Confessions of a Lie Detector: years of theft, sex, and murder

by Jim Wygant

  –––

  I saw Alan one more time after the soda pop hoax had fizzled and while he was still awaiting disposition of the criminal charges against him. I found him at a computer terminal in the Central Library. He had snugged his wheelchair up close to one of the few cubicles built low for handicapped persons. He was searching for something in the catalog of books and was so intent on his work that he did not see me. I peeked over his shoulder and saw that he had asked the computer to search for books about “hotel rules.” I recalled that Alan lived in a hotel, and I imagined the possible beginnings of another crusade, driven by his persistent need for personal recognition. I left him to it.

  Alan was found guilty of filing a false report with the FDA. He was sentenced to five months in federal custody, to be followed by five months in a halfway house.

  4. Mucking Around In Truth

  I once knew a polygraph examiner whose business card was decorated with a picture of an old man carrying a lantern. My friend explained that the picture was intended to represent Diogenes, the Greek philosopher who lived around 350 B.C. and searched for truth, apparently after the sun went down. The search for truth certainly represents a noble purpose, but is that what polygraph examiners do? Most people seem to think so, even many polygraph examiners. Courts share that opinion, and judges have disallowed polygraph testimony at least partly on the grounds that in a criminal trial no one should decide on truthfulness except the jury (or the judge himself if there is no jury). Judges do not want a machine to replace the established judicial process for passing judgment upon another person’s veracity.

  Polygraph examiners actually deal with truth on a very limited basis. A standard test provides for only about ten questions, and usually only three of those address the issue directly. In a murder case, “truth” is apt to be found in some greater context than what is encompassed in the question of who struck the fatal blow.

  Pretend that you are on a jury and are told only that one man is dead and another lied when he denied the killing. Would you be prepared to pass judgment based only upon that information? Perhaps you would want to consider mitigation, such as self-defense; or aggravating factors, like an unprovoked attack or base motive, such as theft?

  When we speak of truth we usually mean everything that might influence our opinion about whatever is under consideration. In 1993 the crew from a “tabloid” style television news program secretly planted small explosive charges on a pickup truck to assure that it would burn in a wreck. They were doing an exposé about vehicle safety. When members of the public learned that the burning truck had been rigged, they complained that they had been lied to. It did not matter that other trucks actually did burn on their own when involved in collisions. Viewers felt betrayed and manipulated by the news crew.

  We do not always react that way to deceit. While we stand in a supermarket line waiting to pay for groceries, we scan the rack of tabloid newspapers. We see from the headlines that a woman in Kansas gave birth to beings from another planet. We are not concerned about the truth of that claim. The difference between that and the burning truck is in our expectations. We relied upon the truthfulness of the TV news program; we did not place the same reliance in a tabloid newspaper that proclaims miracle cancer cures and recent sightings of Elvis.

  Truth is not always important. The proof is that many of us not only tolerate but enjoy such things as supermarket tabloids and professional wrestling. It may be that any extraordinary claim is acceptable if we are already skeptical. It’s not likely that anything we subsequently do will depend upon the information we derived from the tabloid or from the staged wrestling match. We do not make any wrong choices because we think a mother in Kansas is nursing beings from another planet. We do not feel we have been fooled, except to the extent we permitted. When we experience the tabloid and the wrestling match, we remain in control of our own decision processes.

  A lie is a circumstance in which someone else shapes our belief while concealing from us information that we would want to know and that probably would cause us to reach a different conclusion. In that case, we have lost control of our own decision process, and when we discover the deceit we feel cheated. Often that sense of being cheated gives greater offense than whatever it was that the lie concealed. We are less troubled by the issue of whether any truck ever exploded in a wreck than by the notion that a TV news crew manipulated us. Were we tricked only once, we wonder? Can we believe anything they tell us?

  When we discover that we have relied upon information that the teller knew was false, we feel that the liar made a fool of us. The lie not only discredits the liar, it also diminishes the one who believed it. The person who discovers the deceit does not want to be victimized again in that way by that same person. That is what trust is all about; and why it is seriously damaged by a discovered lie.

  Infidelities in intimate relationships usually result in lies that are intended to hide the breach of faith. If the lie is discovered, trust is shattered and the relationship may fail. When I maintained an office I received one or two inquiries per week from persons in heterosexual relationships who wanted to test a spouse or intimate companion. It was almost always the suspicious party who called, rather than the one under suspicion. Few called to arrange a test to prove they were telling the truth. Most wanted to know if their partner was lying.

  I usually declined to do those tests. I would explain that if a relationship had deteriorated to the extent that one or both parties believed a polygraph examination was necessary, then there was probably little left to save. I have found that it is not likely that a polygraph examination will restore trust. If someone who denies infidelity fails the polygraph test, he or she probably will not admit the truth, and suspicions will only increase. Conversely, if an accused cheater passes the test, the doubting party is not likely to surrender his or her suspicions based upon the test results.

