Investigative Decision Making

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• Investigative Decision Making

Bernadette Doran Email doranb_at_hope.ac.uk
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Lecture outline

• 1. Realities of police decision making
• 2. Murder Investigation
• 3. Practical exercise
• 4. Decision making theory
• By the end of this session you will be able to
  apply this
• knowledge to your case
• - Compile 3 examples of investigative
  difficulties
• - Prepare 3 recommendations to give to the
  senior
• investigating officer (S.I.O)

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Realities of police decision making
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MANAGING THE INCIDENT THE TEAM

• RECORD KEEPING
• - Record as much as possible and ensure that
  what is recorded fully justifies the decisions
  made.

EXTERNAL ADVISORS - Be able to critically
evaluate the advice but be ready to listen and
revise hypotheses in light of the advice.
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MANAGING THE POLITICS / CULTURE

• POLITICS
• - Recognize and be able to deal effectively with
  the competing demands that other organizations
  may place on the enquiry.

RACISM DIVERSITY - Be fully acquainted
with new cultures and embrace the
diversity within policing and society.
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MANAGING THE PUBLIC / COMMUNITY

• FAMILY LIAISON
• -Establish an honest and transparent
• relationship with the family.
• MANAGING COMPLEXITY
• -Be able to prioritise and not get lost in
• the volume of information.

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• COMMUNITY
• - Poor community consideration can result in
  the contamination of subsequent
  community-policing links.
• MEDIA
• - Recognize the media as a resource, be aware
  its potentially overwhelming impact.

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2. Murder investigation

• Who did what to whom and why
• Self-solvers- 70
• - Initial response
• - Information collection
• - Case construction

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Murder investigation cont

• Whodunits
• -Initial response
• -Information burst
• -Suspect development
• -Suspect targeting
• -Case construction
• RECOMMENDATION
• Information management- e.g Timelines

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Investigative Task

• What has happened or is happening?
• Give reasons for your answer and score how
  confident
• you are in your assumption in __ confident
•  
• What alternative explanations might account for
  the
• information in the scenario?
• What would your initial line of enquiry be?
• Write down your initial actions as Officer in
  charge
• If you were to interview an individual in this
  enquiry who
• would it be and what 3 questions would you like
  to ask?

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WILSON Phase One

• The body of a 57 year old lady, Ivy WILSON, is
• discovered in woodland near her home. She has
  suffered
• multiple stab wounds to her face, neck and
  breasts. Her
• skirt has been lifted up and her tights and
  knickers pulled
• down. Her dog, Cherry, a black Labrador, has
  been tied
• to a tree and kicked to death. Ernest, her 63
  year old
• husband, an ex RAF pilot, is distraught. He has
  been
• contacted in Toronto Canada, where he was
  visiting their
• 34 year old daughter, husband and two
  grandchildren.
• Enquiries uncover that the WILSONs were having a
  
• conservatory fitted to their country cottage.

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WILSON Phase Two

• In interview, Earnest reports no known enemies
  but
• indicates that there has been some recent
  conflict with a
• group of travelers, who have camped out in the
  field next
• to their cottage. The only other strangers that
  they have
• contact with is the person fitting their
  conservatory, Dave
• WELLS, a 28 year old, employed by SNOWBRIGHT
• conservatories. Forensics have indicated that
  there is no
• semen, and as far as they can establish no
  vaginal
• penetration. However, anal dilation and tearing
  suggest
• that an object approximately 2 in diameter has
  been
• used on the victim. This injury was inflicted
  post mortem.
• Forensics have obtained a partial bootprint from
  Cherrys
• body, indicating steel toecapped boots were used.

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WILSON Phase Three

• A report from the National Crime and
  Operations Faculty have identified another case
  in the adjacent constabulary, that occurred 8
  months previously (i.e., murder of a 54 year old
  female on a country lane, with multiple stab
  wounds who has been vaginally raped). The SIO on
  that case has been contacted and states that a
  principle suspect in the enquiry was a traveler,
  called, Toby MCNULTY, age 19. He has
  preconvictions as a juvenile one for dangerous
  driving and one for affray. MCNULTY is known to
  have a teardrop tattoo. One of the travelers
  camping near the WILSONs residence has such a
  tattoo, though he goes by the name, Jerry OBRIAN.
  The OBRIANs deny being in the neighbouring
  county at the time of the previous murder.
• WELLS has been unable to give an alibi for
  his whereabouts. Police records indicate no
  previous convictions. He was treated two years
  previously for an acute psychotic episode linked
  to heavy use of marijuana. He wears steel toed
  boots, but the pair recovered from him are not a
  match to the marks found on Cherry.

