FETI: (Forensic Experiential Trauma interview) At last, an objective assessment of this still unproven technique for interviewing sex crime complainants. Bravo to author Wendy McElroy and The Independent Institute.

PUBLISHER'S NOTE:  It is  so refreshing to see such an honest, evidence-based critique of FETI (Forensic Experiential Trauma interview) as this one  - as most stories on the latest policing flavor of the month  (FETI) fail to point out that there is not yet  a scientific consensus   that this method of interviewing sex crime complainants  (under 'FETI' they are called victims)  has a solid neurological basis. (Most stories also fail to point out the potential dangers of using the much touted FETI technique - such as the unintended planting of false facts in the mind of the person being interviewed.) Bravo to author Wendy McElroy.

Harold Levy:  Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog;

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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "The manual offers advice on how to engage a traumatized person’s primitive brain. The interviewer assures the interviewee that she is believed, for example, and he does not “dive into crime details, unless victim wants to do so.” When she describes the crime, he is to realize that inconsistencies are normal, not a sign of lying. Moreover, when an account is disjointed, the interviewer translates “it into a report that makes sense.” Traditionally, an investigator’s job is to get a straight-forward narrative that determines whether criminal charges are appropriate. He does not fill in the blanks. FETI refers to an accuser as “the victim,” which damages a basic principle of justice known as the presumption of innocence for an accused. The presumption now shifts to the “victim,” who is automatically assumed to be telling the truth. The burden of proof shifts to the accused. Before radically changing police standards and basic principles of justice, a question must be asked. Does FETI even work? FETI advocates point to its widespread use in the military as proof of legitimacy. But the U.S. Air Force explicitly rejected FETI, stating, “Given the lack of empirical evidence on FETI’s effectiveness, and the large number of investigative, professional and scientific concerns regarding FETI and FETI training, the Air Force does not consider FETI as a viable option for investigative interviewing. We believe it would be inappropriate and irresponsible to discontinue the use of a robust, well-studied, effective, and empirically-validated interviewing method…in favor of an interviewing method that is loosely-constructed, is based on flawed science, makes unfounded claims about its effectiveness, and has never once been tested, studied, researched or validated.”

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STORY: "Abby Honald Act: Reinventing Justice," by Wendy McElroy, published by The Daily Caller on July 5, 2018. (Wendy McElroy is a Research Fellow at The Independent Institute - an American think tank that occasionally  digs into criminal justice matters)

GIST: "H.R.4720-S.2266 is known as the Abby Honold Act. It is named after a University of Minnesota student who was raped and mutilated in 2014. Introduced in December 2017 by Senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and John Cornyn (R-TX), the Act would amend the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). It would require the Department of Justice to award grants to law enforcement agencies “to improve the handling of crimes … by incorporating a trauma-informed approach into the initial response to and investigation of such crimes.” The trauma-informed response is called Forensic Experiential Trauma Interview (FETI). It significantly departs from standard police procedure. Traditionally, police procedure is evidence-driven and unbiased; it is conducted with professionalism and a detached respect toward all. The process is meant to elicit facts and to express basic principles of justice, such as due process for an accused. The reality often falls short. By all accounts, Honold’s rape case was handled badly. She described her in-hospital interview with police: “I didn’t get a lot of information out. I kind of froze.” The detective reportedly became “frustrated” when she “remembered details out of order” because he could do nothing with the jumbled information provided. Then, a nurse trained in FETI questioned Honold, and she was more successful. As the Virginia Department of Criminal Justice Services explains, FETI “was developed to properly interview the more primitive portions of the brain” in which memories of rape are allegedly stored. Memories are accessed by asking open-ended and sensory-focused questions about the assault, such as “what do you remember smelling?” Although the Abby Honold Act does not define the term, avoiding “victim retraumatization” is FETI’s purpose. Competing Methods;

FETI does not supplement standard police procedures; it replaces them because the two are incompatible. Standard police procedure is called the Reid method. It has three steps: factual analysis, interviewing, and interrogation.

• Factual analysis eliminates suspects and develops leads.
• Interviewing is a non-accusatory dialogue with accusers, suspects, and witnesses to elicit investigative and behavioral information. The interview has nine well-defined stages.
• Interrogation involves an accusatory barrage, in which the investigator claims to know the person is guilty and angles for a confession.

