Philly polygraphers let one squeak through

[beech trees]

Ex- Mounted Police boss sold horses, kept cash

When their owners donated Nestor and Swannee to the Philadelphia Police Department, they thought the horses would become proud members of the elite Mounted Unit.

Instead, the healthy equines probably ended up as dog food, authorities said yesterday.

Lt. David Brown, the unit's commander, forged documents from the department's veterinarian saying that Nestor and Swannee were not fit for duty, sold the horses to the horse auction in New Holland for about $1,000 each, then pocketed the proceeds, authorities said.

[Fair Chance]

For whatever reasons, Beech Trees, the Philadelphia Police Department has yelled "Uncle!" and stopped using the polygraph for pre-screening a little while ago.

I think they agree with your implied assumption in this case.

[beech trees]

Yes, I am aware of that recent blessed event Fair_Chance. I would like to think that the powers that be realized that the polygraph is worse than useless when used as a screening tool, just as the recent NAS report confirms, and just what many of us here on the boards have been asserting for quite some time.

[Fair Chance]

Easy Big Guy,

Don't have too much fun dancing on the graves!  I know you have suffered for a long time against the odds but you must try to be a gracious winner (or at least seem to try)!

[beech trees]

Fair_Chance,

While I realize (at least I hope this is the case) you are being somewhat tongue-in-cheek, please be aware that any graciousness on my part would be irrelevant to what occured in Philly. I'm sure the machinations to remove the polygraph from the candidate selection process began long before I arrived on these boards, and I'm not nearly so egotistical as to think I personally had anything to do with the decison or the timing. Thus I am not the winner, rather the City of Philidelphia is. Acknowledging a correct decision could hardly be deemed discourteous.

[Fair Chance]

Dear Beech Trees,

I was being very much tongue-in-cheek.  I was very affected by my negative poygraph experience.  Maybe I try to joke about it to cover up my hurt and disdain over it.  No negative connotations intended.

[J.B. McCloughan]

beech_trees,

I would expect that Brown, based on the article stating he retired in 1998, did not take a pre-employment polygraph.  I also can find no mention of a polygraph in the article you referenced.

[beech trees]

beech_trees,

I would expect that Brown, based on the article stating he retired in 1998, did not take a pre-employment polygraph.  I also can find no mention of a polygraph in the article you referenced.

I would expect he did, JB. The Philadelphia Police Department instigated pre-employment screening of all applicants in the 1970's. (Source: The BBC, Loving and Hating Lie Detecting)

The Philadelphia Police Department has ceased using the polygraph in this application only within the past few months.

The article was referenced not to bolster my assertion that retired Philadelphia Police Lt. Brown passed a pre-employment polygraph exam, it was cited to explain the man's malfeasance and to point out the absurdidty of using the polygraph in a pre-employment setting to help determine future behavior.

Curiously, as of this morning The Philadelphia Police Department's website still indicates that the polygraph is used during the application process.

[Public Servant]

Beech,

The article was referenced not to bolster my assertion that retired Philadelphia Police Lt. Brown passed a pre-employment polygraph exam, it was cited to explain the man's malfeasance and to point out the absurdidty of using the polygraph in a pre-employment setting to help determine future behavior.

That doesn't sound like an attack necessarily on polygraph.  It sounds more like you don't believe in the entire screening process.  You're saying that past behavior might not be a predicting factor for future behavior.  Not something I would completely disagree with--especially when it comes to "did you smoke marijuana 10 times or 11 times"... as if the eleventh time makes you a potential crook, but the first ten indicate good character.  Of course it would be nice to know if someone is an undetected felon or is affiliated with terrorist/foreign intelligence agencies (hopefully zero is the cutoff for those).  Either way, this argument is an overall suitability for employment in a sensitive positions issue--NOT a poly issue.  You have given one (of many I am sure) example of someone who might have beaten the poly or, quite possibly, had absolutely no prior history of deviant behavior, and still went bad.

Mark it down on the calendar.  I found something on which I agreed with Beech Trees. Don't get too excited though, because I'd like to add that he seems to just love pointing out every bad cop in the world as evidence that cops and polygraph(er)s are BAD.

Regards, my worthy nemesis, and good day.

[beech trees]

Beech,

That doesn't sound like an attack necessarily on polygraph.  It sounds more like you don't believe in the entire screening process.

I'm sorry you feel that way. You are the second pro-polygraph individual on this board to draw the inference that because I believe reliance on a polygraph interrogation as part of a pre-employment condition of hire is fundamentally wrong, wasteful, and results in an extraordinary amount of people being excluded from hiring, that this also means I find the whole screening process lacking.

