tasercop wrote on Jul 8^th, 2005 at 10:11pm:



Unfortunately, it seems that he has a very good point here.  In my years in LE I have seen a LARGE increase on the use of the polygraph both as a pre-employment screening tool and as an IA tool.   In my area alone all the major police departments have now gone to using the polygraph.   

The fact of the matter is that it comes down to liability for them at this time. Corruption in LE can seriously hurt a department both from the public perception and from the lawsuits resulting from it.  As a supervisor my previous department I got so fed up with 'corruption" within the department that I actually didn't put up much of a fight when they brought in the polygraph.  Fortunately, the polygraph was not used as a sole disqualifier or as the sole piece of evidence for making decisions.  But I cannot say the same for the other departments in the area.

One thing I can say for sure is that the powers that be that implemented the use of the polygraph in our department really didn't know anything about the polygraph and neither did the IA investigators.  While I did fight for our department to send one of our own to polygraph school, it was ultimately decided to contract an independent investigator to do them for us.  Pretty scary to put your future in the hands of someone who relies on testing you for a profit. (especially when he gets to charge a larger fee for every retest)

A statement was made previously comparing the 'art' of polygraphy to other 'soft' sciences like psychology.  It might seem a valid question to ask why not all the fuss about the psychological review when that is based on a psychologist's opinion and not scientific fact?

The problem with the poly is that it does not fall into the realm of verifiable 'soft science' like psychology does.   However, a poly test is scored as if it is a verifiable, scientific test.  If your blood pressure, pneumo reactions, etc show higher than a relevant question vs. a control, the polygrapher makes a blanket statement that you 'lied' and therefore 'fails' you from the 'test??' It seems to me, as the poly cannot prove that you lied or not, that the polygraph tests one's skills at passing the polygraph and not much else - similar to how a student prepares for the SAT's knowing that the SAT's have little to do with 'student aplitude.' 

This kind of 'testing' cannot be included in the same category with pre-test interviews or psyhological interviews, which are meant to be 'pseudo-scientific' and scored by judgement rather than hard-edged scientific accuracy.  No interviewer would begrudge you the opportunity to explain yourself before passing/failing you, unlike polygraphers, who seem to take delight in indimidating, cooercing, and 'failing' their subjects with zero hard evidence to back it up.

One of the things that bother me and other cops I’ve spoken with regarding the polygraph is the lack of due process.  As police officers we are used to having to prove something, rather than having the luxury of making a guess.   

I am quite comfortable with the thought of conducting an interview with a suspect and getting an overall feeling based on my years of experience that the suspect is lying, but winding up the interview without the suspect confessing or making any damaging admissions.  After such an interview I would continue to investigate that person, using my “gut instinct” that he was being deceptive as justification.  I could not, however, go ahead and arrest him at that point based on nothing other than my “gut instinct.”  Not only would it be unlawfully lacking in probable cause, it would be unfair because there was no due process.

However, change that setting to a police applicant sitting in a polygrapher’s exam room, and suddenly there is no due process.  At the end of the exam, the polygrapher will make a decision based on his years of experience that the suspect was either deceptive or truthful.  It is not a scientifically valid opinion based on hard evidence – it is a judgment call based on feelings and opinions.  Another polygraph examiner could look at the same charts and come up with a different conclusion.  In one study the same chart was given to the same polygrapher a few months later and it produced a different opinion.  Yet when that opinion is given to the police agency it is presented and accepted as fact, not as the scientific wild-ass guess it is.  The buck effectively stops at the polygrapher, for all practical purposes.  There is no investigation afterward to prove or disprove any claims of theft, drug usage, or drug dealing.  The process is over with a single person’s opinion, which is inherently unfair.

Matty wrote on Jul 14^th, 2005 at 12:50am:
And why do most of the other police departments in the state of New York require the applicant to undergo a polygraph examination?

hmmmmmm?

Matty wrote on Jul 14^th, 2005 at 5:11am:


And why are more and more federal, state, and local agencies coming on line and adding polygraph testing to their hiring process (or greatly increasing their use?)

We can play this game all day

Nonombre, 

Side step the question all you want, but it's obvious you cannot answer the question... But then as long as I have been around here I have never heard one of you witch doctors explain the fairness of your sorry line of work....can you say Karma?