Original reporting and commentary about polygraphs, voice stress analyzers, and other purported "lie detectors."
Pasadena (California) Star News staff writer Emmanuel Parker reports in an article titled, “Fatal fire in 200[0] remains unsolved.” Excerpt: ALTADENA — Sometimes the simplest crimes are the hardest to solve. So it is with the death of Justine Marie Kaposy, 14, a popular Rose City High School student burned beyond recognition on December 3, …
P. Mitchell Prothero of United Press International reports that as part of a plea agreement between John Walker Lindh and federal prosecutors, Walker Lindh “will be required to cooperate with investigators, take repeated polygraph examinations, and appear as a witness in any trial at which he might be needed.” Prothero’s article on the plea deal …
Madelaine Vitale reports for The Press of Atlantic City (New Jersey). Excerpt: The prosecution’s key witness in the Lloyd Massey II triple-murder trial failed a polygraph. The jury never heard about the lie detector. While polygraphs are considered valuable tools in helping law enforcement rule out potential suspects in crimes or focus on a particular …
Stephen Beaven reports for The Oregonian. Excerpt: OREGON CITY — The mothers of two missing girls took lie-detector tests this week, family friends said Thursday. Lori Pond, the mother of Ashley Pond, and Michelle Duffey, the mother of Miranda Gaddis, took the tests at the Oregon City Police Department on Wednesday. An FBI spokeswoman declined …
Staff writer Sharron Haley reports for the Sumter, South Carolina Item. Excerpt: MANNING — In what some are calling a landmark decision, At-Large Circuit Court Judge Clifton Newman allowed a defense attorney to introduce results from a polygraph test in the murder trial of Anthony Ray White. White, who authorities say did not appear to …
Brian Toohey writes for the Sydney Morning Herald in an article titled, “Security proves a complicated affair.” Excerpt: The war on terrorism also means that US intelligence officials want tough action taken against any Australian minister who has an affair which they regard as a security risk. Although ministers will want to be exempt, the …
The Japan Times Online published the following reader’s letter: Challenging an American icon Regarding the June 21 Washington Post article “Private eye who found Levy bone declines lie test”: If most people challenged or disregarded the place of the polygraph test in American police investigations the way that private investigator Joe McCann is reported to …
Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times reports on the case of Abdallah Higazy, from whom an FBI polygrapher coerced a false confession, resulting in Higazy wrongly spending a month in solitary confinement. (This article, re-printed in the International Herald Tribune, was first published in the New York Times on 29 June 2002.) Excerpt: Innocent …
Doug Moore of the St. Louis Post Dispatch reports in an article titled, “City fires three employees, charges them with stealing from meters.” Excerpt: Three St. Louis city workers have been fired and charged with stealing quarters from parking meters. As a result, the treasurer’s office is asking some of its other employees to submit …
In an article titled, “Who is Steven Hatfill” published on the American Prospect website, freelance writer Laura Rozen reports that Dr. Steven Hatfill, whose home the FBI recently searched in its ongoing anthrax investigation, allegedly lost his security clearance following a failed polygraph examination (although he reportedly passed an FBI polygraph interrogation regarding last year’s …