POLICE PSYCHOLOGY:Fitness-for-Duty Evaluation (FFDE), False Confessions

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Forensic Psychology (PSY - 513)

Lesson 05

POLICE PSYCHOLOGY

PSTR (Post Shooting Traumatic Response)

Along with many other task related, organization related and personal stressors, PSTR is also of great

importance, it is just like Post-traumatic stress disorder "that is an anxiety disorder that's triggered

by your memories of a traumatic event -- an event that directly affected you or an event that you

witnessed". In PSTR a policeman can experience a collection of emotions and psychological

response patterns that may occur after a police officer shoots a person in the line of duty" it is

more likely if the victim dies, like shooting a bank robber while he was about to shoot some innocent

victim. But remember not everyone involved in a traumatic and shooting event experiences post-

shooting stress disorder.

Symptoms of Post Shooting Traumatic Response (PSTR)

According to (Bartol & Bartol 2004 ) symptoms may include:

1. Perceptual distortions of time, sight and sound

2. Enhanced Sense of danger

3. Anger

4. Sleep difficulties

5. Isolation/ withdrawal

6. Flashbacks

Officers may be furious at the person they shot, their department, their colleagues, or society at general

for putting them in a position of having to shoot someone. Now the role of psychologist is again very

important to help such officers. Assessment is also automatically done after any police officer shoots a

person in the line of duty. The kind of psychological service provided here is generally of a more long-

term and continuously-monitored nature. So, some times they recommend employees involved in

shooting incidents frequently have to take a leave of absence and/or get assigned to "administrative

duties." The psychologist sometimes plays a role in determining if such an employee is ready to re-

assume their normal duties or not. More and more police departments are experimenting with peer

group counseling for shooting (critical) incidents.

Fitness-for-Duty Evaluation (FFDE)

Certain kinds of psychological assessments are done as a matter of standard procedure with some

aspects of police work. For example, SWAT team members and officers (Special Weapons and Tactics,

a unit that is trained and equipped to handle special, high-risk incidents) working undercover, narcotics,

vice, or internal affairs are frequently required to undergo some sort of periodic psychological

assessment to ensure they are "fit" to continue working in these high-stress positions. Normally, these

assessments are done on a yearly basis and an FFDE can usually be ordered by any upper-rank

employee on a lower-rank employee whenever the lower-rank employee engages in "suspicious"

behavior which brings up serious questions about whether they are fit to carry out public safety work or

not.

Procedure of fitness for duty evaluation

For on-duty assessment role of psychologist is very important, critical and difficult as FFDE requires a

much more intensive assessment than the pre-employment psychological screening evaluation. Fitness

for duty evaluations should be used with care and while working in the same department it is really

difficult to assess the co-workers especially when you have to report that person under assessment is not

fit for the duty.

The full ramp up required by an FFDE involves:

1. Psychological screening report

2. Personality tests, cognitive and ability tests

3. Performance evaluations

4. Use of excessive force incidents (how much torture is exhibited?)

Forensic Psychology (PSY - 513)

Formal complaints

Shootings

Medical records

Frequent mental status exams

An intensive background investigation

10.

The collection of testimonials by fellow officers

11.

Follow-up on citizen complaints

12.

Examination of medical records

13.

Internal affairs investigation

14.

Investigation of brain injuries

FFDE needs to be done with care and sophistication so; IACP (International Association of Chiefs

of Police) sets the following criteria for FFDE:

1. One or more citizen complaints regarding excessive force, inappropriate verbal conduct, or

inability to exercise self control and self discipline.

2. Abrupt and negative change in customary behavior.

3. Irrational verbal conduct or behaviors, including delusions and hallucinations.

4. Suicidal statements or behaviors, or personal expressions of mental instability.

5. Unexplained and excessive tiredness or hyperactivity.

6. Dramatic change in eating patterns, sudden weight loss or gain, diagnosis of life threatening

disorder.

7. Change in attention to personal hygiene and health.

8. Inappropriate use of alcohol, medications or other drugs, including symptoms of illegal drug

use.

9. Memory losses

10. Impatience or impulsiveness, especially with loss of temper.

11. Inability to defuse tense situations, or tendency to escalate situations and create confrontations.

12. Unexplained and inappropriate excessive lateness or absenteeism.

13. Any other factor or combinations of factors that causes a supervisor to reasonably suspect that a

fitness for duty evaluation may be necessary.

False Confessions

"A false confession is where a suspect in a crime admits guilt to the crime, even though he or she is not

responsible for the crime." (Wikipedia)

Even though false confessions might appear to be an exceptional and unlikely event, they occur on a

regular basis in law systems and it is one of the reasons that law has established a series of rules to

detect, and subsequently reject, false confessions. These are called the "confession rules". Whenever a

sensational crime occurs involving a celebrity, public official or well-known person in the public eye,

hundreds of people usually come forward to confess to the crime. Not all of these confessions can be

true, so most if not all of them must be false. The false confession phenomenon also occurs with

unsolved crimes. For example, over two hundred people confessed to the Lindbergh baby (1932)

kidnapping, and hundreds of people confessed to the (1947) Black Dahlia murder in Los Angeles.

Some people continue to confess to this day about these crimes, and include people who were not even

born at the time. So, why do these people confess to crimes they didn't commit?

Types of false confessions

False confession can occur for a variety of reasons, ranging from the suspect feeling "overpowered" by

police questioning to someone who is "psychologically vulnerable" admitting to something they didn't

do. Kassin's (1997) typology is probably the most-reproduced list of false confession types, and appears

below:

1. Voluntary

2. Coerced

Forensic Psychology (PSY - 513)

1. Voluntary confessions

Attention seeking & Publicity conscious

Few people falsely confess just to seek fame or recognition or impress others usually come forward in

celebrity cases or seekers of attention commit this abnormal behavior.

2. Protection of others

These types of confessions are very common in our culture and people falsely confess to protect their

valuable dear ones e.g. one younger brother falsely confessed to save his elder brother as elder brother

was the only one who was earning and supporting the whole family.

Coerced false confessions

Coerced false confessions are results of compelling a person to involuntarily behave in a certain way

(whether through action or inaction) by use of threats, intimidation or some other form of pressure or

force. Coercion may typically involve the actual infliction of physical or psychological harm in order to

enhance the credibility of a threat. The threat of further harm may then lead to the cooperation or

obedience of the person being coerced (Wikipedia).So, coerced confessions are initiated by police

because of several reasons like Police need to solve the crime because of higher authorities' pressure to

solve the case or/and police officer wants to show the success for promotions.

Coerced-compliant false confessions

People confess to just get the police interrogation over with or confess to avoid being prosecuted for a

crime elsewhere with stiffer penalties.

Coerced-internalized false confessions

This type of people come forward and really believe they did the crime because of their guilt out of

interrogation or persuasion and commonly innocent, tired and confused people are highly

psychologically vulnerable to these types of confessions. if two persons are equally exposed to same

type of coercion one can internalize false confession because of the factors mentioned earlier.

Techniques used for police interrogation

Police of various countries use different typical techniques for interrogations like:

· Use of excessive force

· Threats

· Sleep deprivation

· Physical and psychological torture

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