interviewing
by David E. Zulawski, CFI, CFE and Shane G. Sturman, CFI, CPP
To Record or Not Record
© 2016 Wicklander-Zulawski & Associates, Inc.
W
e just returned from the International Association of Interviewers’ Elite Training Days in Minnesota at the Best Buy corporate headquarters. We had a number of wonderful speakers covering topics ranging from false confessions, the PEACE interviewing model, and Making a Murderer confession tapes evaluations, plus some tips on leadership. All in all it was an interesting and thought-provoking two days of instruction. One topic that seemed to form a connecting thread through many of the topics was a discussion of confessions,
The recording provides outstanding feedback to the interviewer that can’t be replicated by simply sitting in and observing the conversation. Undoubtedly, the supervisor will miss any number of potential critiques because he is listening in real time. contaminated statements, or improper tactics used by interviewers. The program started off with Steven Z. Kaplan, a litigator with the Fredrikson & Byron law firm discussing a case he worked on that was a miscarriage of justice. He along with other lawyers helped establish the individual’s innocence in a rape-homicide. He went on to discuss some of the causes of false confessions, including presentation of false evidence, age and mental capacity of the suspect, and length of the conversation, to name but a few.
Contaminated Confessions
One of the fundamental issues being addressed by legislatures across the country is the failure of police to record the interview and interrogation of suspects. A number
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Zulawski and Sturman are executives in the investigative and training firm of Wicklander-Zulawski & Associates (w-z.com). Zulawski is a senior partner, and Sturman is president. Sturman is also a member of ASIS International’s Retail Loss Prevention Council. They can be reached at 800-222-7789 or via email at dzulawski@w-z.com and ssturman@w-z.com.
of states have mandated the audio-video recording of police interrogations of suspects. The law firm Jenner & Block has an ongoing research project run by a senior partner to catalog states and cities that mandate recording of interviews and interrogations and the police response to having to record these conversations. This study is available on their website at jenner.com. Kaplan suggested the introduction of evidence by the police could contaminate the conversation and provide the suspect with information to make his confession seem credible when compared against the investigative findings. He went on to say that the use of false evidence and the extended length of interrogations can increase the possibility of a false confession occurring. Having a recording of the interview and interrogation can identify if the investigators fed the suspect investigative findings that were later used to corroborate the confession. Unfortunately, simply identifying points in the conversation where information was leaked to the suspect does not clearly identify the suspect’s statement as a false confession. It simply suggests that if the suspect was innocent, the crime scene information could have been introduced by the police. However, if the suspect was guilty, he would’ve already known that information regardless of whether it was leaked by the police or not. Simply stated, the discussion of evidence should be limited during the interview and interrogation so that contamination does not occur. Michael Yoder, supervisory special agent with the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit, discussed personality types that fit along with the discussion of false confession, which as we mentioned threaded through most of the presentations. Pulling the two previous discussions together, David Thompson, CFI, discussed the implications of these two presentations while discussing and evaluating the documentary Making a Murderer. Evaluating the recorded conversations in the Dassey interrogation, the group was able to critique the conversation and potential missteps that may have affected the suspect’s decision to confess. It was this session that brought up a significant conversation about organizations currently using recordings in their dishonest employee interviews. It is this topic we want to focus the remainder of this and our next column on.
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