by 4<8=8AB@0B>@
officer in the line of duty; or (2) the killing of a felon, during the com-
mission of a felony, by a private citizen. (b) Manslaughter by negligence:
56
The Art of Investigative Interviewing
The killing of another person through gross negligence. Deaths of per-
sons due to their own negligence, accidental deaths not resulting from
gross negligence, and traffic fatalities are not included in the category
of manslaughter by negligence.
•
Forcible rape. The carnal knowledge of a female, forcibly and against her
will. Rapes by force and attempts or assaults to rape, regardless of the age
of the victim, are included. Statutory offenses (no force used—victim
under age of consent) are excluded.
•
Robbery. The taking or attempting to take anything of value from the
care, custody, or control of a person or persons by force or threat of force
or violence and/or by putting the victim in fear.
•
Aggravated assault. An unlawful attack by one person upon another for the
purpose of inflicting severe or aggravated bodily injury. This type of
assault usually is accompanied by the use of a weapon or by means likely
to produce death or great bodily harm. Simple assaults are excluded.
•
Burglary (breaking or entering). The unlawful entry of a structure to commit
a felony or a theft. Attempted forcible entry is included.
•
Larceny; theft (except motor vehicle theft). The unlawful taking, carrying,
leading, or riding away of property from the possession or constructive
possession of another. Examples are thefts of bicycles, motor vehicle parts
and accessories, shoplifting, pocket picking, or the stealing of any prop-
erty or article that is not taken by force and violence or by fraud.
Attempted larcenies are included. Embezzlement, confidence games,
forgery, check fraud, etc. are excluded.
•
Motor vehicle theft. The theft or attempted theft of a motor vehicle.
A motor vehicle is self-propelled and runs on land surface and not on
rails. Motorboats, construction equipment, airplanes, and farming equip-
ment are specifically excluded from this category.
•
Arson. Any willful or malicious burning or attempt to burn, with or with-
out intent to defraud, a dwelling house, public building, motor vehicle or
aircraft, personal property of another, etc.
The Part II offenses, for which only arrest data are collected, are:
•
Other assaults (simple). Assaults and attempted assaults where no weapon
was used or no serious or aggravated injury resulted to the victim. Stalk-
ing, intimidation, coercion, and hazing are included.
•
Forgery and counterfeiting. The altering, copying, or imitating of some-
thing, without authority or right, with the intent to deceive or defraud
by passing the copy or thing altered or imitated as that which is original or
genuine; or the selling, buying, or possession of an altered, copied, or
Public and Private Interviewing
57
imitated thing with the intent to deceive or defraud. Attempts are
included.
•
Fraud. The intentional perversion of the truth for the purpose of induc-
ing another person or other entity in reliance upon it to part with some-
thing of value or to surrender a legal right. Fraudulent conversion and
obtaining of money or property by false pretenses. Confidence games
and bad checks, except forgeries and counterfeiting, are included.
•
Embezzlement. The unlawful misappropriation or misapplication by an
offender to his/her own use or purpose of money, property, or some
other thing of value entrusted to his/her care, custody, or control.
•
Stolen property—buying, receiving, possessing. Buying, receiving, possessing,
selling, concealing, or transporting any property with the knowledge that
it has been unlawfully taken, as by burglary, embezzlement, fraud, lar-
ceny, robbery, etc. Attempts are included.
•
Vandalism. To willfully or maliciously destroy, injure, disfigure, or deface
any public or private property, real or personal, without the consent of
the owner or person having custody or control by cutting, tearing,
breaking, marking, painting, drawing, covering with filth, or any other
such means as may be specified by local law. Attempts are included.
•
Weapons—carrying, possessing, etc. The violation of laws or ordinances
prohibiting the manufacture, sale, purchase, transportation, possession,
concealment, or use of firearms, cutting instruments, explosives, incen-
diary devices, or other deadly weapons. Attempts are included.
•
Prostitution and commercialized vice. The unlawful promotion of or partic-
ipation in sexual activities for profit, including attempts. To solicit cus-
tomers or transport persons for prostitution purposes; to own, manage, or
operate a dwelling or other establishment for the purpose of providing a
place where prostitution is performed; or to otherwise assist or promote
prostitution.
•
Sex offenses (except forcible rape, prostitution, and commercialized vice). Offenses against chastity, common decency, morals, and the like. Incest, indecent
exposure, and statutory rape are included. Attempts are included.
