Philly polygraphers let one squeak through

[beech trees]

Noted and corrected. Sorry JB.

[The_Breeze]

Fair Chance
You seem like a reasonable person, so here's the problem. Your thought about background investigations solving most hidden employee issues is just not true, Im sorry to say.  Just this year our department had  applicants admit ( after failing a polygraph) to an agg. battery, felony fraud, sodomy of a child, and of course drastically different drug use histories than placed in the application for hire.  We in contrast to the federal govt, do a background first.  Many of course fail for various suitability reasons, but if an individual is from another state, or thier violations are dated, a background will just not find it in many cases.  This was a common thread in the individuals having the histories I mentioned.
So if we followed the thinking as put forth here, we would have to take our chances in putting our limited resources in a background and calling the process over.  I suggest to you that that approach would of enabled several people that should never even come close to the uniform to be armed and go to work.  I have no hope that our psychologist would of been able to do more than the background investigators.  Does anyone have any good faith suggestions for the real world scenario that I am giving here? (please dont tell me to hire new fully competent background investigators, all are retired Det's with 20+ years experience) If your wondering how many good candidates we falsely turned away, let me say now that all DI charts (this year) were supported by confessions/explanations and then sent back out to background. Someone explain to me without rancor how to prevent an unsuitable candidate from being hired if the background can not provide a legal end to the application.

[Fair Chance]

Dear The Breeze,

My contention is that my polygraph accusations were only accusations.  No background check was performed and there were no further investigations of any type to back the allegations: yet, my integrity is now in question due to a polygraph that the NAS confirms in prescreening situations is above chance but well below perfect (note, this was not specific incident testing because their were no known facts gathered because there was no investigation).

If you see my earlier replies to Poly-Cop,  my complaint is that there is no investigation at all by the federal agencies that I mentioned if you fail the pre-screening test (or come back "not withing acceptable parameters).  This is before or after.

Do you agree that non-specific incident general screening polygraphs are even close to accurate without external information that is gathered through the background check?

My other question, were the quality of FBI hires before 1994 so poor and had such problems that we indeed had to polygraph all applicants?  What did we gain?  Security, the NAS states no and we are opening doors to spies who are trained to pass the test because we are placing too much emphasis on successful polygraph testing.

There is no reasonable way to find the information which "accused me".  I will spend months if not years doing a freedom of information act trying to get my files from the Federal Government.

A far as legal rancor goes,  the polygraph is subject to significant questionable validity according to the NAS.  The door of legal rancor is just starting to open.  This is a nationally recognized agency of Congress and most judges would be hesitate to throw out such expert testimony

My time is limited because I am on my lunchbreak.  I would like to continue your discussion later.  You bring in many ideas to the discussion.

Forgive any typing errors or spelling errors, I am hitting the keys as fast as I can in my time alloted.

Thanks for reading my opinions and replying.

[George W. Maschke]

Fair Chance,

You wrote in part:

...my integrity is now in question due to a polygraph that the NAS confirms in prescreening situations is above chance but well below perfect...

Note that the NAS found no validity for polygraph screening at all. Their conclusion that polygraphy can distinguish truth-telling from deception at levels "well above chance but well below perfection" was with regard to specific incident "testing" under conditions similar to those in the studies they reviewed, that is, with subjects who didn't understand that the "test" is a fraud and who were untrained in countermeasures. And the NAS found that "[t]here is essentially no evidence on the incremental validity of polygraph testing, that is, its ability to add predictive value to that which can be achieved by other methods." An example of an "other method" would be interrogating a subject with a polygraph substitute such as colander wired to a photocopier.

[Marty]

Breeze,
Assuming there is no dispute about what is learned from a polygraph interrogation then this is one area that the NAS concurs the polygraph is effective with naive subjects. The problem of false positives doesn't include confessional DQ's and the rate of false positives with the espionage screens the DOE uses is universally agreed to be far higher than the incidence of true positives, simply because, fortunately, the incidence of traitors is so low.

-Marty

[beech trees]

Your thought about background investigations solving most hidden employee issues is just not true, Im sorry to say.  Just this year our department had  applicants admit ( after failing a polygraph) to an agg. battery,

A BATF agent who allegedly terrorized a group of Indianola teenagers who had thrown toilet paper in his yard was charged Tuesday with drunken driving and multiple counts of assault.

As a member of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms this man was subjected to-- and passed-- a pre-employment polygraph.

felony fraud,

For the second time in one week, a Houston police officer is involved in an alleged fraud case.

As a member of the Houston Police Department this man was subjected to-- and passed-- a pre-employment polygraph.

sodomy of a child,

LOS ANGELES – A Los Angeles police officer was charged today with raping two women earlier this year while he was on duty, the District Attorney's office announced.

As a member of the Los Angeles Police Department this man was subjected to-- and passed-- a pre-employment polygraph.

Jailed Teen Says Cop Fathered Baby... The girl had been called into court to answer questions about a police officer charged with having sex with her while she was underage.

As a member of the Ocala Police Department this man was subjected to-- and passed-- a pre-employment polygraph.

and of course drastically different drug use histories than placed in the application for hire.

A Los Angeles police officer who was suspended late last month after being arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence has been charged with multiple drug-related counts including manufacture of GHB, sometimes known as a "date rape" drug, the District Attorney's office announced today.

You already know this woman was subjected to-- and passed-- a pre-employment polygraph.

The polygraph is worthless as a pre employment screening tool, both as a means of checking accuracy of an applicant's information and as an indicator of future behavior. End of story.

[George W. Maschke]

beech trees,

Certainly, police officers who passed pre-employment polygraph examinations have gone on to be charged with and/or convicted of crimes, as evidenced by the examples you've cited. The LAPD may not be a suitable example though, since its pre-employment polygraph screening program began in February 2001, and it's likely the LAPD officers in the cases you cited were not polygraphed.