  My advice to those callers is based upon experience. There was a time when I did run a few of those tests. I recall vividly a young man who insisted that his wife be tested to prove that she had not had sex with another man. The couple had been married for about two years. She insisted that during that time she had only had sex with her husband. He asked her to wait in the lobby of my office and then told me privately that he had cheated on her. He saw no inconsistency between his casual acceptance of his own infidelity and his suspicions about what she might have done.

  I did that test, and she produced definite truthful results. I called the husband into the office and told him. He asked a few questions, already revealing his reluctance to accept the results of the examination he had requested. Later that day he phoned and asked me to explain the test results again. More questions, more doubts. He called repeatedly over the next few months, trying to get me to retract my conclusion. At one point he threatened to sue me. I invited him to do so, but requested that he stop calling, since I had already answered the same questions for him many times.

  Seven years later the woman I had tested called me. They were still married, which surprised me. She said that her husband still did not believe her faithfulness. It sounded as though he never had. She wanted a copy of the report I had written for them seven years earlier. I destroy most paper files that are more than six years old, keeping only a computerized abstract. I told her that I no longer had a copy of the report or the questions used in her test. She was clearly disappointed and, I suppose, went back to repeating the usual denials that her husband still could not bring himself to believe.

  –––

  If truth is so important to maintaining trust, why do we lie? There is no simple answer to that because there is no simple definition of a lie. Lies come in various shapes and sizes. We can construct an imaginary scale that represents how much damage a lie might inflict upon the trust that existed between the liar and the listener. At the low end of that scale would be lies of convenience. Here are a few examples:

  “I was about to do that.” No you weren’t.<
br />
  “Forget it. It’s not important to me.” Yes it is.

  “I hope you have a nice day.” Do you really care or are you just trying to end an encounter on a positive note?

  “Since you asked, it looks great.” Does it, or are you trying to avoid offense?

  We all use these little conversational devices regularly. Most listeners recognize them for what they are, clichés that, at worst, might represent an effort to avoid confrontation. In most circumstances the listener does not rely upon the truthfulness of such remarks, no more than he would rely upon the veracity of a supermarket tabloid or the authenticity of professional wrestling.

  At the opposite end of our scale, the worst kind of lie is one deliberately constructed in advance and initiated by the teller for the purpose of controlling another person’s judgment. This would include such lies as:

  The pickup truck burned because of the collision. The truth was that the news crew planted explosive charges.

  A man says that he and his wife need help with their disabled car. The car is not disabled and the helper is beaten and robbed.

  A woman says she found a syringe in her soda pop. But she actually put it there herself in an effort to collect money from the bottler.

  If those represent the worst kind of lie, we can easily recognize that even in that category the examples vary greatly in seriousness. The lie that lures a man into a circumstance in which he is beaten and robbed is obviously of greater consequence than the other two examples. However, all three lies share a common trait. They are told with the primary intent of obtaining something from the listener. In those three examples the goals were to obtain a high number of TV viewers, a favorable opportunity to commit a robbery, and a means of extorting money from a business. The liar could not achieve his or her goal without taking control of the listener by deceit. The lie deliberately exploited the listener’s natural trust.

  The consequences of those three lies extended beyond each individual incident. When we learn that a particular manufacturer’s pickup blows up, we become reluctant to buy any vehicle made by the same manufacturer. When we hear that a helpful motorist was beaten and robbed, we resolve to be more guarded about any offer we might make to help. When we are told that someone found something in their soda pop, we switch to another brand. It does not matter that we do not know any of the persons involved. We see ourselves as potential victims.

  It is these lies that are methodically concocted to achieve some undeserved result that we fear the most. They suggest that we can all be manipulated by deliberate deceit at any time. Carried to an irrational extreme, this fear becomes paranoia.

  Somewhere lower on our scale of lies we locate those that are spontaneous, typically lies told in self-defense in response to an inquiry, lies told to avoid consequences. We tend to be more forgiving of these lies. Most of us have told at least one of them at some time. The wife asks her husband, “Why are you so late?” He lies and says he was working at the office. She says she called his direct line and got no answer. He adds to his deceit by saying that he ignored the phone so he could get his work done sooner. She asks what he was working on. He hesitates while he tries to think of something. She is a skilled interrogator. She knows which questions to ask and what kinds of responses to look for. With only three questions she has her answer. She must then make her own decision, either to openly challenge his story or to reserve her doubts and put off a confrontation. During the questioning he senses her suspicion developing. If she does not challenge him, he may mistakenly assume that his lie worked. If she accuses him he must make a decision of his own, whether to compound the lie or to confess his deception. This all happens in the span of a few seconds, but it demands considerable effort from both parties. Lying is not easy, and good interrogators rely upon that in discovering the truth. In the case of the husband who gets home late, the decisions that each party makes in those few seconds of discussion will be representative of the level of trust in their relationship and its durability.

