John Potts Dr. Becky Milne University of Portsmouth

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John PottsDr. Becky MilneUniversity of
Portsmouth
A PILOT STUDY INTO THE USE OF ENHANCED COGNITIVE
INTERVIEW TECHNIQUETO DEBRIEF POLICE INFORMANTS
AGENTS
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Regulation Of Investigatory Powers Act 2000

• Introduced legislation on Conduct and Use of
  informants.
• Introduced a chain of command for the protection
  of police and the informant and defined the
  following
• CHIS.(Covert Human Intelligence Source)
• Handler.
• Controller.
• Authorising Officer.

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How is the CHIS currently debriefed?

• Not seen as a witness.
• Standard Interview. (Fisher et.al1987)
• Why not use ECI?

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Aims and Objective of the Study.

• What is the standard interview and how productive
  is it in the area of informants?
• Does the ECI get better information compared to a
  SI in an informant scenario?

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Method

• Interviewees / informants military students.
• Event 4 minute video.
• Interviewers experienced informant handlers.
• Within subject design.

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Scoring and Coding

• Correct
• Incorrect
• Confabulation.
• Person.
• Action
• Surroundings
• Object

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Results 1
ECI N 10 SI N 10
Correct 487 245
Incorrect 85 39
Confabulation 100 47
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Results 2
ECI
SI
Correct Incorrect Confab Correct Incorrect Confab
Person 143 52 38 72 7 3
Object 71 5 8 99 22 34
Action 149 18 27 28 3 2
Surrin 124 10 27 46 7 8
Total 487 85 100 245 39 47
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Conclusions 1

• ECI produces more correct information than the SI
  in
• Persons
• Actions
• Surroundings

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Conclusions 2

• ECI gt incorrect details in
• Person

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Conclusions 3

• ECI gt Confabulations in
• Person
• Actions

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John PottsMetropolitan Police, University of
PortsmouthE-Mail john.potts_at_metpolice.pnn.co.uk

• Dr. Becky Milne
• University of Portsmouth