Nathan J Gordon, William L Fleisher
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the accused person makes references about other comparable situations with
another person.
• If a witness describes that he talked later with another person about the criminal
act, this criterion is not fulfilled, because the other person had nothing to do with
the act.
He pointed a gun at me and said, “If you cooperate you won’t get hurt. I am sure you know this
happened to someone else from your office and because he cooperated I did not hurt him” and I
put my hands up in the air, and said, “What do you want?” Another person suddenly walked into
the parking lot and he told me to put my hands down and don’t move. He suddenly pushed the
gun into my stomach and came very close to me. After the person left he said, “Give me those
6. FORENSIC STATEMENT ANALYSIS
63
papers,” and he took the papers from my hand. I tightened my hold and tried not to let go and he
hit me with the butt of the gun and said, “Don’t make me hurt you,” and took the papers and ran
away. When he grabbed the papers a small piece ripped off that was still in my hand.
12. Accounts of subjective mental state
• Reference to internal-psychological states.
• This criterion is accomplished when the statement reports in a differentiated
way the emotional or sensory reactions of the person in reference to the
criminal act.
• A simple reference to a threatening situation cannot justify the presence of this
criterion.
He pointed a gun at me and said, “If you cooperate you won’t get hurt. I am sure you know
this happened to someone else from your office and because he cooperated I did not hurt him” and I
put my hands up in the air, and said, “What do you want?” Another person suddenly walked into
the parking lot and he told me to put my hands down and don’t move. He suddenly pushed the
gun into my stomach and came very close to me. After the person left he said, “Give me those papers,”
and he took the papers from my hand. I tightened my hold and tried not to let go and he hit me with
the butt of the gun and said, “Don’t make me hurt you,” and took the papers and ran away. When he
grabbed the papers a small piece ripped off that was still in my hand. I felt my legs trembling, I almost
collapsed. I thought he was going to kill me. How would my family exist?
13. Attribution of perpetrator’s mental state
• If the statement contains specific elements concerning the psychological state of
the accused person it is a sign that the statement is based on real experience (i.e.:
heavy or rapid respiration).
• This has to be reported in a spontaneous way, not as a response to a
question.
He pointed a gun at me and said, “If you cooperate you won’t get hurt. I am sure you know
this happened to someone else from your office and because he cooperated I did not hurt him”
and I put my hands up in the air, and said, “What do you want?” Another person suddenly walked
into the parking lot and he told me to put my hands down and don’t move. He suddenly pushed
the gun into my stomach and came very close to me. I could feel his breath on my neck. He
was breathing rapidly. His cheek touched mine. It felt cold and clammy. After the person left
he said, “Give me those papers,” and he took the papers from my hand. I tightened my hold and
tried not to let go and he hit me with the butt of the gun and said, “Don’t make me hurt you,”
and took the papers and ran away. When he grabbed the papers a small piece ripped off that
was still in my hand. I felt my legs trembling, I almost collapsed. I thought he was going to kill
me. How would my family exist?
Motivation Related Contents: The previous categories described the contents and
elements from cognitive psychological aspects. The following criteria concerns the
motivation and the presentation of the self as by the suspect, and whether he tries to
put himself into a favorable light in an attempt to convince the interviewer he is being
truthful.
14. Spontaneous details: spontaneous corrections
64
6. FORENSIC STATEMENT ANALYSIS
• When there are spontaneous corrections (not grammatical ones) it is a valuable
sign of the credibility of the statement.
• Fabricated statements rarely have spontaneous corrections.
He pointed a gun at me and said, “If you cooperate you won’t get hurt. I am sure you know this
happened to someone else from your office and because he cooperated I did not hurt him” and
I put my hands up in the air, and said, “What do you want?” I didn’t just put my hands up,
he told me to put my hands up in the air. Another person suddenly walked into the parking lot
and he told me to put my hands down and don’t move. He suddenly pushed the gun into my stom
ach and came very close to me. I could feel his breath on my neck. He was breathing rapidly.
His cheek touched mine. It felt cold and clammy. After the person left he said, “Give me those
papers,” and he took the papers from my hand. I tightened my hold and tried not to let go and
he hit me with the butt of the gun and said, “Don’t make me hurt you,” and took the papers and
ran away. When he grabbed the papers a small piece ripped off that was still in my hand. I felt
my legs trembling, I almost collapsed. I thought he was going to kill me. How would my family
exist?
15. Admitting lack of memory
• If a statement is based on reality the writer will not be afraid to admit gaps in
memory.