•
Drug abuse violations. The violation of laws prohibiting the production,
distribution, and/or use of certain controlled substances. The unlawful
cultivation, manufacture, distribution, sale, purchase, use, possession,
transportation, or importation of any controlled drug or narcotic sub-
stance. Arrests for violations of state and local laws, specifically those
relating to the unlawful possession, sale, use, growing, manufacturing,
and making of narcotic drugs. The following drug categories are
58
The Art of Investigative Interviewing
specified: opium or cocaine and their derivatives (morphine, heroin,
codeine); marijuana; synthetic narcotics—manufactured narcotics that
can cause true addiction (demerol, methadone); and dangerous nonnar-
cotic drugs (barbiturates, benzedrine).
•
Gambling. To unlawfully bet or wager money or something else of value;
assist, promote, or operate a game of chance for money or some other
stake; possess or transmit wagering information; manufacture, sell, pur-
chase, possess, or transport gambling equipment, devices, or goods; or
tamper with the outcome of a sporting event or contest to gain a gam-
bling advantage.
•
Offenses against the family and children. Unlawful nonviolent acts by a fam-
ily member (or legal guardian) that threaten the physical, mental, or eco-
nomic well-being or morals of another family member and that are not
classifiable as other offenses, such as assault or sex offenses. Attempts are
included.
•
Driving under the influence. Driving or operating a motor vehicle or com-
mon carrier while mentally or physically impaired a
s the result of con-
suming an alcoholic beverage or using a drug or narcotic.
•
Liquor laws. The violation of state or local laws or ordinances prohibiting
the manufacture, sale, purchase, transportation, possession, or use of
alcoholic beverages, not including driving under the influence and
drunkenness. Federal violations are excluded.
•
Drunkenness. To drink alcoholic beverages to the extent that one’s mental
faculties and physical coordination are substantially impaired. Driving
under the influence is excluded.
•
Disorderly conduct. Any behavior that tends to disturb the public peace or
decorum, scandalize the community, or shock the public sense of
morality.
•
Vagrancy. The violation of a court order, regulation, ordinance, or law
requiring the withdrawal of persons from the streets or other specified
areas; prohibiting persons from remaining in an area or place in an idle
or aimless manner; or prohibiting persons from going from place to place
without visible means of support.
•
All other offenses. All violations of state or local laws not specifically iden-
tified as Part I or Part II offenses, except traffic violations.
•
Suspicion. Arrested for no specific offense and released without formal
charges being placed.
•
Curfew and loitering laws (persons under age 18). Violations by juveniles of
local curfew or loitering ordinances.
Public and Private Interviewing
59
According to the 2011 Crime in the United States report, the estimated number
of violent crimes reported to law enforcement (1,203,564) decreased for the
fifth year in a row, whereas the estimated number of property crimes reported
to law enforcement (9,063,173) decreased for the ninth year in a row. 2
VIOLENT CRIME
The South, the most populous region in the country, accounted for 41.3 per-
cent of all violent crimes (lesser volumes of 22.9 percent were tallied in the
West, 19.5 percent in the Midwest, and 16.2 percent in the Northeast).
•
Aggravated assaults accounted for the highest number of estimated vio-
lent crimes reported to law enforcement at 62.4 percent.
•
Firearms were used in 67.8 percent of the nation’s murders, 41.3 percent
of robberies, and 21.2 percent of aggravated assaults. (Data on weapons
used during forcible rapes is not collected.)
•
In 2011, 64.8 percent of murder offenses, 41.2 percent of forcible rape
offenses, 28.7 percent of robbery offenses, and 56.9 percent of aggravated
assault offenses were “cleared”—either by the arrest of the subject or because
law enforcement encountered a circumstance beyond its control that pro-
hibited an arrest after the subject was identified (i.e., death of the subject).
PROPERTY CRIME
Property crime which are crimes against property, in the US, are typically
referred to criminal offenses such as burglary, larceny, fraud, embezzlement,
forgery, car theft and arson. Another property crime offense, shoplifting, is a
form of larceny. The property crime offense list is vast and can also be
described as crimes against property/material based items.
•
Data shows that 43.2 percent of the estimated property crimes occurred
in the South (followed by the West with 22.8 percent, the Midwest with
21.1 percent, and the Northeast with 13.0 percent).
•
Larceny-theft accounted for 68 percent of all property crimes in 2011.
•
Property crimes resulted in estimated losses of $156.6 billion.
