Police Interviews With Victims And Suspects of Violent and Sexual Crimes; Interviewees' Experiences and Interview Outcomes

Abstract

The police interview is one of the most important investigative tools that law enforcement has close at hand, and police interview methods have changed during the twentieth century. A good police interview is conducted in the frame of the law, is governed by the interview goal, and is influenced by facilitating factors that may affect the elicited report. The present doctoral dissertation focuses on police interviews in cases of very serious crimes of violence and sexual offences. Results reveal crime victims' and perpetrators' experiences of being interviewed and police officers' attitudes towards conducting interviews related to traumatizing crimes. Study 1 revealed that when police officers interviewed murderers and sexual offenders, the interviewees perceived attitudes characterized by either dominance or humanity. Police interviews marked by dominance and suspects' responses of anxiety were mainly associated with a higher proportion of denials, whereas an approach marked by humanity, and responses of being respected were significantly associated with admissions. In line with Study 1, the victims of rape and aggravated assault in Study 2 also revealed the experience of two police interview styles, where an interviewing style marked by dominance and responses of anxiety was significantly associated with crime victims' omissions of information. Moreover, a humanitarian interviewing style, and crime victims' feelings of being respected and cooperative, was significantly related to crime victims providing all information from painful events. Special squad police officers' attitudes towards interviewing crime victims, in Study 3, also showed a humanitarian approach and two dominant approaches, one affective and the other refusing. The attitude towards interviewing suspects of crimes in focus revealed humanitarian and dominant interviewing attitudes, and an approach marked by kindness. The present thesis shows that, during their entire career, an overwhelming majority of the special squad police officers have experienced stressful events during patrol as well as investigative duty. Results show that symptoms from stressful event exposures and coping mechanisms are associated with negative attitudes towards interviewing suspects and supportive attitudes towards crime victim interviews. Thus, experiences from stressful exposures may automatically activate egodefensive functions that automatically generate dominant attitudes. Moreover, it is important to offer police officers who have been exposed to stressful events the opportunity to work through their experiences, for example, through debriefing procedures. After debriefings, police officers are better prepared to meet crime victims and suspects and, through conscious closed-loop processes, to conduct police interviews without awaking ego-defensive functions.

The Impact of Question Type and Empathy on Police Interviews with Suspects of Homicide, Filicide and Child Sexual Abuse

“…As such, no evidence was found to support the overall arguments made by Holmberg and Christianson (2002) and Kebbell et al (2006) that empathic interviews should be "better" on some measure than non-empathic ones. Of course, this could be due to various factors, including: (1) the relatively low use of empathy in the present study À which is worthy of note in itself; (2) that the definition of empathy put forward in the present study does not capture what Holmberg and Christianson (2002), and Kebbell et al (2006) meant by empathy;and (3) that in the present study, confessions by the suspect were not included in the analysis (contrary to the studies by Holmberg andChristianson, 2002 andKebbell et al, 2006). This was because in England and Wales, where the present study was conducted, police officers do not conduct investigative interviews to obtain confessions (Milne & Bull, 1999).…”

“…This is especially so if those officers involved suffer with vicarious traumatization from accumulated traumarelated events, which could influence their attitudes towards suspects (Pearlman & MacIan, 1993;Saakvitne & Pearlman, 1996). Indeed, Holmberg (2004) found that officers who had been exposed to traumatizing events held more negative attitudes when interviewing suspects of sexual offences, and that stressful event exposure was directly related to police officers' self-reported negative attitudes towards interviewing such suspects À this may well only serve to generate some kind of avoidance to the suspect.…”

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

“…Being 'humane' has been found to be a very low priority for police interviewers (Holmberg, 2004), as has empathy, regardless of whether they were interviewing victims or suspects; a finding that is likely to be exacerbated when the crimes are of a particularly serious nature. Indeed, more recent research indicates that police officers find it difficult to adopt a sensitive or humane approach with interviewees accused of particular types of crimes (e.g.…”

“…Research indicates that police officers often adopt markedly different 'styles' when conducting interviews with suspects, and that their style often depends upon the type of crime a person is suspected of having committed (Holmberg, 2004). 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).…”

Police officers' views of effective interview tactics with suspects: The effects of weight of case evidence and discomfort with ambiguity

“…Baldwin, 1992;Cherryman & Bull, 2001;Holmberg, 2004;Pearse & Gudjonsson, 1999), The list of tactics was further discussed with two experienced homicide investigators in order to ensure that no relevant tactics would be missing from the list. The tactics were drawn from the literature and books regarding police interview (e.g.…”