The Reid method assembles facts and evidence, without bias toward the accuser or the accused. The neutral approach accomplishes two important goals. First, the investigator can objectively elicit and evaluate information without emotional involvement. Second, an accuser is taken seriously without denying due process to an accused. Only when there is reason to believe a person is lying or guilty does the approach become confrontational. FETI transforms the interview stage of investigation. The manual, “FETI Forensic Experiential Trauma Interview,” opens, “The real key to FETI is not the exact questions, but the approach: sympathetic, believing, victim-centered.” The investigator moves closer to being a therapist. He uses “principles and techniques developed for forensic child interviews (open-ended non-leading questions, soft interview room and empathy).” The manual offers advice on how to engage a traumatized person’s primitive brain. The interviewer assures the interviewee that she is believed, for example, and he does not “dive into crime details, unless victim wants to do so.” When she describes the crime, he is to realize that inconsistencies are normal, not a sign of lying. Moreover, when an account is disjointed, the interviewer translates “it into a report that makes sense.” Traditionally, an investigator’s job is to get a straight-forward narrative that determines whether criminal charges are appropriate. He does not fill in the blanks. FETI refers to an accuser as “the victim,” which damages a basic principle of justice known as the presumption of innocence for an accused. The presumption now shifts to the “victim,” who is automatically assumed to be telling the truth. The burden of proof shifts to the accused. Before radically changing police standards and basic principles of justice, a question must be asked. Does FETI even work? FETI advocates point to its widespread use in the military as proof of legitimacy. But the U.S. Air Force explicitly rejected FETI, stating, “Given the lack of empirical evidence on FETI’s effectiveness, and the large number of investigative, professional and scientific concerns regarding FETI and FETI training, the Air Force does not consider FETI as a viable option for investigative interviewing. We believe it would be inappropriate and irresponsible to discontinue the use of a robust, well-studied, effective, and empirically-validated interviewing method…in favor of an interviewing method that is loosely-constructed, is based on flawed science, makes unfounded claims about its effectiveness, and has never once been tested, studied, researched or validated.” Conclusion: Honold’s experience with the police may have been wretched, but the officer may have also been incompetent. And the nurse acted as a therapist, not as an investigator. Why blur the two roles, and make a systemic change in police procedure based on anecdotal and unclear reports? FETI advocates give a clear answer: to obtain more convictions, because the Reid Method apparently classifies too many accusations as “unfounded” or “unsubstantiated.” One standard by which H.R.4720 intends to evaluate FETI, if implemented, is by its “effectiveness” on “prosecutorial practices and outcomes”; that is, by the increase in charges and convictions. Wendy Wilson, victim advocate at the Ocala [Florida] Sexual Assault Center is typical in her belief that “arrest and conviction rates will increase once FETI is implemented.” This presumes that current rates are inadequately low. Law enforcement’s handling of sexual assault is deeply flawed. Years of unopened rape kits in police storage attest to that. But FETI is not the answer. Sexual assault needs to be taken more seriously within the existing framework."

The entire story can be read at the link below:
http://dailycaller.com/2018/07/05/abby-honold-act-reinventing-justice/

Read previous post of this Blog at the link below: "PUBLISHER'S NOTE:  In an article cited in Part 1  of this series on 'Forensic Experiential Trauma interview' - a matter of growing concern - author Emily Green writes that "Investigators in the U.S. Army have fully adopted the FETI approach, and it’s quickly taking hold in other branches of the military as well." According to a fascinating report which I have obtained, this is not exactly the case. It  is called "Report to Congressional Commitees: Report on the use of the Forensic Experiential Trauma Interview (FETI) Technique within the Department of the Air Force. The Executive Summary of this report states: "Given the lack of empirical evidence on FETI’s effectiveness, and the large number of investigative, professional and scientific concerns regarding FETI and FETI training, the Air Force does not consider FETI as a viable option for investigative interviewing. We believe it would be inappropriate and irresponsible to discontinue the use of a robust, well-studied, effective, and empirically-validated interviewing method that is supported by the latest scientific research (the Cognitive Interview), in favor of an interviewing method that is loosely constructed, is based on flawed science, makes unfounded claims about its effectiveness, and has never once been tested, studied, researched or validated (FETI)." The Executive Summary also indicates: "U.S. Air Force sexual assault investigators and Air Force judge advocates are trained to use the Cognitive Interview technique for interviewing victims of sexual assault. The Air Force does not train or utilize the FETI technique, and has no plans to do so in the future. The decision to select the Cognitive Interview, and to eliminate FETI as a viable option, resulted from exhaustive research and consultation with leading subject matter experts. The Cognitive Interview is a very robust, well-studied, effective, empirically-validated interviewing method that is supported by the latest scientific research. In contrast, FETI has never been empirically studied or validated. Given the lack of any empirical evidence on FETI’s effectiveness, and the large number of investigative, professional and scientific concerns about FETI and FETI training, the Air Force does not consider FETI as a viable option for investigative interviewing. In addition to providing the attached subject matter expert reviews, AFOSI will gladly provide any additional supporting document."  The report is a big deal - and sends out the message in the strongest terms  that FETI must be closely scrutinized and carefully validated  before it is ever  accepted as evidence in the courts.  It was commissioned by the U.S Senate and  sent by Air Force specifically to Senator John McCain, Chairman of the Committee on Armed Services, Jack Reid, Ranking member of the Committee on Armed Services, and Mac Thornberry, Chairman of the Committee on  Armed Services of The U.S. House of Representatives. Most importantly, the report is based on contributions from highly respected consultants, whose work in enclosed in appendices to the report. Here are some capsules: 