The NAS report indeed makes it clear that polygraph screening is without validity. But admissions obtained in the process may nonetheless be of some value. I think The Breeze has raised some interesting points, which I hope to address here this weekend.

[Fair Chance]

As always George, keep me straight on my quotes.

Beach Trees, I believe you provided sufficient samplings to indicate future behavior is not predictable UNDER ANY TYPE OF TESTING.  I do not believe anyone can tell the future behavior of human beings from any type of current scientific test.

Breeze,

My orginal premise under this thread was that the NAS was very specific that no employment decision should be based only on polygraph results alone yet this is happening in Federal Agencies.  This is policy and this is fact.

This is wrong.

[Marty]

George,

Have there been any longitudinal studies on large numbers of police depts that have/have not done polygraph screenings? Since the polygraph seems to be such a key part of the hiring process I would expect there would be many or even some studies showing the value of it but I don't recall ever running across any.

Also, the polygraph may constitute a form of bonding much like that created by hazing rituals. The bonding created by these is incredibly strong and is one of the things that perpetuates the rituals.  Cialdini has a very good exposition on the power of this and certainly the polygraph with it's interrogation component may constitute functionally a form of hazing.

-Marty

[George W. Maschke]

Marty,

I am not aware of any studies of the kind you have described.

I'm skeptical that any bonds of camaraderie built through shared hardship, such as might be associated with hazing rituals, would be built through polygraph screening. The former is a group exercise, whereas the latter is one-on-one.

[Drew Richardson]

Marty,

You write in part:

...the polygraph may constitute a form of bonding much like that created by hazing rituals. The bonding created by these is incredibly strong and is one of the things that perpetuates the rituals...

Although there clearly is bonding occurring as the result of polygraph screening, I believe you badly miss the population of where that bonding is occurring.  There is no more bonding amongst a group of employees as a result of having taken polygraph screening exams than there is amongst employees who have endured rectal digital exams in a yearly physical.  The bonding that has occurred has been amongst victims of polygraph examinations with many of these victims having been denied employment and not those who as present employees are merely sharing past memories of their hiring experience.  The good news is that those who actually share this bonding are the same who are thus motivated to create this site, contribute to it, and will ultimately be those who eliminate that which is anything but an experience to be treasured and remembered as shared trials of days gone by.

[Marty]

I once knew a LE fellow that told me that the polygraph was one of the most dreaded things that the officers were subjected to when they applied calling it invasive and humiliating. There seemed to be a sense that it was one of the common things they were subjected to - and passed - that they all disliked and feared to a degree.  That seems psychologically very similar to hazing and I suspect at least a part of it may be irrationally propogated for the same reasons.

-Marty

[Marty]

Drew,

I think if a rectal exam took 6 hours and involved more of a mental rape rather than just an unpleasant procedure that reflects in no way on character, it would have much in common with hazing, creating a bond amongst those who had been through it.

Of course the form of bonding created by being mentally raped and having one's character questioned by a process one later learns is essentially voo-doo is pretty strong too. That is a quite different thing and is perhaps the singular thing most likely to defeat polygraph screening. Were the polygraph not limited by law to a fairly small group it's likely it would have been abolished years ago as a result of these effects.

-Marty

[The_Breeze]

BT
If I had your diligence in exposing human folly (outside of police work) I could do so in any career field you wish.  I have stories of Q-cleared child molesters, murderous physicians, and
now soldiers turned sniper if you would like to broaden your outlook.  I may be wrong, but our agency does not think the polygraph predicts future behavior.  If a 21 year old comes  to the dept, tells the truth and has no negative background, they may be hired.  They could then succumb to some personality weakness and commit one of the acts that you take such glee in finding on a national level.  There are many thousands of police officers, some are flawed, some may of been polygraphed...some may of been cancer screened and still got cancer, time for you to move on.
But speaking of predictions, I recently re-read my psych eval from my pre-employment testing and found that the psychologist made definite predictions of future behavior to include probable instances of discipline in a specified period.  I doubt if anyone in polygraph testing makes such forcasts, If im wrong let me know. (someone who actually knows please) I would be greatly interested to hear from a psychologist who may visit here what he feels would be the error rate in such predictions, and any studies to support the view.
I know its embarrassing when even George has to check you, but then jumping to conclusions has always been the area here where you have the greatest experience.
Since I provided actual examples, and you dismiss them with a flippant "end of story", maybe you are not mentally equipped to deal with a subject that has serious real world consequences.

[The_Breeze]

Fair Chance
You seem busy so Ill keep it short.  I am not comfortable with what happened to you and am glad our agency does things differently.
We background first, verify all DI scores and re-investigate as necessary. In other words we value our applicants.
Another thing we do is to go over an applicants paperwork line by line and have them re-answer all the questions, prior to polygraph.  This not only centers any areas of concern that an applicant may want to explain, but I believe it makes the test very specific to an applicant who intends to lie about a portion of thier past. I think this has saved numerous applicants who changed a "no" to a yes with an explanation. Yes we video tape as well.
We go over results prior to the applicant leaving, there is no mystery or wonder.  I find the fact that you would have to file a FOI request alarming.
Obviously, local government is not federal and you have little worth as a mere applicant.  There is another in line with similiar qualifications.  Im not sure throwing out polygraph would fix hiring inequities, but more care should go into the approach with a qualified applicant.  At least a specific test for a failure...was this offered to you?
Im not sure what you meant by "legal rancor".  I was simply asking for a response free of animosity since its clear I am swimming upstream on this site. It almost happened.
Good luck in what you need to do.