Professional Documents
Culture Documents
The Psychology of Police Investigations
The Psychology of Police Investigations
The Psychology of
Police Investigations
Outline
Police Interrogations
The Reid model of interrogation
Interrogations and the courts
False Confessions
Types of false confessions
Criminal Profiling
Profiling approaches
Problems with profiling
Police Investigations
Rely on witnesses, victims, and suspects to fill
in the details surrounding the crime
Who was involved, what happened, where
and when did it happen, how did it happen,
why did it happen
Evidence is collected through interviews,
interrogations, and confessions
Police Interrogations
Interrogation Techniques
interrogations is becoming
more common
Benefits include:
Protects police against false
allegations of abuse
Protects citizens from police coercion
Allows courts to make informed
decisions
False Confessions
A false confession occurs when an individual
confesses to a crime they did not commit or
exaggerates their involvement in a crime they
did commit
Must be distinguished from a disputed and a
retracted confession
Three types of false confessions:
Voluntary
Coerced-compliant
Coerced-internalized
Coerced-Compliant False
Confessions
A coerced-compliant false confession
occurs in response to a desire to escape
further interrogation or to gain a promised
reward
The confessor knows that they did not
commit the crime
An example: Gerry Conlon and the IRA
bombings
Coerced-Internalized False
Confession
A coerced-internalized false confession
results from highly suggestive interrogations
The confessor comes to believe that they did
commit the crime (i.e., internalizes)
Some people, such as those with learning
disabilities, are more susceptible to this type
of confession (Gudjonsson, 1992)
An example: The Paul Ingram case
(continued)
No False Evidence
False Evidence
Fast
Pace
Slow
Pace
Fast
Pace
Slow
Pace
Compliance
Internalization
35%
0
65%
12%
89%
44%
100%
65%
Confabulation
6%
35%
Criminal Profiling
Criminal profiling is a technique for
identifying the personality and
behavioural features of an offender based
on an analysis of the crimes they have
committed
Most frequently used in homicide and rape
cases
Approaches to Profiling
Organized-Disorganized Model
Organized-Disorganized Model
(continued)
Organized-Disorganized Model:
Problems
Little research has examined the model, but
that which has been conducted raises serious
doubts (Canter et al., 2004)
Cannot account for offenders who display a
mix of organized and disorganized features
(Douglas et al., 1992)
Geographic Profiling
Geographic profiling involves an
analysis of crime scene locations in order
to determine the most probable area of
offender residence
Assumes that offenders do not travel long
distances from home to commit the
majority of their crimes
In many cases geographic profiles can be
quite accurate (Rossmo, 2000)
Racial Profiling
Racial profiling refers to any police
initiated action that uses race to make
decisions regarding an individual
One common form of racial profiling is
stopping and searching vehicles when it is
believed that a persons race does not
match the type of car driven
Empirical research does not support the
use of racial profiling (Lamberth, 1999)