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Reid Interrogation

AKA: Coercive and Deceptive Questioning

interrogate: to question formally and systematically<br><br>similar words: question, ask, probe

What is Reid Interrogation?

Reid Interrogation is the brand name for a method of asking questions that uses both coercion and deception as part of the technique. It was developed by John Reid and Frank Inbau in the late 50’s for interviewing and questioning suspects and at the time it was considered a major improvement from the “Third Degree”. The method was quickly adopted by law enforcement and continues its dominance today even though its effectiveness and accuracy have come under question over the past 15 to 20 years (and is no longer allowed in England, New Zealand or Australia).

3 Components of the Method

Factual Analysis:
Investigators estimate the likelihood that a suspect is guilty or innocent based on the investigative findings. They consider: Opportunity/Access, Attitude, Motivation, Biographical Information, and Evidence.  

This factual analysis is also intended to “identify characteristics about the suspect and the crime which will be helpful during an interrogation of the suspect believed to be guilty” such as motive or the suspect’s personality type. 1

The Interview: How Innocent People Become the Focus of Interrogation
The Reid interview process, called the Behavior Analysis Interview (BAI), is used to identify when people are lying, rather than to gather information. The former police officer who created the Reid Technique, believes that investigators can be trained to become accurate “human lie detectors.” As with a polygraph test, BAI questions start in a non-threatening manner. Investigators make the individual feel relaxed, often presenting themselves as someone who needs help understanding the situation. Then, behavior-provoking questions are asked to elicit both verbal and nonverbal responses, which the investigator assesses to determine if the person is lying and/or guilty.

The Interrogation
When Reid-trained investigators move into the Interrogation phase, they believe they have the guilty person. The goal is to determine why the suspect committed the crime rather than if they did, and to get a confession by using the Nine Steps of Interrogation. Those Steps of Interrogation involve the use of Maximization and Minimization techniques.

Maximization: Through the interview, the interrogator firmly asserts the suspect’s guilt and ignores any claims of innocence.

  • begins by stating the suspect is guilty
  • shares the investigator’s theory of the crime
  • exaggerates the strength of evidence (may or may not be completely fabricated)
  • exaggerate the charges suspect is facing

Minimization: after making it clear that claims of innocence won’t be believed, the interrogator downplays the seriousness of the offense, offering opportunities for the suspect to explain why they committed the crime. Common phrases include:

  • I just want to hear your side of the story.
  • Everyone makes mistakes. But it’s important that you man up and tell the truth.
  • I’m trying to help you. But I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me.

When They See Us, Ava DuVernay’s four-part Netflix film telling the story of the Central Park Five – now the Exonerated Five – clearly shows how the coercive and deceptive tactics can lead to a false confession.

Why is it a Problem?

Problems at Any Age

These are a few of the reasons Reid Interview and Interrogation is a problem at any age2:

  • Research has consistently shown found that humans, even those with training, are rarely better at detecting guilt through behavior analysis than a coin flip.3
  • Investigators are not only allowed to lie; they are encouraged to do so. Deception can take the form of lying about or misrepresenting the existence of evidence or witnesses against the suspect, setting time limits to “accept a deal”, and feigning concern for the suspect’s well-being.
  • Police mistakenly focus interrogation on a truthful suspect because they have misinterpreted a particular behavior as deceptive — once the wrong person is the focus of the interrogation anything can happen.
  • One problem with tricks and deceit is that both guilty and innocent suspects become more willing to confess.
  • Lengthy interrogations under difficult conditions (i.e., not able to use bathroom, restricted food and water), often conducted in isolation, can lead to confusion and disorientation in the average person. “On average, people who falsely confessed were interrogated for up to 16 hours before admitting to a crime they did not commit (research shows that the reliability of confessions is greatly reduced after a prolonged interrogation).”4

Reid and Learning or Intellectual Disabilities

Five people of different ages, gender and races stand next to each other against a purple background. Above them are the words: 1 in 5 adults has a Learning Disability. Below them are the words: Can you tell which one it is?<br><br>Below that one a cream background are the words: Estimated that 75% of offenders later identified to have intellectual disabilities were not identified as such at the time of arrest.
Image Footnote 5

Learning disabilities in adults and high school age youth may show up as:

  • Difficulty understanding abstract or complex concepts
  • Difficulty putting things in the right sequence
  • Frequently misreading information
  • Struggling to follow conversations
  • Difficulty following directions
  • Poor memory

Imagine these challenges in an interrogation room!

In April 2022 there were 3060 exonerations on the National Registry of Exonerations list. Of those, 12% involved a false confession. 33% of these false confessions were by people with a mental or intellectual disability

Learn about Youth and Reid Interrogation

Additional Resources

This video is 52 minutes long and has a few commercials. However, it is a great demonstration of how Reid Interrogation can lead to a wrongful conviction. The case happened in Detroit, Michigan.

Footnotes

  1. INTERROGATION TECHNIQUES (ct.gov) ↩︎
  2. John Reid & Associates have stated: “False confessions are not caused by the application of the Reid Technique . . . [but instead] are usually caused by interrogators engaging in improper behavior that is outside of the parameters of the Reid Technique”.
    Related Interesting Fact: one of the early cases that boosted John Reid’s career and his technique was that of Darrell Parker. Parker was accused of killing his wife in 1955. John Reid, himself interrogated him for 12 hours and obtained a confession.  Even though Mr. Parker recanted that confession almost immediately, he was found guilty – confessions carry substantial weight in court. Parker was exonerated in 1991 after another man confessed to killing Parker’s wife. The man who confessed had been interviewed by police before Parker and was determined not to be involved. ↩︎
  3. For example, in 1991, psychologists Paul Ekman and Maureen O’Sullivan tested groups of professionals on their abilities to detect lies. The results showed how accurate (or inaccurate) a person was at lie detection. Compared to college students, who averaged 53% (nearly the baseline in the lay population), police investigators were only able to detect 56% of lies, and so were polygraph examiners. Trial judges were at 57% and psychiatrists were at 58%. At the top end, US Secret Service agents averaged 65% (a result that has not since been replicated). Kassin, Saul, Ph.D. Duped (pp. 110-111). Prometheus ↩︎
  4. False Confessions – Innocence Project ↩︎
  5. Interrogated with Intellectual Disabilities: The Risk of False Confession, Samson D. Schatz, J.D., Stanford Law Review, Volume 70, 2018. ↩︎