  Spontaneous lies are among the most vulnerable to discovery. They are not carefully thought out, so they often contain flaws that the listener detects. And their spontaneity prevents them from being imprinted in the liar’s memory very well, so they are also subject to discovery through inconsistencies. It is common for someone who has told a spontaneous lie to retract it under even the slightest challenge. He may then admit at least some of the truth in an effort to reestablish his credibility. The clever spontaneous liar knows these things from experience and always tells lies that are close to the truth. He may draw upon a recent true experience, simply changing the place or the date to accommodate his needs. He is then describing a real situation and only needs to remember those critical details that he changed.

  Most of us are not good liars. Telling a lie makes us uncomfortable, sometimes to the extent of obvious physical manifestations like blushing or looking away or fidgeting during the lie. That discomfort must arise at least partly from the fear of getting caught, but it probably is also triggered by the realization that a lie breaks the bond between the liar and the listener. The liar has betrayed trust and sees that his relationship with the listener has changed irrevocably from what it was before the lie. There is now a secret that only the liar knows. The closer the relationship, the greater will be this breach between the liar and the person he deceives.

  That brings us to confessions. People rescind their lies with confessions for a variety of reasons, often simply because the deception has already been discovered. Whatever the initial impetus to disclose the truth, all confessions contain one common element, the liar’s desire to eliminate the breach he has created.

  Even if the listener does not yet suspect a lie, the liar has already opened a gap between himself and the listener. The lie manipulates the listener into a false belief, as the liar deliberately warps the listener’s view of a circumstance so it no longer resembles what the liar himself knows or believes. The listener does not know of this flight from reality. Only the liar does, and the liar can do nothing to correct the breach without revealing his lie.

  When the listener begins to suspect deceit, the gap only widens. The listener fears betrayal of trust. The liar can not eliminate that concern without telling more lies or revealing the truth.

  Police officers who interrogate suspects in crimes often try to build a partial bond by offering cigarettes and coffee and by making small talk about family and work. They want the suspect to strive for a complete bond with them, only possible if he reveals the truth. They also want to see how he behaves when they can be relatively certain he is being truthful. That will make it easier to recognize deceit. The interrogator may eventually drop into the conversation the old line “I can only help you if you tell me the truth.” The most successful interrogators are not insincere in saying that. They genuinely want the suspect to understand that they are available to him. Sometimes this creates identity difficulties for the officer, who later wonders how he could have treated a suspect in a particularly loathsome crime with the tolerance and even compassion necessary to get a confession.

  –––

  There is another common kind of lie that overlaps all of the categories already mentioned. It is the false accusation.

  It can be spontaneous. Children are particularly prone to this type of lie. The adult asks, “Did you break the peanut butter jar?” The six-year-old culprit with the peanut butter still on her hands immediately blames her sister, who is conveniently absent at the moment.

  False accusations can also be deliberate constructs, carefully formulated in advance. Wars have begun with this kind of lie. Hitler claimed that Poland attacked. He sent in his tanks and completed the annexation of the entire country before the Poles had time to disprove Hitler’s claim.

  False accusations between individuals are most often delivered when the accused is not present. Often the easiest way to resolve a suspected false accusation is simply to ask the accuser to directly confront the other
person. That kind of encounter emphasizes the breach that will be created if the lie is maintained. The usefulness of a confrontation is so well understood that it has become a dramatic cliché, the innocent man crying out, “I demand to face my accuser!” Our own criminal trial procedures have formalized the confrontation. The prosecutor asks a victim, “Do you see your attacker here in this courtroom?” The victim points to the defendant. In this context, confrontation has become little more than ritual.

  Even outside the courtroom, the technique of confrontation does not always reveal the truth. Some who are rightly accused are bold enough to demand confrontation, hoping that their demand will help conceal their guilt. And some false accusers allow themselves to be pushed into a direct confrontation, only to become more entrenched in their deception, fearing the consequences of discovery more than the damage they are doing to someone else.

  False accusations are regarded as a particularly low kind of lie. They are unlike the lie that someone tells about his own conduct in order to avoid trouble. Although we hold that it is wrong to lie about ourselves, principally in the form of denying an accusation or exaggerating a personal claim, we regard as despicable the lie that damages an innocent person. It is so much worse because we recognize that any of us can become its victim. We do not need to have done anything to be targeted by a false accuser.

  A false accusation forces the accused to defend himself, whether he wants to or not. To remain silent is to lend credibility to the accusation. But denial alone, unsupported by any proof, is rarely enough to extinguish suspicion. As long as there is even the slightest possibility that the accusation might be genuine, some will choose to believe it. Alfred Hitchcock built a career around movies in which his heroes struggled to overcome false accusations of murder. The popular television series “The Fugitive”, and the movie based upon it, pursued the same theme. Kafka wrote about it as an abstract threat in “The Trial.” He gave us the most insidious example, the accusation that remained a secret, the lie against which there was no possible defense.