• We have to be careful if the witness does this in response to a precise question.
In that case we cannot differentiate between a real or false statement.
He pointed a gun at me and said, “If you cooperate you won’t get hurt. I am sure you know this hap
pened to someone else from your office and because he cooperated I did not hurt him” and I put my
hands up in the air, and said, “What do you want?” I didn’t just put my hands up, he told me to put
my hands up in the air. Another person suddenly walked into the parking lot and he told me to put
my hands down and don’t move. He suddenly pushed the gun into my stomach and came very close
to me. I could feel his breath on my neck. He was breathing rapidly. His cheek touched mine. It felt cold
and clammy. I am not sure if the gun was a revolver or automatic. After the person left he said, “Give
me those papers,” and he took the papers from my hand. I tightened my hold and tried not to let go and
he hit me with the butt of the gun and said, “Don’t make me hurt you,” and took the papers and ran
away. When he grabbed the papers a small piece ripped off that was still in my hand. I felt my legs trem
bling, I almost collapsed. I thought he was going to kill me. How would my family exist?
16. Raising doubts about one’s own testimony
• It would be counterproductive for a person who is not telling the truth to
question his own statement.
• This criterion is accomplished when the person reports in a spontaneous way that
what he said before is so unbelievable that he himself wouldn’t believe it if
somebody told it to him.
He pointed a gun at me and said, “If you cooperate you won’t get hurt. I am sure you know this
happened to someone else from your office and beca
use he cooperated I did not hurt him” and I
put my hands up in the air, and said, “What do you want?” I didn’t just put my hands up, he told
me to put my hands up in the air. Another person suddenly walked into the parking lot and he told
me to put my hands down and don’t move. He suddenly pushed the gun into my stomach and
came very close to me. I could feel his breath on my neck. He was breathing rapidly. His cheek
touched mine. It felt cold and clammy. I am not sure if the gun was a revolver or automatic. After
the person left he said, “Give me those papers,” and he took the papers from my hand. I tightened
6. FORENSIC STATEMENT ANALYSIS
65
my hold and tried not to let go and he hit me with the butt of the gun and said, “Don’t make me
hurt you,” and took the papers and ran away. When he grabbed the papers a small piece ripped off
that was still in my hand. I felt my legs trembling, I almost collapsed. I thought he was going to kill
me. How would my family exist? It seemed like it was a nightmare. I had to pinch myself to make
sure it was really happening.
17. Self-deprecation: self-accusation
• If the person presents himself in a negative light, he admits his own errors, for
instance, says: “It was my fault; I should have locked the door and not have let
him enter,” or “His caresses felt nice, but afterwards it wasn’t nice anymore, it
hurt,” the presence of this criterion reinforces the hypothesis that they are
reporting a real experience.
• A person who didn’t experience what he is saying has the tendency to describe
the act in a black-and-white way. He would like to convince people that he is
pure (white), and the accused or accuser is completely evil (black).
. . . After the person left he said, “Give me those papers,” and he took the papers from my
hand. I tightened my hold and tried not to let go and he hit me with the butt of the gun and said,
“Don’t make me hurt you,” and took the papers and ran away. When he grabbed the papers a small
piece ripped off that was still in my hand. I felt my legs trembling, I almost collapsed. I thought he
was going to kill me. How would my family exist? It seemed like it was a nightmare. I had to pinch
myself to make sure it was really happening. If I had left the papers in the office they wouldn’t
have been stolen.
18. Pardoning the perpetrator: discharging the accused person
• This criterion is present when the statement shows a neutral attitude toward the
accused person.
• This attitude would be incompatible in the case of motivation for a false
allegation.
. . . After the person left he said, “Give me those papers,” and he took the papers from my hand.
I tightened my hold and tried not to let go and he hit me with the butt of the gun and said, “Don’t make
me hurt you,” and took the papers and ran away. When he grabbed the papers a small piece ripped off
that was still in my hand. I felt my legs trembling, I almost collapsed. I thought he was going to kill me.
How would my family exist? It seemed like it was a nightmare. I had to pinch myself to make sure it
was really happening. If I had left the papers in the office they wouldn’t have been stolen. Maybe
someone is forcing him to do this.
Offense-Specific Elements:
19. Detailed characteristics of the offense: crime-specific characteristics
• To fulfill this criterion, there has to be a sequence in the statement that has to do
with criminology or victimology.
• The writer has no idea that what he says has anything to do with criminology or
victimology. An example of this would be grooming behaviors used to
manipulate the intended target/victim.
