Ex-CIA Officer Richard Haver on Polygraph Policy

[George W. Maschke]

On a recent visit to the UCLA law library, I had the opportunity to peruse back issues of the American Polygraph Association's Newsletter. The following item in Volume 28, No. 4 (July-August 1995) caught my attention:

AMES STUDY MANAGER CRITICIZES POLYGRAPH

Richard Haver, who is managing the study of the Ames case at the Central Intelligence Agency, is quoted by the Washington Post [28 June 1995] as saying, "We use the polygraph as a crutch." Haver said the device has been abused, misunderstood and misapplied in counterintelligence work.[/size]

More than a decade after discovering that Aldrich Ames had passed two polygraph screening examinations while spying for the Russians, the CIA, having studiously avoided learning from the experience, appears to be leaning as heavily as ever on that flimsy crutch.