•
Also cleared were 21.5 percent of larceny-theft offenses, 12.7 percent of
burglary offenses, 11.9 percent of motor vehicle theft offenses, and 18.8
percent of arson offenses.
The FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) program is one of two statis-
tical programs administered by the Department of Justice that measure
2 FBI website, www.fbi.gov, March 1, 2013.
60
The Art of Investigative Interviewing
the magnitude, nature, and impact of crime. The other is the National
Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), conducted by the Bureau of Justice
Statistics.
The programs were designed to complement each other, providing valu-
able information about aspects of the nation’s crime problem, but due to
methodology and crime coverage differences, users should not compare
crime trends between the two programs. The UCR program provides a reli-
able set of criminal justice statistics for law enforcement administration, operation, and management as well as to indicate fluctuations in the level of crime.
The NCVS provides previously unavailable information about victims,
offenders, and crime, including crimes not reported to police. Additional
information about the differences between the two programs can be found
in the “Nation’s Two Crime Measures” section of Crime in the United States.
Looking ahead to 2013 and beyond, the UCR program is working to
complete the automation of its data collection system, which will result
in improved data collection efforts with new offense categories and revised
offense definitions as well as a faster turnaround time to analyze and publish
the data. In addition, beginning with the 2013 data, the new definition of
rape will take effect; the FBI is developing options for law enforcement
agencies to meet this requirement, which will be built into the new data col-
lection system.
UCR’s Law Enforcement Officers Killed and Assaulted, 2011 and Hate
Crimes Statistics, 2011
INVESTIGATIONS IN THE PUBLIC AND PRIVATE SPHERES
Traditionally, private investigators have dealt with fraud and embezzlement,
whereas the police have handled the violent crimes of murder, rape, and
assault. Until just recently, law enforcement officers were not properly
trained to investigate sophisticated white-collar crimes. Rather, police train-
ing was reactive in nature, emphasizing how to diffuse violent situations,
how to perform first aid, how to shoot straight, and such topics. The subtle
aspects of human interaction, the gentle art of communication, and their
usefulness in investigative interviewing were all but ignored.
Today, businesses call on private investigators to look into various
offenses committed against companies or their employees. Many large busi-
nesses have trained investigators on staff to investigate crimes ranging from
stalking to theft. Typically, if a Part I offense has occurred, the internal
Public and Private Interviewing
61
investigation is turned over to the appropriate police agency. However, if
the incident can be investigated by internal security personnel, it is. Few
companies want the embarrassment of a public disclosure of their problems.
In addition, many businesses do not think law enforcement agencies can
properly investigate so-called white-collar crimes.
In the private sector, private detectives and security personnel for corpo-
rations might investig
ate an incident, even though no civil or criminal mat-
ter is pending. The investigation might be aimed specifically at providing
information to help management make administrative decisions regarding
the violation of company rules or procedures. Often, the evidence collected
never reaches the outside world or the civil or criminal courts. The decision
to reveal or not reveal the evidence to the public depends on what’s ulti-
mately best for the company.
In Chapter 12, we examine internal controls and investigations from the
corporate perspective and the role in which you could likely find yourself
should you be working on an internal investigation.
Police agencies investigate few embezzlement cases. The vast majority of
such cases are handled by private investigators. Why aren’t police agencies
involved in the investigation of more white-collar crimes?
Based on my 35 years of experience, I am convinced that businesses,
banks in particular, do not want their internal matters revealed to the public.
Reports of internal theft lead to bad press. That is, if internal losses become
public knowledge, the bank’s image as a safe place to deposit money will
suffer.
At one time, the FBI investigated all internal and other bank thefts, and
technically it still retains jurisdiction. But today the FBI does not investigate cases involving losses of only a few thousand dollars. The bureau has shifted
its priorities, leaving local police agencies to investigate most cases of fraud and embezzlement. Unfortunately, local police agencies are generally not
properly trained in these investigations, and even if they were, most bank
managers would still prefer to handle the matter privately.
THE COLLECTION OF EVIDENCE
Whether the investigator is a police detective, a loss prevention officer of a
large corporation, or a private investigator hired to look into a particular
incident, he or she must operate within predefined parameters in conducting
an investigation and collecting evidence. Police investigators must work
within federal and state laws intended to protect society from unreasonable
62
The Art of Investigative Interviewing
police behavior. In addition, they work within the bureaucracy and oper-
ating procedures of their respective agencies. Private investigators have a
wider choice of investigative methods because there are fewer laws govern-