54 Million Dollar Judgment – Polygraph Sent Innocent Man to Prison For 16 years, Reports NACVSA
Polygraph Increasingly Being Used as Interrogation Tool To Make Innocent Confess
LEWES, Del., Nov. 5, 2014 /PRNewswire/ — According to the National Association of Computer Voice Stress Analysts (NACVSA), the polygraph machine is increasingly being used by police across the US as a tool to get confessions, even from innocent people.
The latest glaring example is a 40 million dollar judgment just awarded to Jeffery Deskovic. This amount is in addition to the 14 million dollars that other government agencies have already agreed to pay Mr. Deskovic for his treatment at the hands of a police polygrapher. Nationally recognized polygraph expert Dr. Charles Honts testified that the polygraph test used to get Mr. Deskovic to confess was “No better than the flip of a coin.”
Dr. David Raskin, another nationally recognized polygraph expert recently testified at the hearing for a retrial for Frank Gable, convicted in 1965 of murder and sentenced to life in prison, that all of the witnesses against him were given polygraphs and told they failed. They were then coerced into giving false testimony against Mr. Gable. They have all now recanted their coerced statements.
The growing list of innocent people sent to prison by the polygraph is alarming. According to the NACVSA, one of the things that these stories about innocent people going to prison never address is the fact that by sending an innocent person to prison, you automatically allow the guilty to go free to commit more crimes and in some cases, another murder. It’s a double tragedy.
Detective Lt. Kenneth Merchant, NACVSA Legislative Director and a supervisor with the Erie, PA Police Department, sees one possible reason that there are so many bad polygraph examiners at police departments costing the taxpayers so much in awards. “Polygraph examiners, unlike detectives that operate the Computer Voice Stress Analyzer (CVSA), are not required to attend any continuing education courses or recertify to retain their ability to conduct examinations. Once a polygraph examiner graduates from school they are on their own, good or bad, and any bad habits they develop will stay with them for life. On the other hand, CVSA examiners are required by the manufacturer and the NACVSA to take a three-day recertification course every two years where both the basics and ethics are taught. This really keeps CVSA examiners on the straight and narrow.”
Until law enforcement executives and other government officials come to grips with the terrible consequences caused by using an inaccurate 100-year-old technology that has become just a prop to get confessions, tax payers will continue to pay exorbitant awards and innocent people will continue to go to prison.
For further information on the NACVSA, contact Diana Montoya at 888-358-5025 or via email.
For further information on the Computer Voice Stress Analyzer visit CVSA1.com or call 561-798-6280.
