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Archives of Forensic Psychology c 2014 Global Institute of Forensic Psychology 2014, Vol. 1, No. 1, 1–13 ISSN 2334-2749 Crime on the Border: Use of Evidence in Customs Interviews P¨arAnders Granhag Department of Psychology, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden Norwegian Police University College, Oslo, Norway Department of Psychology, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway Franziska Clemens Department of Psychology, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden Leif A. Str¨omwall Department of Psychology, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden Erik Mac Giolla∗ Department of Psychology, University of Gothenburg, Box 500, 405 30 Gothenburg, Sweden, [email protected] Customs officers are an understudied population in psycho-legal research. The present study is an attempt to fill this gap by examining customs officers’ interview strategies. Specifically, in an experimental setup, we examined how customs officers (N = 80) planned to use evidence in an investigative interview. Half the customs officers were members of a crime-fighting unit (less experienced interviewers) and half were members of an investigative unit (more experienced interviewers). Participants were randomly assigned to two evidence conditions: weak or strong. Participants extracted evidence from a mock crime brief and described how they would use this evidence in a suspect interview. Of the extracted pieces of evidence only 15% were planned to be used in a strategic manner. Evidence strength did not influence whether participants planned to use evidence strategically. The results showed that members of the crime-fighting unit were less likely to use evidence strategically than members of the investigative unit. Completed training courses were associated with an improvement in the planned use of evidence. In contrast, experience in years was associated with a poorer planned use of evidence. Taken together, the results imply that if customs officers are to improve with regards to their use of evidence in suspect interviews, explicit and systematic training may be more effective than experience. Keywords: Customs officers, Suspect interviews, Evidence strength, Strategic interviewing 1 giolla, granhag, clemens, & stromwall¨ Customs officers represent an understudied population in psycho-legal research. They are, however, faced with many issues that are relevant to legal psychology. One example, and the focus of this study, is suspect interviewing. A primary aim of suspect interviews is to obtain information to resolve unsolved issues relating to a crime, such as a suspect’s potential role in it (Memon, Vrij, & Bull, 2003). A growing number of researchers argue that central to the task of suspect interviewing is (1) the evidence that the interviewer has against the suspect and (2) how this evidence is used during the interview (for reviews see Bull, 2014; Granhag & Hartwig, 2015). The more specific focus of the current study is therefore on customs officers’ planned use of evidence in suspect interviews. To our knowledge, this is the first study on customs officers’ interview strategies. For this reason, our literature review will focus on the related field of evidence use in police interviews. The best practice on how to use evidence in an interview remains open, with accepted practices varying from country to country. For instance, a study of real-life police interviews in the US found that interviewers disclosed the evidence against the suspect (together with a suggestion of guilt) at the beginning of the interview in 85% of cases (Leo, 1996). Such findings likely reflect the influence of police manuals advocating the Reid Technique (Inbau, Reid, Buckley, & Jayne, 2011) which recommends, amongst other things, confronting a suspect with much, but not all, of the evidence at the outset of an interview. This is done to emphasize the degree and severity of the evidence the interviewer holds against the suspect. In contrast, in the UK, results have shown that in only a minority of cases (slightly above 10%) was the evidence disclosed at the beginning of an interview (Moston & Engelberg, 1993). These differences are likely due to the differing goals of suspect interviews in the two countries: In the US interviews are typically confession-focused, whereas investigative interviews conducted in the UK focus on information gathering (Gudjonsson, 2003). In a recent study, Japanese police officers were asked about their use of evidence during interviews (Wachi et al., 2014). Statements relating to police behavior were rated on a five-point scale (1 = never occurs; 5 = always occurs). Mean ratings showed that police rarely confronted suspects with evidence, while they were somewhat more likely to highlight statement-evidence inconsistencies (for an overview