police investigation and criminal profiling Flashcards
what are the criteria that would make a confession inadmissible in court?
- if the police made threates or promises
- if there was any inhumane conduct that caused an involuntary confession
- if the suspect does not have an operating mind
- if there was a lot of police trickery
what is the reid model of interrogation and its main goal
a three-part process with the primary objective of having the suspect confess to the crime (the goal is to make confessing to the crime more desirable than the anxiety of lying about it.
what are the three stages of the reid model of interrogation
1- gathering evidence related to the crime and to interview witnesses and victims
2- conducting a con-accusatorial interview of the suspect to assess any evidence of deception
3- conducting an accusatorial interrigation of the suspect in which a nine step procedure is implemented (good cop bad cop) (only is suspect was found to be deceptful in step 2)
explain the two general categories of the reid model techniques
-minimization techniques: soft cell tactics designed to lull the suspect into a false sense of security (good cop)
- maximization techniques: scare tactics designed to intimidate a suspect believed to be guilty (bad cop)
what are the potential problems with the reid model?
- deception detection is not always accurate
- investigator bias in which they believe that the suspect is guilty when they begin the interrogation
- the coercive nature of the interrogation (risk of false confession)
what is the peace model of interrogation?
- model based on information gathering rather than confession
- used for all parties involved (witness, victime, and suspect)
what are some of the psychological explanations of the advantages of the peace model over the reid model
- allowing ppl to talk w/o interruptions may allow them to rmb more things
- less susceptible to suggestions
name the types of false confessions
- voluntary
- coerced-compliant
- coerced-internalized
explain a voluntary false confession
- when someone voluntarily confesses to a crime they did not commit without any elicitation from the police
- for a desire for notoriety, being unable to distinguish fact from fantasy, the need to make up for pathological guilt by receiving punishment, desire to protect someone else from harm (common among juveniles)
explain a coerced-compliant false confession
- the suspect confesses to a crime, even though the suspect is fully aware that they did not commit it
- most common
- caused by the use of coercive interrogation techniques by the police
explain a coerced-internalized false confession
- confession to a crime they did not commit, but end up believing they actually committed the crime
- results from suggestive interrogation techniques
what are some of the consequences of false confessions?
- a jury could convict the suspect for a crime they did not commit
- may lead investigators down the wrong track; putting the public at further risk from the real offender
why are jurors unlikely to identify false confessions?
- it counters self-interest (makes no sense why someone would do that)
- difficulty to distinguish btwn the true n false confessions
- false confessions are very similar to true confessions in both their form and content
what is criminal profiling
an investigative technique for identifying major personality and behavioural caracs of an ind based upon an analysis of the crimes they have committed.
in what kind of crimes is criminal profiling used most commonly
serial homicide or rape (or other violent crimes) where the offender is unknown
modern profiling is often attributed to the work of which psychiatrist who offered clues to the possible identity of a suspect in which case
dr james brussel, mad bomber case
name some of the criticism of dr james brussel
- barnum statements:
- hindsight bias:
what does VCLAS stand for and what is its role and objective?
- violent crime linkage analysis system
- used by the rcmp to collect and analyse info on serious crimes from accross canada to reduce linkage blindness
what is linkage blindness?
inability to link geographically dispersed serial crimes committed by the same offender bc of lack of info sharing among police agencies
what are the five categories of profiling
- crime scene profiling
- geographic profiling
- psychological profiling
- suspect-based profiling
- psychological autopsy
what is crime scene profiling?
the process of identifying cognitive tendencies, behavioural patterns and emotional dispositions of a unknown offender based on caracs and evidence gathered at the scene of the crime
what are the two main approaches to crime scene profiling (and explain)
- deductive analysis: drawing a conclusion from what is already known about the case based on evidence from the crime scene
- inductive: making inferences from what is known about other solved cases, statistical averages of the caracs of the typical offender
explain the organized/disorganized dichotomy of the offender’s caracs
- organized: methodological, could be amicable, carries out crime far from their residence
- disorganized: lacks cunning, trouble maintaining relationships, commits crime closer to residence
explain the organized/disorganized dichotomy of the crime scene behaviour
- organized: deliberate, cold, systematic scene
- disorganized: chaotic and messy scene
