You May Not Be A Successful Interviewer If ...

You are unacquainted with the case details.
Efforts at "winging it" in the interview room or going on a "fishingnexpedition" very rarely produces positive results. You shouldnalways approach every interview with the "construction of proof"nas your objective. That's for all interviews - victims, witnesses,nsuspects, applicants, informants, petitioners, etc.

You approach your subject with an assumption of guilt.
No one can be truly objective when they enter the interview roomnbut by assuming guilt, we typically ignore asking the questions ornhearing answers that might challenge and even threaten our pre-nconceptions.

You use an “accusatory style” interview.
An accusatory style tends to "drive" the interview in only onendirection and rarely uncovers new or additional information. It alsonseldom generates cooperation from victims or witnesses andncompliance from subjects. An accusatory approach is alsonnotorious for generating contaminated statements.

You frequently interrupt your subject.
Any interview as well as an interrogation is far from beingnsuccessful without active, participatory listening by the interviewer.
Frequent interruption cuts off the flow of conversation andnultimately information.

You are repetitive in your questioning or labor over the same linenof questioning.
Persistent questioning from a single narrow perspective tends tonfrustrate even the cooperative subject - it tends to lock thei
reasoning and thinking process into one line of thought. Varyingnyour approach, method of framing a question, and using a morennarrative-based approach results in content rich statements andncooperative subjects.
Note: Once the interview starts out bad, it rarely ever improves.nnn© 2005 by Stan B. Walters "The Lie Guy®"