Police interrogation practice in Slovenia

Interrogation techniques are well explored, but in Slovenia it has remained unknown what interrogation techniques are used and what the basic characteristics of suspect interrogations are. The Slovenian interrogation manual proposes some coercive interrogation techniques and neglects their weaknesses. The aim of the current study was to examine Slovenian police officers’ beliefs as to the basic characteristics of their interrogations and whether techniques proposed by the manual are used in practice to begin to provide some insight into what actually happens in such interrogations. A survey instrument was used to obtain selfreport data from a sample of criminal investigators. From 86 completed questionnaires it was found that a typical interrogation of a suspect lasts around 90 minutes and is not recorded. Interviewers typically use three interrogation techniques namely (i) conducting interrogations in isolation; (ii) identifying contradictions in the suspect’s story; and (iii) confronting the suspect with evidence. Findings suggest that some coercive interrogation techniques are used in practice (e.g. offering moral justifications, alluding to have evidence of guilt, good cop/bad cop routine, and minimization). The study is the first insight into the practices of Slovenian investigators when questioning suspects. Differences among general, white-collar and organized crime investigators are also discussed

Znanstvena izhodišča, zanesljivost in veljavnost tehnik za ugotavljanje besednega zavajanja

The paper focuses on a comparison of three techniques mostly used for verbal detection of deceit. Criteria-Based Content Analysis (CBCA) is considered a scientifically grounded, standardized, empirically tested, valid and reliable technique for veracity detection of witnesses' and victims' accounts. Similar conclusions may be drawn for Reality Monitoring (RM) techniques, which have a comparable accuracy of 70% in making decisions about the veracity of analysed accounts, but it is considered less standardized. In comparison to the RM, which is not well tested in the context of crime investigations, the CBCA is a more time-consuming and professionally demanding procedure. Contrary to previously mentioned techniques, the Scientific Content Analysis (SCAN) is considered as a pseudoscientific procedure without sound scientific grounding, relying on uncorroborated assumptions by its proponents. It is an unstandardized technique, results of which are influenced by the subjectivity of interrogators affect in the results. Research shows that the SCAN technique is ineffective in detecting deceit, and furthermore, decisions made by practitioners are under the influence of their expectations and previously gained knowledge about a suspect. Criminal investigators should therefore be discouraged from using the SCAN technique due to its ineffectiveness. The technique also leads to chance guessing about deception of suspects and therefore, to unjustified exclusion of guilty suspects and to unjustified accusations of innocent suspects. In contrast, the CBCA and the RM are 70% accuracy, snf useful in criminal investigation; however, it should be emphasized that their results may have an indicative value for criminal investigators but no evidence value due to their deficiencies

L’analyse de la communication non verbale: Les dangers de la pseudoscience en contextes de sécurité et de justice

For security and justice professionals, the thousands of peer-reviewed articles on nonverbal communication represent important sources of knowledge. However, despite the scope of the scientific work carried out on this subject, professionals can turn to programs, methods and approaches that fail to reflect the state of science. The objective of this article is to examine (i) concepts of nonverbal communication conveyed by these programs, methods and approaches, but also (ii) the consequences of their use. To achieve this objective, we describe the scope of scientific research on nonverbal communication. A program (SPOT; “Screening of Passengers by Observation Techniques”), a method (the BAI; “Behavior Analysis Interview”) and an approach (synergology) that each run counter to the state of science are examined. Finally, we outline five hypotheses to explain why some organizations in the fields of security and justice are turning to pseudoscience and pseudoscientific techniques