How do sex offenders think the police should interview to elicit confessions from sex offenders?

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to explore sex offenders' perceptions of how the police should interview suspected sex offenders to facilitate confessions, and to investigate whether there is a relationship between sex offenders' perceptions of how the police interviewed them and their decisions to confess or deny. Forty-three convicted sex offenders were interviewed using two 35-item questionnaires that contained five questions on each of seven interviewing strategies. An additional 20 violent offenders were included for comparison purposes. The strategies were evidence presenting strategies, ethical interviewing, displays of humanity, displays of dominance, use of minimization and maximization techniques, and demonstrating an understanding of sex offenders' cognitive distortions. One questionnaire concerned how the police should interview sex offenders and the other concerned how they perceived the police who interviewed them. Generally speaking, evidence presenting strategies, ethical interviewing, and displays of humanity were perceived to increase the likelihood of a confession. Interviewer dominance was perceived to be associated with a reduction in the likelihood of a confession. Interviewing suspects 3 Sex offences are difficult to prove because prosecutions typically rely on the victim's word against that of the offender and, unlike many other offences, sex offences most often occur within personal settings with few corroborating witnesses (Greenfield, 1997). Consequently, confession evidence can prove invaluable because the likelihood of securing a conviction is greatly increased (Kassin & Neumann, 1997; but see also Gudjonsson, 2003, for a discussion of the problems associated with false confessions). Further, confessions reduce the likelihood of the victim having to give evidence in court, thereby countering the potentially negative impact on the victim of testifying (Epstein,

Evaluating police interviewing practices with suspects in child-sexual abuse cases

“…While a number of areas requiring progress have been discussed, overall interviewers adopted an approach that appeared ethical and humane. This is consistent with the current guidelines for interviewing suspects in Australia and the UK (Gudjonsson and Sigurdsson 2000, Holmberg and Christianson 2002, Beauregard et al 2010, Kebbell et al 2010) and with Soukara et al's (2009) findings. Despite commonly held misconceptions about the dramatic nature of police interviews from popular television programs, our study supports the assertions of Dixon (2009), who argued that interviewing can be improved by interviewers practicing everyday social skills in the interview room, such as good eye-contact, active listening and appropriate follow-up questioning.…”

Japanese Suspect Interviews, Confessions, and Related Factors

“…According to Beauregard et al (2010), sexual offenders may be unique; less likely to confess their crimes because of the objective and subjective severity of these offences, personal experiences of humiliation and shame during the interrogation, and the police officers' negative demeanor during interrogation (Beauregard et al 2010). Further, several studies (e.g., Holmberg and Christianson 2002;Kebbell et al 2010) have demonstrated that different interviewing techniques are used when interrogating sexual as opposed to violent offenders. Therefore, we examined the type of offense as one factor influencing suspects' confessions.…”

“…When the evidence is strong, suspects are more likely to confess (Cassell and Hayman 1996;Moston et al 1992). Certain police techniques such as adoption of a humanitarian approach (Holmberg and Christianson 2002;Kebbell et al 2010), minimization and maximization (Horgan et al 2012), and showing understanding of the suspect's actions (Kebbell et al 2010) also help to elicit confessions from guilty suspects.…”

“…Most researchers (e.g., Kebbell et al 2010;Leo 1996) have only examined interviewing styles and/or suspects' confessions. However, Holmberg et al (2007) examined the relationship between interviews and offenders' psychological wellbeing by questioning murderers and sexual offenders.…”

Police officers’ perceptions of interviews in cases of sexual offences and murder involving children and adult victims

“…Two distinct styles are referred to in the recent literature, namely humane or dominant (see Holmberg & Christianson, 2002;Kebbell, Alison, Hurren, & Mazerolle, 2010;Kebbell, Hurren, & Mazerolle, 2006). Dominant interviewing is characterised by aggressive and hostile interviewer behaviour, whereas humane interviewing is marked by a less confrontational, more empathic and respectful attitude by the interviewer.…”