Webinar Video Clip: Inductive Interviewing

Coercive and clever psychological interviewing tactics look cool in TV, but in reality, such practices produce false confessions that instead of shedding light and helping solve a case causes confusion and leads investigators further astray. Sheriff Ray Nash joins Justice Clearinghouse on this course to talk about an interviewing technique that he, and Chief Tim Stephenson, designed that aims to create an environment conducive for telling the truth.

Sheriff Ray Nash has a teeming 40-year career that started while he was still in high school. From street patrol duties to becoming a police chief and an elected sheriff. Upon retiring, his hustle never stopped and he pursued an international police reform effort in Afghanistan and founded the Police Dynamics Institute that provides training and consulting services to both the public and private sector. His latest endeavor was co-founding the Inductive Interview System in 2018, which will be the central focus of this webinar.

Sheriff Nash unpacks the Inductive Interview System, discussing areas as:

• Definitions of the concepts involved in Inductive Interviewing.
• Why Inductive Interviewing doesn’t differentiate interview from interrogation.
• Dissecting lies and deception and how Inductive Interviewing focuses on identifying and responding to indicators of lie and deceit.
• An overview of the 6-Phase Inductive Interview System, its non-linear quality and the shutdown.
• The first IN² phase, the Preparation that includes training, experience, and research, and the sources for a case review.
• The virtues that an inductive interviewer must possess and room setting considerations in interviews.
• Building rapport, the second phase of IN², that aims to get the interviewers buy-in and trust by:
  • Setting the context, showing respect and genuine human concern.
  • Learning to seamlessly transition from one phase to another.
  • Determining and understanding baseline norms.
  • Leveraging both common and uncommon ground.
  • Utilizing help and truth phrases, hook questions, tag questions, proxemics, reverse mirroring, and the ask-follow up-offer technique.
• The third IN² phase called the Narrative and best practices during this part of the interview.
• Discerning for lies and deception during the Narrative phase by looking at:
  • The balance and chronology of the narrative, as well as unaccounted for time in the chronology/timeline.
  • Grammatical elements such as distancing, missing or extra words, shifting into passive voice, and inconsistent verb tense.
  • Word cues or specific words to watch out for being used by the interviewee.
• A video that urges the audience to take note of cues indicating attempts to lie and deceit.
• Sheriff Ray clarified the audience’s questions related to:
  • Developing Inductive Interviewing skills.
  • Formulating good interview questions.
  • The easiest way to build rapport if time is limited.
  • How the IN² System ensures that the victims and witnesses are not subjected to trauma or retraumatization.

Other webinars in this series:

• Feb 5, 3p ET: Inductive Interviewing Part 2
• Feb 14, 3p ET: 10 Types of Lies