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Voice Stress Analyzers Criticized

by TChris

Conventional lie detectors are untrustworthy assessors of the truth, at best. Even worse, according to a recent ABC Primetime report, are Voice Stress Analyzers. Expect police departments to continue using them, nonetheless. They've paid big money for these machines and are likely to stand behind them, even though they're about as reliable as voodoo.

"Police departments have paid $10,000 per system over the last 18 years and rely on it exclusively for truth verification," said Charles Humble, chairman and CEO of the National Institute for Truth Verification, which sells the CVSA. "We have a remarkable record of success."

Not according to the military, which used voice stress analyzers during interrogations in Guantanamo Bay and Iraq. Military investigators now realize that Voice Stress Analyzers are no more accurate than a coin-flip.

Several suspected terrorists were released from custody based on the machine's results and former Iraqi deputy prime minister Tariz Aziz was one of the many "high value targets" who were hooked up to the now discredited machine. ...

Robert Rogalski, deputy undersecretary of defense for counterntelligence, said that an exhaustive Pentagon-ordered study of the stress analyzer, whose results are now being made public, found little or no relationship between the machine's reading and the actual presence or absence of deception and stress.

Others have arrived at the same conclusion.

"This device is nothing more than a prop," said John Palmatier, who earned a doctorate in psychology and who studied the machine for the Michigan State Police Department, where he worked. He said his study along with others found no scientific basis for Humble's claims.

The police don't always care whether technology is accurate. It's enough that the interrogator can tell a suspect, "You failed the test." That assertion is often enough to prompt a confession -- even if the suspect is innocent. Just ask Michael Crowe, who was falsely accused of murdering his sister.

"I started to think that, you know, maybe the machine's right, especially when they added on top of it that the machine was getting my subconscious feelings on it, that I could be lying and not even know it," Crowe, now 21, told "Primetime." "They said the machine is more accurate than the polygraph and is the best device for telling the truth, for finding the truth." ...

But one week before the start of his trial, the police found DNA evidence that led to the real killer, a transient who is now in prison for killing Crowe's sister. The judge denounced both the false confession and Humble's machine.

Will Charles Humble admit that his machine was inaccurate? Of course not.

"I don't believe the instrument was wrong. Now were the examiners wrong? I don't know," Humble replied when asked about the case. "I don't believe I owe Michael Crowe an apology."

Admitting the truth about the machines would probably put an end to Humble's lucrative business. And what, exactly, are Humble's credentials?

Although throughout the video Humble is referred to as Dr. Humble, "Primetime" discovered that he is neither a medical doctor nor has he earned a doctorate from an accredited university. Instead, the diploma on his office wall, which reads "Doctor of Psychology," is an honorary degree, awarded by a Bible college in Indiana that used to have an office in the strip mall where Humble's first office was located.

Humble seems to know how tell lies, but even a top executive in his company acknowledged that his device can't detect them. Police agencies that were duped into buying this useless piece of seemingly high tech gadgetry should be asking for their money back. So should the military, which paid more than a million bucks for Humble's machines.

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    Re: Voice Stress Analyzers Criticized (none / 0) (#1)
    by Steven Sanderson on Mon Apr 03, 2006 at 02:44:48 PM EST
    I first read about psychological stress analysis in the 1970's and believed it to be more wishful thinking than achievable fact, something that would soon go the way of phrenology. They did do away with phrenology, didn't they?

    Re: Voice Stress Analyzers Criticized (none / 0) (#2)
    by Patrick on Mon Apr 03, 2006 at 04:44:35 PM EST
    Wasn't there a thread recently where TL touted that the defendants had taken a polygraph? The one about lacrosse team rape? Why is they are only good to show innocence? They are a tool, just a tool, and the better the interrogator, the better the results. Of course they don't detect lies, they record reactions which may indicate lies. Then the interrogator takes over.

    Re: Voice Stress Analyzers Criticized (none / 0) (#3)
    by Patrick on Mon Apr 03, 2006 at 04:45:07 PM EST
    Nice grammar...Sorry

    Re: Voice Stress Analyzers Criticized (none / 0) (#4)
    by cpinva on Mon Apr 03, 2006 at 09:20:58 PM EST
    you're right patrick, they are a tool, a completely useless one. "lie detectors" and "stress analyzers" are nothing more than scientific "black boxes". filled with jumbles of wires, flashing lights on top, and the occasional siren, they represent the apogee of "snake oil", that wonderful 19th century concoction said to cure everything from the blahs to ingrown toenails, and consisting mostly of alcohol. no one can provide replicable data to show the scientific basis for either machine, because there isn't any. any machine not able to provide quantifiable results, is bogus. that it ultimately relys upon the "interpretive skills" of amatuers, themselves not objective, lays open the fraud complete. the greater farce is that anyone ever actually believed the charlatans who created and sold them in the first place. psssssst! patrick, i have a machine, this black box which, when pointed in the direction of the subject, can read his mind. it's yours, for a mere $50,000. a bargain at any price. oh, i also have shares in the brooklyn bridge.