of related literature see Moston & Engelberg, 2011). Researchers have also examined how the strength of evidence influences how police carry out interviews. For example, Moston, Stephenson, and Williamson (1992) found that interviewers chose an accusatory (vs. information-gathering) interviewing style more often when there was strong (vs. weak) evidence against the suspect. An accusatory interviewing style is often characterized by confronting the suspect with the available evidence at the outset of the interview (Moston & Stephenson, 1993). Hence, when the evidence is strong and the interviewer therefore focuses on eliciting a confession from the suspect, s/he might consider an accusatory interview style an effective approach. This finding was qualified by a recent questionnaire study, in which police officers’ evidence disclosure tactics were examined in both strong and weak evidence conditions (Smith & Bull, 2014). The vast majority of officers reported that they would choose to disclose evidence to the suspect either gradually throughout the interview or at the end of the interview. Furthermore, a majority did not change their disclosure tactic depending on evidence strength. It should be noted, however, that the populations differed between the two studies (the majority of officers, approximately 80%, in the study by Smith and Bull, were Australian, while officers in the study by Moston et al. were from the UK). 2 crime on the border Additionally, there was a 20-year difference between the two data collections. Considering how standard practices vary from country to country and are likely to vary over time, these differences may account for the observed discrepancies. In recent years researchers have turned to the laboratory to answer questions as to how best to use evidence during suspect interviews. Here the focus has primarily been on when evidence should be disclosed. Much of this research speaks against the early disclosure of evidence and instead suggests disclosing evidence either at the end of the interview or gradually throughout the interview (Bull, 2014; Hartwig, Granhag, Str¨omwall, & Kronkvist, 2006; Sellers & Kebbell, 2009). Late disclosure and gradual disclosure increase the chances of statement-evidence inconsistencies—an important indicator of deceit (Clemens, Granhag, & Str¨omwall, 2011; Granhag, Str¨omwall, Will´en, & Hartwig, 2013; Hartwig, Granhag, Str¨omwall, & Vrij, 2005; Jordan & Hartwig, 2013; Sorochinski et al., 2014). Late and gradual disclosure have also been shown to improve the accuracy of judgments of guilt and innocence (Dando & Bull, 2011; Dando, Bull, Ormerod, & Sandham, 2013; Hartwig et al., 2006) and to result in more true confessions than early disclosure (Sellers & Kebbell, 2009). Although some issues remain moot regarding whether to disclose evidence late or gradually—for instance, Dando and Bull (2011) found gradual disclosure to be more effective when detecting deceit than late disclosure, while Sorochinski et al. (2014) found late disclosure to be more effective than gradual disclosure—the results consistently speak against the early disclosure of evidence. Many scholars have raised a number of disadvantages to the early disclosure of evidence, including: (1) it does not take into account evasive strategies (e.g., withholding information, denial strategies) that guilty suspects typically employ during interviews (Hartwig, Granhag, & Str¨omwall, 2007); (2) by disclosing known evidence early in an interview, guilty suspects are better equipped to create statements that are consistent both with the evidence and with their claimed innocence (Sellers & Kebbell, 2009); and (3) there are generally more risks involved when disclosing compared with not disclosing information (Sellers & Kebbell, 2009). Sellers and Kebbell highlight a number of potential risks associated with evidence disclosure, including: (1) a diminished interviewer-suspect rapport (if the evidence is presented confrontationally); (2) a risk that the evidence is inaccurate (which may reduce the credibility of the interviewer in the eyes of the suspect and in turn the likelihood of true confessions; Kebbell, Hurren, & Roberts, 2006); and (3) the fact that once the evidence has been used, it cannot be unused. The Current Study The common theme of the research on this topic is a belief that evidence can and should be used in a strategic manner during suspect interviews. The primary aim of the current study was to examine the extent to which customs officers would use evidence in a strategic vs. a non-strategic manner. In addition, we examined whether experience, training, and evidence strength would influence the planned use of evidence. 3 giolla, granhag, clemens, & stromwall¨ Method Participants and Design A total of 80 Swedish customs officers (32 women,

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