Christian A. Meissner: PhD; Iowa State University; "A through search of the available research literature yielded no published peer review studies on the efficacy or the effectiveness of FETI. The supporting materials developed by Strand and colleagues provided no empirical  evidence to support these claims of effectiveness - no experimental or field studies have been offered comparing the effectiveness of FETI to either existing practice or other comparable methods developed within the empirical literature ...Only anecdotal claims (testimonials) are provided to bolster some degree of efficacy and relevance to forensic practice - an insufficient basis upon which to rest claims of effectiveness."

Charles A. Morgan; MD; MA: University of New Haven; "In my opinion, it is in a reasonable degree  of medical certainty that" FETI does NOT represent a best practice standard  for the assessment of people with PTSD; FETI does not represent a clinical best practice standard for the assessment of trauma related memories; FETI does not represent a valid scientific representation of the nature of neurobiology, brain functioning and human memory. Put bluntly, there is NO scientific evidence to support the idea that FETI should be offered as a valid clinical method for working with victims of trauma."

 

Susan E. Brandon; PhD and Sujeeta Bhatt, PhD; High-Value Detainee Interrogation Group;  "The notion that trauma victims/witnesses should be interviewed differently then  non-trauma victims/witnesses because of different memory processes, is not supported by science. Even if trauma memories were different from non-trauma memories, there are no data  showing that different interview methods are necessary. However,  it is reasonable to assume that victims or witnesses of trauma require additional displays of empathy  and assurances that make feel safe (as noted by Strand (undated), relative to victims/witnesses of non-traumatic events."

Daniel J. Neller; PsyD, ABPP (Forensic); Directorate of Psychological Operations, U.S. Army Special Operations Cmd. "It is worth noting that the FETI is offered as a technique to collect nonphysical evidence. Just as techniques that collect physical evidence can be subjected to admissibility challenges, so, too, can techniques that collect nonphysical evidence. To the extent that FETI-informed testimony is based on scientific, technical, or other specialized knowledge, its admissibility can be challenged in courts of law. To date, the FETI evidently has not been studied with rigorous empirical testing; has not been subjected to formal peer review and publication; does not have a known or potential error rate; and does not clearly enjoy widespread acceptance  within the forensic  and law enforcement community. Consequently, and robust challenge to the admissibility of FETI-based testimony could result in its exclusion, thereby jeopardizing the effective prosecution of a sexual assault case."

Linda S. Estes, PhD and Jeane M. Lambrecht, PsyD, Major, USAF Air Force Office of  Special Investigations.  (Because of their experience as investigative psychologists, they were asked to assess   sections of a course in which students were taught "memory, trauma and the Forensic Experiential Trauma  (FETI) Interviewing Technique.) "We do not disagree that sensory details and emotion consistent with an allegation add to statement credibility and make for a more credible and sympathetic victim in court. However, we are concerned with calling this "evidence"  and particularly with the implication that retrieving emotion equals proof of trauma. At one point, the instructor stated; "Behavior after the event can be used to show evidence of non-consent." This seemed to imply that symptoms of PTSD or trauma-related anxiety cab be used as evidence to show that a crime had been committed. There is a danger of faulty reasoning here - if there is emotion present, one must have been traumatized, even if one cannot retrieve the memory. This exact type of reasoning became endemic in the therapeutic community decades ago as part of the "recovered memory" movement, which led to many false accusations of abuse. In fact, the recovered memory movement relied heavily on the same sources (such as literature on "body memory") cited in this course. As noted above, memory is susceptible to suggestion, even in adults, and some individuals are mire susceptible to suggestion than others.. We do not feel it is prudent to present sensory details and emotion as "evidence" of an allegation and we are concerned that using this terminology could lead our investigators to be discredited in court."

The entire Executive Summary and Report can be read at the link below:

 

 https://drive.google.com/file/d/10wN-5j23K3vNolsOjcc5iyW-LEUHLrYL/view?usp=sharing

 http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2017/12/forensic-experiential-trauma-interview_10.html

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith. Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at: http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy; Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog;

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