Such is not the case. I limit my criticism (at least within this current topic) to the use of the polygraph in pre-employment screening. To quote the NAS Executive Summary:

The use of polygraph testing for preemployment screening is even more complicated because it involves inferences about future behavior on the basis of information about past behaviors that may be quite different (e.g., does past use of illegal drugs, or lying about such use on a polygraph test, predict future spying?)... Scientific evidence relevant to the accuracy of polygraph tests for employee or preemployment screening is extremely limited. Only one field study, which is flawed, provides evidence directly relevant to accuracy for preemployment screening... Because the studies of acceptable quality [of the polygraph] all focus on specific incidents, generalization from them to uses for screening is not justified. [NAS's emphasis]

You're saying that past behavior might not be a predicting factor for future behavior.

No-o-o-o-o-o I'm not saying that either, although the NAS does make that point in their report. I'm saying that the polygraph is worse than useless in determining that prior behavior.

Not something I would completely disagree with--especially when it comes to "did you smoke marijuana 10 times or 11 times"... as if the eleventh time makes you a potential crook, but the first ten indicate good character.  Of course it would be nice to know if someone is an undetected felon or is affiliated with terrorist/foreign intelligence agencies (hopefully zero is the cutoff for those).  Either way, this argument is an overall suitability for employment in a sensitive positions issue--NOT a poly issue.

So it's 'Blame The Test-taker' now? You are playing an extraordinary game of Pass The Buck, and it's really ill-beseeming.

You have given one (of many I am sure) example of someone who might have beaten the poly or, quite possibly, had absolutely no prior history of deviant behavior, and still went bad.

You raise an interesing tangential point. As I have heard first-hand detectives utter sentiments such as "When a perp is caught, the chances that it's the very first time that person is commiting the offense are so astronomically low as to be insignificant", one has to wonder. When a person placed in a position of trust over others (such as a police officer) decides to abuse that power, one must ask 'what went wrong'. Either the crucible of holding such power over others was to great for that person's character (certainly possible) OR that person's character was already established through prior bad acts that the polygrapher (in part) failed to detect.

Mark it down on the calendar.  I found something on which I agreed with Beech Trees. Don't get too excited though, because I'd like to add that he seems to just love pointing out every bad cop in the world as evidence that cops and polygraph(er)s are BAD.

I think it's really unfortunate you feel that way. If you take a moment to think about it, I have been a vociferous critic of the use of the polygraph in almost EVERY possible setting.

[Fair Chance]

From my own two experiences being on the receiving side of polygraph prescreening, I do not think the polygraph should be used at all during the fact gathering process.  The NAS report strongly states that no employment decision, either POSITIVE or NEGATIVE, should be based on pre-screening by itself.  Yet in most Federal pre-screening  uses, it can stop an application in its tracks without any further investigation.  This is WRONG!  As people find out that polygraphs used in this way do not work, they will not confess anything, and the whole polygraph process becomes a moot point.  

If I agrue with someone that they owe me twenty dollars and they say they only owe me ten,  I would suggest to take the ten dollars that we agree on and keep negotiating the rest.

The NAS was rather specific to pre-screening and screening polygraphs about the fact that they find them ineffective to predict if someone is a threat to security (the whole of a background check).  Let's take this off the table and then we can possible discuss other polygraph procedures which need further investigation.

If there are other legitimate uses of polygraphs (subject to great debate on this website), further research will bear this out.  The pre-screening and screening issues will constantly cloud the discussion and must be taken off the table of discussion by their removal from use by the polygraph proponents.

[just a voice]

