Improving the interviewing of suspected sex offenders

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Improving the interviewing of suspected sex
offenders
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Why bother?

• For a sample of 4,023 male and female children
  aged between 12 and 17, 8.1 had been sexually
  assaulted (Ashcroft, Daniels, Hart, 2003).
• Between 20 and 30 of females in the United
  States suffer at least one rape or rape attempt
  in their lifetime (Ellis, 1989 Koss Oros,
  1982 Muehlenhard Linton, 1987).
• Sexual offences are reasonably frequent.

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Why bother?

• Sexual offences are often difficult to
  investigate and prosecute.
• Many victims do not report sexual crime
  (Clay-Warner Burt, 2005).
• When they do, conviction rates are low compared
  with other crimes (Greenfield, 1997)

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Why bother?

• Confessions make a conviction almost inevitable
  (Kassin Neumann, 1997)
• Means the victim does not have to give evidence
  in court (Epstein, Saunders, Kilpatrick, 1997
  Mackey et al., 1992).

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How can we increase confession rates for sex
offenders?

• Why are sex offenders different?
• What is likely to influence an offenders
  decision to confess?
• Asking sex offenders about how they were
  interviewed, how they think the police should
  interview, and responses to vignettes
• Implications for interviewing

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Why are sex offenders different?

• Police officers appear to hold more negative
  attitudes towards sex offenders (Holmberg
  Christianson, 2002).
• Stigma is associated with sexual offending
  (McGrath, 1990 Quinn, Forsyth, Mullen-Quinn,
  2004)
• Sex offenders often have personality deficits
  (e.g., Fisher, Beech, Browne, 1999)

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Why are sex offenders different?

• Sex offenders often have distorted ways of
  thinking about their victims (Swaffer, Hollin,
  Beech, Beckett, Fisher, 1999 Ward, Hudson,
  Johnston, Marshall, 1997).
• The principle source of evidence is likely to be
  eyewitness evidence (Eastwood Patton, 2002
  Kebbell, Hatton, Johnson, 2004 Home Office,
  1998)

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What is likely to influence an offenders
decision to confess?

• Research suggests that many factors may impact
  (Kassin Gudjonsson, 2004 Gudjonsson, 2003
  Holmberg Christianson, 2002 Leo, 1996).
• Of particular importance humanity and dominance
  minimization and maximization strength of
  evidence, and, ethical interviewing.

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Humanity and Dominance

• Holmberg Christianson (2002) surveyed 83 sex
  offenders of murderers.
• Friendliness, the suspect feeling acknowledged
  and respected as a human being, and a feeling of
  co-operation (humanity) increased the likelihood
  of a confession

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Humanity and Dominance

• Aggression, hostility, insulting and condemning
  behaviour which they labelled dominance was
  associated with reduced likelihood of confession.

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Minimization and maximization

• Minimization occurs when the interviewer reduces
  the consequence of the crime, for example, saying
  the suspect didnt mean the offence to happen.
• Maximization occurs when the interviewer
  emphasizes the consequences of not confessing,
  e.g., it will be worse for you if you dont
  confess

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Minimization and Maximization

• There is field and laboratory data to support
  minimization (Leo, 1996 Russano et al., 2005)

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Strength of Evidence

• The stronger the evidence the more likely a
  suspect is to confess (Gudjonsson, 2003 Kebbell,
  Hurren, Roberts, 2006).

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Ethical interviewing

• Ethical interviewing can be defined as an
  open-minded approach to determining the truth
  rather than simply seeking a confession (Milne
  Bull, 1999). Such a search for truth, consistent
  with avoiding reactance (Brehm, 1962), may
  increase the likelihood of confession.

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Cognititve Distortions

• Displaying an understanding of the cognitive
  distortions typically held by sex offenders
  should increase the likelihood of a confession
  because, 1) this display indicates that the
  officer understands the way the offender thinks,
  2) displaying this understanding whilst not
  becoming aggressive indicates the officer will
  not become aggressive if the suspect confesses.
  Both reduce the consequences of confessing.

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Kebbell, Mazerolle, Hurren (2005)

• Thanks to
• Criminology Research Council
• Crime and Misconduct Commission
• Queensland Department of Corrective Services
• Queensland Police Service
• Participants

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What do sex offenders think?

• Tested 41 participants, all convicted of a sex
  offence and incarcerated.
• Mean participant age was 48.08 years (SD11.87),
  with a range of 25 to 79.
• The mean length of sentence was 6.48 years
  (SD3.34)

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Method

• 35 Item questionnaire concerning their own
  experience of being interviewed by the police
  covering
• Ethical interviewing
• Humanity
• Dominance
• Minimization
• Maximization
• Evidence
• Cognitive distortions

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Method

• 35 item questionnaire concerning how how the
  police can interview to ensure a sex offender is
  most likely to confess.
• Vignettes concerning mock crimes and interviews
  where the participant has to rate the characters
  likelihood of confessing

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Offenders perceptions of the efficacy of the
different strategies

• Participants were required to rate the likelihood
  of different suspects confessing to police
  officers in the different interview conditions.
  An ANOVA was significant, F (3,117) 13.38, p lt
  .001.

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Vignettes

• In relation to the control interview (M 6.10,
  SD 2.02) participants rated the characters as
  being less likely to confess in the dominant
  interview (M 4.55, SD 2.53). Participants
  rated the characters as being more likely,
  compared with the control interview, to confess
  in the humanistic interview (M 7.30, SD
  1.91). There was no difference between the
  cognitive distortions interview (M 6.35, SD
  1.85) and the control.

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Implications

• To increase the likelihood of confessions it
  appears that interviewing officers should
• Interview ethically
• Interview with humanity
• Not interview in a dominant fashion
• Present strong evidence
• Display an understanding of cognitive distortions