of the modern day criminal interrogation. There are nine steps to Reid’s techniques: direct confrontation, deflection, dominance, turning objections into justifications, expressing empathy, offering alternative themes, posing the alternative question, repetition, and documentation (Ury, 2009). When put into practice, investigators find that using these techniques result in successful confessions than the use of physical coercion. Direct confrontation is the simple method of presenting all the evidence in front of the suspect in the hope that the suspect will opt to tell the truth rather than continue with a lie. Dominance is the art by which the investigator dominates the conversation by presenting all the evidence and giving the scenario of the crime in detail. The act of dominance prevents the suspect from interjecting denial and does not allow lessons the opportunity for the suspect to request a lawyer. Turning objections into justifications occurs when the suspect has given some sort of character-based reason for not committing the crime. Investigators are able to twist the words of the suspect into a justification for why he or she had reason to commit the crime. For example, a suspect says that he or she hates violence and an investigator changes the context of the statement to an acceptable excuse of the suspect did not really want to commit murder (Ury). Expressing empathy is the most common technique because it shows how the interrogator can relate to the suspect’s feelings. Empathy and justification give the suspect a false sense of security and therefore allows him or her to rationalize the crime into an acceptable norm. Offering alternative themes occurs when the interrogator believes the suspect has gone quiet and therefore offers up multiple scenarios or motives to invoke a reaction. If the interrogator discovers a reaction to a scenario he or she will offer alternative themes. By offering alternative themes with one situation possessing a more acceptable social norm, the suspect may choose the safer option even though both result in guilt. Repetition and documentation are similar in which the suspect has given a confession and the interrogator ensures that the confession is recorded on paper as well as verified by other law enforcement personnel. These techniques are not full proof as it takes experience from the interrogator to recognize not only voluntarily given information but also recognizing the key nonverbal communication cues from the suspect.
Nonverbal Communication
Despite an individual’s best efforts when telling a lie there are nonverbal communications cues that ultimately will give the lie away. Physical behavior by an individual is not solely the actual behavior that an individual’s body acts but a combination of voice variation, unconscious body movements, and the manner of how an individual speaks grammatically. The physical behavior that experts focus on are heart rate, blood pressure, skin conductance, respiration, heat emanation from faces/heads, pupil dilation, and gaze directions (Matsumoto, Hwang, Skinner, & Frank, 2011). Investigators who have skills with the lie detector machines can detect a lie with a high level of certainty by measuring an individual’s heart rate during questioning. According to United Kingdom, (n.d.), “When people lie, they put themselves in a state of stress. Adrenaline floods the body, the heart beats faster, muscles tense, blood vessels dilate, pupils shrink, the need for nicotine increases and breathing becomes faster” (para. 4). Involuntary nonverbal cues also play a role when an individual is attempting to lie.
An individual suddenly might cross legs or arms, force eye contact or avoid eye contact, touch his or her mouth, and face his or her palms downwards. The act of hiding the palms of the hands interprets the intent to hide something. Palms facing up show a sign of nothing to hide. The example of the magician using techniques to distract or conceal the truth always has his or her hands facing down. During testimonial processes lawyers pay close attention to the witness’s nonverbal cues to direct the line of questioning he or she might use to extract the truth. The art of recognizing key nonverbal communication cues is not unethical but instead a key skill of observation to find the truth.
Conclusion
Investigators, interrogators, lawyers, and law enforcement professionals have come a long way from the unethical and immoral practices of finding the truth from people. The techniques in use today are in the grey area of ethics but are not completely unethical. The art of deception in interrogation to extract the truth so that justice is fulfilled outweighs the possible violation of ethical practice. Because deception cannot fully be proven unjust by deontological ethics it therefore is a valid procedure. Observing nonverbal communication cues is definitely not unethical and when combined with Reid’s nine techniques of interviewing can be a profound success. Paul St. Claire said it best, “Like an old married couple, the body and brain rarely agree to say the same thing” (1964 - ).

References
Matsumoto, D., Hwang, H.S., Skinner, L., & Frank, M. (2011 June). Evaluating Truthfulness and
Detecting Deception. Retrieved from http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/law-enforcement-bulletin/june_2011/school_violence Skolnick, J., & Leo, R. (1992, Winter/Spring). The Ethics of Deceptive Interrogation. Criminal Justice Ethics, 11(1).
United Kingdom. (n.d.). Body Language Lies and Lying. Retrieved from http://www.reading-body-language.co.uk/body-language-lying.html Ury, A.B. (2009 June 8). Modern Police Interrogation Techniques Use Subtle Psychological
Manipulation. Retrieved from http://news.everest.edu/post/2009/06/modern-police-interrogation-techniques