Fair Chance, hopefully as your name implies you will consider the following: Knowing full well that GM, BT and others will jump all over me, many, myself included, do not believe the polygraph should be used as the sole determinant.  That being said, despite what you state, it SHOULD be used as part of the fact gathering process ~note what YOU said ~FACT GATHERING ~ To be fair, yes there are cases (most?, I do not think so) where a "negative" (as you call it) polygraph can stop an application in it's tracks.  But what people should know is that in these cases, during the pretest, the applicant has denied some behavior that MIGHT preclude his hiring...he takes the examination, fails it and then confesses to lying about witholding the information.  Congratulations to him for being honest, but alas, he was too late. I assure you he was told up front to be honest (see the FBI manual on this site), but CHOSE not to be.  Now it is NOT a matter of the polygraph, rather it was his CONSCIOUS decision not to be honest.  What a lot of folks fail to consider is that there are many behaviors which are possible to overlook, especially when you weigh frequency and current involvement. Much more so than if the person CHOOSES to lie about it and demonstrate his lack of candor and integrity.  I am sorry, but I and many others DO believe that there is a deterrent effect in the prospect of taking a polygraph.  There are those who say that Ames and others defeated the process; while that may be arguably true, they represent a small segment and as bad a taste as that may put in your mouth, the prospect of taking a polygraph has stopped some from spying on their country.  Christopher Boyce from the  infamous Falcon & Snowman case is a case in point. He testified before Congress that the prospect of taking a polygraph caused him agreat deal of concern.  Enough to stop him? We may never know.  Has the prospect of taking polygraph ever stopped someone who has not yet been identified?  We can never know that. But I believe it has. It has been said that the polygraph is imperfect.  True, there are woefully few things that ARE perfect, but it IS the best thing we have at our disposal right now.  Can improvements be made? For sure that can be accomplished, but it takes committment, not just an attitude that "it is time to fold the tents".  There is a price that we must be willing to pay to enjoy not only the freedoms that we have, but because of our open society.  Whether we like it or not, polygraph may very well be one of those prices. I may be wrong, and only you know the answer here, but is there a possibility that out of fear of not getting the job you wanted, or whatever, you made a choice to be untruthful about a matter and when confronted about it, you admitted your transgression, were not hired and now you are "blaming" the polygraph?  I am not out to embarrass you.  You do not even have to respond to this, but MY experience (you cited yours) has been that this is exactly the scenario that occurs.

[Skeptic]

Fair Chance, hopefully as your name implies you will consider the following: Knowing full well that GM, BT and others will jump all over me, many, myself included, do not believe the polygraph should be used as the sole determinant.  That being said, despite what you state, it SHOULD be used as part of the fact gathering process ~note what YOU said ~FACT GATHERING ~ To be fair, yes there are cases (most?, I do not think so) where a "negative" (as you call it) polygraph can stop an application in it's tracks.  But what people should know is that in these cases, during the pretest, the applicant has denied some behavior that MIGHT preclude his hiring...he takes the examination, fails it and then confesses to lying about witholding the information.  Congratulations to him for being honest, but alas, he was too late. I assure you he was told up front to be honest (see the FBI manual on this site), but CHOSE not to be.  Now it is NOT a matter of the polygraph, rather it was his CONSCIOUS decision not to be honest.

Oh, but it is a matter of the polygraph.  What happens if this applicant, not being a lawyer, "fesses up" to something he or she considered minor and not initially worth mentioning after polygraph interrogation (the screening questions are generally subjective, you know)?  What if, after a rough session or multiple polygraphs, the desperate applicant falsely confesses?

Polygraph screening is a form of psychological torture, pure and simple.  No hiring decisions should ever be made based upon this process.

Skeptic

[Fair Chance]

Dear Just a Voice,

I appreciate you reading my discussion and expressing your opinions.  That is what is special about this site.   Let me make this clear that in my two experiences with the prescreening process in the FBI,  I did not confess to anything because I have not done anything wrong to confess about.  I was accused of wrongdoing.  This accusal was strictly base upon polygraph interpretation.  I take exception to your assumption that the polygraph is part of a "total" screening effort.  The FBI, CIA, DEA, and Secret Service do not do any prior background examination prior to the polygraph experience. They base no questions on actual investigated life experiences.   If  "THEY" believe that you failed the polygraph according to "THEIR" interpretation, even without any admissions on their part, YOUR APPLICATION ENDS.    This is fact and policy in these government agencies.  What everyone keeps telling me is that this is part of a "Bigger" investigation of an applicant's background.  IT IS NOT! I have worked over ten years in law enforcement and eight years in the military.  I have nothing to hide and a proper background check will prove it.  I will not get that opportunity strictly due to the interpretation of a polygraph.  On no other evidence was my application stopped.  This has nothing to do about security issues.  This has to do with placing such a high amount of trust in an "instrument" without any confession or background investigation.  Can you not see the absurdity in this assumption?  I can because my current postion of in the Department of Justice requires me to have  a tremendous amount of integrity and my managers have already stated that they would never take any polygraph evidence against me without "witnessed and collaborated" facts and confession.  To blindly place absolute trust in blood pressure, pulse, breathing, and sweat measurements and tell anyone that this is "high probability fact" in pre-screening issues without investigation can not be logically argued with me.  I have stated that most back ground investigations should be able to be adjudicated without the use of polygraph. I am keeping an open mind to other polygraph use based upon more results of studies similar to the recent NAS study.  I state this, not withstanding confessions, or admissions, should an application be stopped strictly due to polygraph results?

[J.B. McCloughan]

beech_trees,

The quotes you used in your last post and accredited as being my assertions were not mine.