PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "According to the best available science, polygraph tests are no more reliable at extracting the truth than Wonder Woman’s magic lasso. But by the time a new installment of the super hero’s story is released, in November 2019, millions more polygraphs will have been administered across the nation."
STORY: "The Lie Generator: Inside the Black Mirror World of Polygraph Job Screenings," by Mark Harris, published by 'Wired' on February 8, 2020.
SUB-HEADING: "Want to become a police officer, firefighter, or paramedic? A WIRED investigation finds government jobs are one of the last holdouts in using—and misusing—otherwise debunked polygraph technology."
SUB-HEADING: "Want to become a police officer, firefighter, or paramedic? A WIRED investigation finds government jobs are one of the last holdouts in using—and misusing—otherwise debunked polygraph technology."
CAPTION: In
the public sector, millions of polygraph tests are conducted annually,
as a last-ditch effort to weed out unsuitable job candidates.
GIST: Christopher Talbot thought he would make a great police officer. He was 29 years old, fit, and had a clean background record. Talbot had military experience, including a tour of Iraq as a US Marine, and his commanding officer had written him a glowing recommendation. In 2014, armed with an associate degree in criminal justice, he felt ready to apply to become an officer with the New Haven Police Department, in his home state of Connecticut. Talbot sailed through the department’s rigorous physical and mental tests, passing speed and agility trials and a written examination—but there was one final test. Like thousands of other law enforcement, fire, paramedic, and federal agencies across the country, the New Haven Police Department insists that each applicant take an assessment that has been rejected by almost every scientific authority: the polygraph test. Commonly known as lie detectors, polygraphs are virtually unused in civilian life. They’re largely inadmissible in court and it’s illegal for most private companies to consult them. Over the past century, scientists have debunked the polygraph, proving again and again that the test can’t reliably distinguish truth from falsehood. At best, it is a roll of the dice; at worst, it’s a vessel for test administrators to project their own beliefs. Yet Talbot’s test was no different from the millions of others conducted annually across the public sector, where the polygraph is commonly used as a last-ditch effort to weed out unsuitable candidates. Hiring managers will ask a range of questions about minor crimes, like marijuana use and vandalism, and major infractions, like kidnapping, child abuse, terrorism, and bestiality. Using a polygraph, these departments believe, increases the likelihood of obtaining facts that potential recruits might prefer not to reveal. And like hundreds of thousands of job candidates each year, Talbot was judged to have lied on the test. He failed. New Haven allows failed applicants to plead their case in public before the Board of Police Commissioners. So in February 2014, Talbot sat down and recited his experiences with lie detectors.................. Electronic lie detection is a peculiarly American obsession. No other country carries out anywhere near the estimated 2.5 million polygraph tests conducted in the US every year, a system that fuels a thriving $2 billion industry. A survey by the Bureau of Justice Statistics from 2007 found that around three-quarters of urban sheriff and police departments use polygraphs when hiring. Each test can cost $700 or more. Apply to become a police officer, trooper, firefighter, or paramedic today, and there is a good chance you will find yourself connected to a machine little changed since the 1950s, subject to the judgment of an examiner with just a few weeks’ pseudoscientific training..........In 2004 the American Psychological Association said “the lie detector might be better called a fear detector,” noting there was virtually no research validating its use in job screening. In 1999 the Department of Energy asked the National Academies of Science to review the scientific evidence of the validity and reliability of polygraph examinations, particularly as used for screening. The resulting committee visited governmental polygraph units and reviewed almost a century of scientific papers and data. Its comprehensive report, which took four years to research and write, was damning. “Almost a century of research ... provides little basis for the expectation that a polygraph test could have extremely high accuracy,” wrote its authors. “Polygraph testing yields an unacceptable choice between too many loyal employees falsely judged deceptive and too many threats left undetected. Its accuracy in distinguishing actual or potential violators from innocent test takers is insufficient to justify reliance on its use in employee screening.”.........In a survey of Virginia’s state licensed polygraphers carried out by University of Virginia researcher Vera Wilde in 2011, roughly 20 percent of respondents said they thought certain groups (for example, black people) tended to fail polygraphs more than others. In a US Senate hearing in 1987, the attorney general for New York said, “The [polygraph] operator’s prejudices, moods and feelings can strongly influence and even determine the outcome of the test. For example, we have received complaints about a polygraph operator who consistently fails a much higher percentage of black subjects than white subjects.”................... The one thing that lie detection appears to be good for is tricking naïve people into thinking that the person who’s examining them knows more about what’s in their mind than they actually ever could,” says Jay Stanley of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project. “It’s an intimidation device.” The polygraph industry does not always get its way. The ACLU and the Oregon Coalition of Police and Sheriffs succeeded in fighting off the attempt to legalize polygraph screening tests in Oregon last year, and evidence obtained using a polygraph remains inadmissible in most legal settings. Even the New Haven Police Department, which continues to use the polygraph for screening recruits, has proposed shifting their standards around the test. Earlier this year, the New Haven mayor’s Police and Community Task Force noted that minority officers are underrepresented in the department and laid part of the blame for that with the polygraph screening process. “NHPD needs to create a policy prohibiting contact between the psychologist and recruitment staff and the person administering the polygraph test,” it wrote in a report. According to the best available science, polygraph tests are no more reliable at extracting the truth than Wonder Woman’s magic lasso. But by the time a new installment of the super hero’s story is released, in November 2019, millions more polygraphs will have been administered across the nation."
The entire story can be read at:
https://www.wired.com/story/inside-polygraph-job-screening-black-mirror/
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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FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
