Seeking or controlling the truth? An examination of courtroom questioning practices by Canadian lawyers*

ABSTRACT

The questioning practices of Canadian lawyers were examined. Courtroom examinations (N?=?91) were coded for the type of utterance, the assumed purpose of the utterance, and the length of utterance. Results showed that approximately one-fifth of all utterances were classified as productive for gathering reliable information (i.e. open-ended, probing); less than one percent of all utterances were open-ended. Direct examinations contained more closed yes/no, probing, and open-ended questions. Cross-examinations contained more leading and clarification questions, and opinions. Moreover, cross- (vs. direct) examinations contained more questions with a ‘challenging the witness’ purpose. The longest utterances were opinions, followed by multiple and forced-choice questions. The longest answers were in response to open-ended questions, followed by multiple and probing questions. Implications for the truth-seeking function of the judiciary are discussed.     

A field study of adult witness interviewing practices in a Canadian police organization

Purpose. The current study examined witness interviewing practices in a Canadian police organization. The effect of interviewer, interviewee, and interview characteristics on those practices was also examined. Method. Ninety witness interviews from a Canadian police organization were coded for the following interviewing practices: types of questions asked (i.e. open‐ended, probing, closed‐ended, clarification, multiple, leading, opinion/statement, and re‐asked), the number of interruptions, percentage of words spoken by interviewer, type of pre‐interview instructions (consequential vs. generic), and whether or not a free narrative was requested (and when requested during the interview). Characteristics pertaining to the interviewer (e.g. primary interviewer's age), interviewee (e.g. witness gender), and interview (e.g. crime type) were also coded. Results. Results showed that closed‐ended and probing questions were the most widely asked questions, and that open‐ended questions were asked relatively infrequently. It was also found that the 80–20 talking rule was violated in 89% of the interviews, interviewers rarely interrupted the witnesses, and free narratives were requested often. Overall, the effect of interviewer, interview, or interviewee characteristics on interviewing practices was minimal. Conclusions. The finding that scientifically prescribed interviewing practices are employed rarely by Canadian police officers highlights a need for increased professional interviewing training. The finding that practices are largely unaffected by personal and situational factors suggests that such training would be equally beneficial for all types of interviewers, interviewees, and contexts.     

Simply Criminal: Predicting Burglars’ Occupancy Decisions with a Simple Heuristic

Rational choice theories of criminal decision making assume that offenders weight and integrate multiple cues when making decisions (i.e., are compensatory). We tested this assumption by comparing how well a compensatory strategy called Franklin’s Rule captured burglars’ decision policies regarding residence occupancy compared to a non-compensatory strategy (i.e., Matching Heuristic). Forty burglars each decided on the occupancy of 20 randomly selected photographs of residences (for which actual occupancy was known when the photo was taken). Participants also provided open-ended reports on the cues that influenced their decisions in each case, and then rated the importance of eight cues (e.g., deadbolt visible) over all decisions. Burglars predicted occupancy beyond chance levels. The Matching Heuristic was a significantly better predictor of burglars’ decisions than Franklin’s Rule, and cue use in the Matching Heuristic better corresponded to the cue ecological validities in the environment than cue use in Franklin’s Rule. The most important cue in burglars’ models was also the most ecologically valid or predictive of actual occupancy (i.e., vehicle present). The majority of burglars correctly identified the most important cue in their models, and the open-ended technique showed greater correspondence between self-reported and captured cue use than the rating over decision technique. Our findings support a limited rationality perspective to understanding criminal decision making, and have implications for crime prevention.     

Validities and abilities in criminal profiling: a critique of the studies conducted by Richard Kocsis and his colleagues

In a recent issue of this journal, Kocsis reviewed the criminal profiling research that he and his colleagues have conducted during the past 4 years. Their research examines the correlates of profile accuracy with respect to the skills of the individual constructing the profile, and it has led Kocsis to draw conclusions that are important to the profiling field. In this article, the authors review the contributions of the Kocsis studies and critique their methodological and conceptual foundations. The authors raise a number of concerns and argue that data from the Kocsis studies fail to support many of the conclusions presented in his recent review. The authors present evidence in support of their assertions and provide recommendations that will allow future research in the area to generate data that are more meaningful and generalizable.     

Witness Interview Training: a Field Evaluation

The effect of a witness interviewing training program on interviewing performance in actual investigations was examined. Eighty interviews, conducted by police officers in one Canadian organization, were coded for the presence of 38 desirable practices. Results showed that, in general, trained interviewers outperformed their untrained counterparts. Specifically, there was a large improvement in engage and explain behaviors (d = 1.65), a moderate improvement in account behaviors (d = 0.54), and a large improvement in closure behaviors (d = 0.90). Trained interviewers also used more open-ended questions and fewer leading questions. The implications of the findings for transferring interviewing skills from the classroom to the field are discussed.     

Don’t stop believing: the relative impact of internal alibi details on judgments of veracity

The relative impact of five alibi components on the assessment of alibi veracity was investigated using a policy-capturing methodology. Participants (N?=?115) were instructed to assume the role of a homicide investigator and evaluate 32 alibis that varied on five dichotomous variables: Salaciousness; Legality; Change in Details; Superfluous Details; and Specific Details. Participants evaluated the believability of each alibi, and the likelihood of the alibi provider’s guilt. Results indicated that participants tended to disbelieve suspects when illegal or salacious behaviours were mentioned within the alibi. Few decision policies contained Change in Details, Superfluous Details, or Specific Details. The potential implications for alibi assessments during police investigations are discussed.     

A Failure to Find Empirical Support for the Homology Assumption in Criminal Profiling

A fundamental assumption in criminal profiling is that criminals who exhibit similar crime scene actions have similar background characteristics. We tested this so-called homology assumption by first classifying, with pre-existing typologies, a sample of arsons (N = 87) and robberies (N = 177) into different crime types and then comparing the background characteristics of criminals who committed the various crime types. Results showed that using pre-existing typologies to classify the crimes into mutually exclusive types was not easily accomplished. Notwithstanding classification difficulties, the homology assumption was violated in 56% of the comparisons of background characteristics between the different arson types and in 67% of the comparisons of background characteristics between the different robbery types. Overall, 73% of the effect sizes for the associations between crime type and background characteristics were low to moderate (V < .3; d < .2). The implications of these findings for profiling practices are discussed.

Assessing the validity of white-collar crime definitions using experimental survey data

Journal of Experimental Criminology - We examine the extent to which the characteristics of offenders, the circumstance of offending, and offense characteristics affect public willingness to label...