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British Police using lie detectors

zooterkin

Nitpicking dilettante, Administrator
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zooterkin
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OMFG.

Police have begun using lie detector tests on suspected sex offenders in a trial which could be widened.

Hertfordshire Police confirmed it had been using polygraphs, which monitor heart rate, brain activity, sweating and blood pressure, during questioning.

The pilot scheme was being used to help decide whether to charge suspects, according to The Times.

But the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo) said the tests were at a very early stage.
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Let's hope that sanity prevails; the article seems fairly even-handed, though the way it was being reported on TV suggested it was likely that the trial would be extended.

(The original Times article is behind a pay-wall.)

ETA: I did find this article from two years ago, on a related topic. Haven't found a follow-up to that, yet, as that was supposed to be a 3 year trial.

Sex offenders released from prison will be compelled to take lie detector tests as part of their probation conditions, the Ministry of Justice said yesterday.

A three-year pilot project will start in the Midlands this week. Between 350 and 450 offenders are expected to be tested over the next three years; any who refuse face being sent back to jail.

Professor Don Grubin, who will conduct the tests, said: "It is part of a package aimed at preventing new sex offences. Disclosures made during polygraph examinations, as well as conclusions drawn from passed or failed examinations, let probation officers and the police intervene to reduce risk."
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A bit more from the PA:

The force is reported to have completed a successful pilot scheme in November in which 25 "low level" sex offenders were tested.

Many were exposed as being a higher risk to children than originally thought, The Times reported, and a further 12-month trial has been approved to begin in April.
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I wonder how they will use the results of the study? Compare the re-offending rates of people listed as high risk with those listed as low risk? Or maybe just condemn those judged as high risk, throw them back into jail.
 
Thank you for posting this, Zooterkin. I saw the story too. The BBC news website piece leaves behind more confusion than it clears up. E.g.:

"Evidence elicited during the examinations is not admissible at court."
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Ok, that's a relief, but then the article continues by saying that Hertfordshire Police will use the lie detector test as an "additional tool" without going into detail as to how. Then we are told that the test can "cut down investigative time significantly", again without further elaboration. How can a test that can show up duff readings, thereby complicating an already complex situation for a crime investigation team, "cut down investigative time significantly"? It doesn't make any sense to me at all.

Further down the page, I find it unsettling to read that the chap from the British Polygraph Association considers someone's refusal to take a test was a "mark of insight". How, exactly, Mr Polygraph Association? Maybe that individual refuses to take a lie detector test because they know how inaccurate they are, not because they're trying to hide something.

Can anyone with more knowledge of lie dectector tests, and how they are used by police in other countries, shed some light on this please?
 
I wonder if it's mainly used as a scare tool, like "TV Detector Vans"?

If you can convince someone that he can't lie to the gadget, you may gget to the truth a shade faster. Of course, if he knows you're lying, he may bluff better'n you do.
Question of interest is - who's smarter- cops or crooks?
 
Soapy Sam said:
I wonder if it's mainly used as a scare tool, like "TV Detector Vans"?

If you can convince someone that he can't lie to the gadget, you may gget to the truth a shade faster. Of course, if he knows you're lying, he may bluff better'n you do.
Question of interest is - who's smarter- cops or crooks?
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But that's unethical. Scaring people leads to false positive results.
 
Nobody should agree to take a lie detector test administered by law enforcement, because no good can ever come of it. If you pass, its not admissable in court in your defense, and the police can still tell themselves that psychopaths and pathological liars are known to be able to pass polygraph tests. If you fail, while it still can't be used against you in court, it will encourage the police to focus even harder on you as a suspect. They might also leak the results of the polygraph to the press, thus prejudicing the public against you.

Just say no.
 
Then the same lie detector tests should be used to examine the witnesses.
It's only fair
 
zooterkin said:
Police have begun using lie detector tests on suspected sex offenders in a trial which could be widened.
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Interesting that this unproven and possibly totally bogus technology is tested in live circumstances. OK you must test it somewhere, if you wish to ever learn how accurately it functions. But then...

Also draw legally applicable conclusions about the test results -- before you have proven that the technology produces results whose reliability would be superior to a wild guess or a coin toss -- and apply the said conclusions on real people:

zooterkin said:
to help decide whether to charge suspects
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WTF
zooterkin said:
conclusions drawn from passed or failed examinations, let probation officers and the police intervene to reduce risk to take an unknowable random risk.
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Corrected that "reduce risk" thing for them.

I think this is a bit more fair for the suspect, after all, than the good old Numbers 5:11-31 thing, where a woman suspected of adultery must drink Holy Water mixed with some nasty herbs -- and if she is innocent, she will survive the herb without her stomach bursting into pieces.
 
Well, in the USA is acceptable for police to use lie detectors for investigative purposes provided that:

The person being evaluated consents to the use of the lie detector, and that the results of the lie detector are not used in court.

However, several years ago I had the good fortune to talk honestly with a police officer who runs the lie detector program in his city, and what he found was best about the lie detector is that it would often scare people into confessing before the lie detector was actually used. And since the confession was done without the lie detector, then the confession could be used in court.

I expect that the British Police expect to use lie detectors in a similar way.
 
^ this.

The lie detectors will enable the Police to catch the same sort of people who respond to "You have won a new iPad....." operations.
 
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