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Purpose of the Investigative Task

• When an investigator starts an investigation
• What cues are used in deciding whats going on?
• What sort of initial hypotheses are generated?
• What sort of and how many alternative
  explanations are generated?
• How do these influence actions?

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4. Decision making theory

• -Traditional Decision Making- weighing up of pros
  and cons
• - Naturalistic Decision Making- assess situation
  action selection
• - Neither adequately explains
• investigative decision making

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Situation assessment

• - Recognition of key cues
• - Inferences about the meaning of the cues
• - Model of or (story about) what is going on
• - Some individual cues and cue patterns may be
  seen as particularly diagnostic
• E.g. Soham age of girls, fact that there were
  two of them, summers evening? gtnot abducted

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The investigators narrative

• - Pennington and Hastie (1986, 1992)
• - Verbal protocol re verdict
• - Tended to construct stories
• - Filled gaps with assumptions relating to the
  inferred psychological states or likely behaviour
  of the actors involved in the crime
• sometimes when people drink they
• get nasty
• normally a person wouldnt carry a
• big knife in his pocket

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Errors in thinking Heuristics and biases

• Mental shortcuts or rules of thumb
• Memory limitations
• Confirmation bias
• -Tendency to seek and interpret information in
  ways that support existing beliefs
• - Tendency to avoid information that would
  contradict those beliefs

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• Holmes Your neighbour is a doctor
• Watson Yes, he bought a practice as I did
• Holmes An old established one?
• Watson Just the same as mine. Both have been
• ever since the houses were built
• Holmes Ah, then you got hold of the best of the
  
• two.
• Watson I think I did. But how do you know?
• Holmes By the steps, my dear Watson. Yours
• are worn three inches deeper than
  this.
• 
  (Conan Doyle 193375).

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Errors in thinking Heuristics and biases cont

• Tunnel vision
• Narrow focus on a limited range of alternatives
• e.g Rachael Nickell murder
• Representativeness heuristic-
• Where people classify something according to how
• similar it seems to a typical case
• e.g Ted Bundy
• Red-herrings and rumours-
• e.g Yorkshire Ripper, Washington Sniper

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Errors in thinking Heuristics and biases cont

• RECOMMENDATIONS
• Appoint devils advocate
• Brainstorming sessions (creativity rather than
  consensus)
• Listen to everybodys point of view
• External reviews throughout investigation

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Key points to remember

• - Investigators have to manage a large amount of
  information which is often unreliable,
  conflicting and incomplete.
• Timelines
• - Investigators just like fellow human beings use
  heuristics and biases in their decision making.
• A Assume nothing
• B Believe nothing
• C Challenge everything!

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Lecture outline

• 1. Realities of police decision making
• 2. Murder Investigation
• 3. Practical exercise
• 4. Decision making theory
• By the end of this session you will be able to
  apply this
• knowledge to your case
• - Compile 3 examples of investigative
  difficulties
• - Prepare 3 recommendations to give to the
  senior
• investigating officer (S.I.O)

24
Further Reading

• - Alison, L. (2005). The Forensic Psychologists
  Handbook. Willan
• - Crego, J., Alison, L. (2004). Control and
  legacy as functions of perceived criticality in
  major incidents. Journal of Investigative
  Psychology and Offender Profiling, 1 207-225
• - Flin, R. (2002). Incident Command Tales from
  the hot seat. Ashgate
• - Innes, M. (2002). The Process Structures of
  Police Homicide Investigations. British Journal
  of Criminology, 42 669-688.
• - Pennington, N., Hastie, R. (1992).
  Explaining the evidence. Journal of Personality
  Social Psychology, 2 189-206.
• - Public Enquiries