He took me to a fancy restaurant. Gave me a beautiful watch.
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6. FORENSIC STATEMENT ANALYSIS
It is not necessary to find all of the nineteen cited criteria present in every statement.
A lack of criteria does not mean the statement is untrue. This is especially so when analyz-
ing a statement of a young child or mentally incapacitated person who may not have the
verbal skills necessary to write or give a statement of high quality.
The number of criteria found in a given statement does permit the analyzer to make a
qualitative evaluation of its validity. If the statement meets a combination of given criteria,
which proves it to be of a high quality, it supports the assumption that the statement is
based on reality and is true. There is no numerical scoring or cut-off established for this
method.
The evaluation of the nineteen criteria is the “heart” of the analysis. However, it repre-
sents only a part of the whole opinion of the expert. The diagnostic process finds its value
when the criteria is combined with other important elements, such as the birth of the state-
ment, how the statement was developed, the personality traits of the person giving the
statement, and their motivation for giving the statement.
In 1992, Stellar and Boychuk introduced the concept of Statement Validity Analysis
(SVA), which takes into account information in addition to CBSA. The evaluator reviews
all of the relevant case information and then analyzes the statement’s quality using the
CBSA criteria.
In 1997, Stellar and Volbert proposed that the evaluator must ask the critical question, “Is
this witness with his/her intellectual or physical capacities able to produce this statement
without having experienced what was stated?” In other words, could the previous state-
ment in this chapter have been written by a person who alleged the secret documents were
stolen at gunpoint, who could have given such a high-quality statement with so many of
the criteria present indicative of reality, and yet still be lying?
To answer this important question, the evaluator has to consider three elements:
• Personality Diagnosis – was the person giving the statement, considering his cognitive
and physical characteristics, able to clearly and correctly perceive what happened and
able to recall what happened?
• Genesis and Development of the Statement – taking into consideration the occasion and
origin of the statement, and to whom it was given for the first time.
• The reaction of the person receiving the statement for the first time must also be
considered, as well as what questions they could have asked that might have
influenced the statement.
• If the person made more than one statement, the consistency between different
statements must be analyzed, as well as the development of the statement.
• Motivation Analysis – It is necessary to analyze the different motivations that could
cause a person to make a false allegation against somebody: for example, to protect
someone else, for vengeance, to make oneself look better, or to cover up a different
crime. We must differentiate between the individual’s motivation and motivation
that may have been created by the environment (i.e., someone’s desire to create
misinformation).
In considering motivation for false allegations, we have to be aware of the following points:
• Does the language correspond to the experiences of the witness?
• Are the emotions exaggerated in comparison to the event described in the statement?
6. FORENSIC STATEMENT ANALYSIS
67
• Are the emotions totally missing where you would expect them to be?
• Are there indicators for any suggestion in the environment?
• Are there other kinds of conflicts between the accuser and the accused person?
• Are there indicators in the genesis of the testimony for explaining a false allegation?
• Are there indicators in the statement for a violation of natural laws?
• Are there contradictions in the different statements (or different witnesses)?
In 1999, the German Supreme Court issued a standard for expert testimony in statement
psychology. One of the major points of this standard is that the expert has to consider the
“Zero Hypothesis” [1], which assumes that the statement is not truthful until one finds
enough indicators to prove differently. In that case, the alternative hypothesis, that the
victim’s statement is based on real experience, is accepted.
Courts in Germany and Switzerland order forensic psychologists to give expert opinions
about the credibility of statements. The forensic psychologist’s task is to objectively evaluate
the quality of the testimony. Although this process was originally created to determine the
credibility of a child, it is also currently used to analyze the statements of adult witnesses.
The analysis must be performed in a systematic and transparent manner. The assessment
of a statement made spontaneously and consisting of long sequences, without interruptions
by questioning, ensures better validity than an assessment of a statement consisting of
many long questions with short answers. Every interview should be videotaped to ensure
transparency and accuracy.
Warning
A forensic psychological opinion in statement credibility has high validity only when the interview
corresponds to a very strict scientific standard, and when the evaluation is done competently.
In the late 1980s, Avinoam Sapir* immigrated to the United States and began teaching a
method of statement analysis he created, Scientific Content Analysis (SCAN) [2]. Sapir, with a background in code breaking for the Israeli intelligence service, and a polygraph examiner
in the Israeli Police Department in Jerusalem, holds a bachelor’s degree in both psychology
and criminology, and a master’s degree in criminology. He developed the SCAN technique