This week's lesson helped me understand how an investigator prepares for interviews and interrogations, and I also was able to learn the differences between the two. I also found that although the purpose of interviews and interrogations differs, there are quite a few similarities in the methods for conducting both. At the core, both interviews and interrogations revolve around interaction with people to gain valuable information and knowledge with the end goal of helping solve a crime and seek justice. As such, it is crucial that whether conducting an interview or interrogation the investigator must establish good rapport, ask good questions, listen carefully, and properly document the interaction (Swanson, Chamelin, Territo, & Taylor, 2012).

Interviews tend to focus more on gathering valuable information and knowledge related to the investigation, and typically this information comes from victims of the crime or witnesses that otherwise have no relationship to the criminal activity in question (Swanson et al., 2012). As such, the investigator must help make the victim/witness feel comfortable and willing to provide information freely; some tactics include limiting distractions, interviewing witnesses separately, and attempting to interview while memory is still fresh (Swanson et al., 2012). This is not to imply that interviewing is a simple matter, investigators must still take a formal and logical approach to ensure the information they are gaining will be unbiased and beneficial to the investigation.

Interrogations are designed to match information that has already been acquired to a particular suspect with the ultimate goal of securing a confession, so in a sense interviews gain information and interrogations test that information against a specific suspect (Swanson et al., 2012). One of the larger differences from an interview is the location. With an interview, the location could take place in many various locations at different times; however, an interrogation must occur in a pre-selected location/time that is controlled and advantageous to the investigator (Swanson et al., 2012). This is traditionally accomplished in an interrogation room, where everything thing from the placement of the chairs and tables to the lighting and use of two way mirrors is predetermined and setup prior to the interrogation (Swanson et al., 2012).

Failure to properly conduct and document an interrogation could lead to a weakness in the case against a suspect. This weakness, if exposed in court, could very well lead to the loss of conviction. I found an interesting case from the Court of Special Appeals of Maryland where the initial conviction of a defendant from a lower court was overturned due to improper police tactics during an interrogation. Though the case is from 1967, it was fascinating to read and the lessons learned from it still apply today. In the initial case John Bernard Keller, Jr. was found guilty of soliciting to commit mayhem in the Circuit Court for Queen Anne's County on 21 Sep 1966 and sentenced to ten years in the Maryland Penitentiary (Keller v. State, 1967).

Keller appealed on the grounds that the two confessions admitted as evidence at the trial were inadmissible. The Court of Special Appeals of Maryland found that the interrogation procedures used to obtain the confessions were unlawful and as a result inadmissible, resulting in the overturning of the initial court's conviction. Specifically, the interrogator failed to advise Keller of his rights during apprehension and prior to initiating the interrogation (Keller v. State, 1967). Additionally, the interrogator initially denied Keller access to a lawyer prior to making a statement (Keller v. State, 1967). Furthermore, the interrogation was found to be "the product of force or of a promise, threat or inducement whereby the accused might be led to believe that there would be a partial or total abandonment of prosecution" (Keller v. State, 1967). The details of this specific case serve as an important reminder to me that gaining a confession from a suspect only matters if it is obtained legally, without coercion, and is admissible as evidence in court. Further details can be obtained about this case from

http://law.justia.com/cases/maryland/court-of-special-appeals/1967/309-initial-term-1967-0.html

V/R

Alex

References:

Keller v. State, 2 Md. App. 623 (1967)

Swanson, C. R., Chamelin, N. C., Territo, L., & Taylor, R. W., (2012). Criminal investigation (11th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.