Police tactics for extracting confessions, consent searches and field testing- Fairfax criminal lawyer warns against such traps

Police tactics are many for extracting confessions from criminal suspects, consenting to searches by law enforcement officers (LEO), and agreeing to engage in field sobriety testing (FSTs or SFSTs) for Virginia DUI investigations. As a Fairfax criminal lawyer, I know you have a Fifth and Sixth Amendment Constitutional right to remain silent with police, whether or not Miranda righs are read; you have a Fourth Amendment right to decline police searches (just as long as you do not interfere with such searches); and you have a right to decline FSTs (even though that may be considered in determining probable cause to arrest you, and the guilt or innocence determination); and to decline preliminary breath testing (PBT). A slew of police are taught how to cajole, pressure, and intimidate suspects to waive those rights. Hopefully your reading this article will assist you the next time you are a police suspect or arrestee.

Police tactics to draw answers from you, consent searches and FSTs can approach psychological warfare

Police tactics to convince you to speak with LEO, to consent to searches and to engage in SFSTs can approach the point of psychological warfare. This psychological warfare can start with police exercising near total control from the very beginning. For instance, as a Fairfax criminal lawyer, I see in police incident videos from traffic stops, that police often stand behind you in the driver’s seat, making it hard for you to make eye contact without twisting your neck towards LEO. LEO will have you sit in your car while they take their time to return to their cruiser before returning to you and having you get out of your car for further investigation. They will sometimes start firing questions to you, whereby no sooner is one question answered (or the answer is not finished) that the next comes (thus enabling an inaccurate portrayal of the intended answer). A favorite of many police officers is “Be honest”, which a prosecutor can argue is not a command to waive one’s right to remain silent, seeing that silence is not usually dishonesty. Police also sometimes will play good cop-bad cop, leading some criminal suspects to get on the good side of the “good cop” in the hopes of protection against the “bad cop.”

Isolating you in a windowless small room, with conversation available as a way to break the boredom

As a Fairfax criminal lawyer, I repeatedly see video discovery from a police station interview room. The rooms are small. They are devoid of anything to look at but the door. You must ask for permission to go to the restroom. Common among police tactics is for police to deposit you in an interview room, walk out, and not return until many minutes later. For many Virginia criminal arrestees, the silence and the unknown are so uncomfortable and even maddening, that the arrestee may engage in verbal diarrhea, often to their own peril. It is far better to maintain silence in the face of boredom and suspense, than to start talking with LEO and thereby dig yourself into a deeper hole.

Are Fairfax police and Virginia LEO’s permitted to lie to me to extract a confession?

Virginia police tactics for extracting confessions include being permitted by the appellate courts to lie on that path (although their lying makes for great cross examination of police at trial). Those lies can include that other suspects are blabbing against the arrestee at that very moment, or that the police already know much about the case, but want to see if the suspect is being honest with them. (If police know the full story, why are they asking the suspect to tell what happened? They may say they already know everything in order to redirect the suspect’s confession to the benefit of the prosecution.) They love telling suspects that their actions do not make them a bad person, for disingenuous endearing of the suspect to them. Police will often say: This is your one opportunity to give your side of the story, otherwise, I won’t be able to help you with the assistant commonwealth’s attorney / prosecutor.

Beware police tactics of dividing and conquering you and your friends, and pressuring your time schedule

Police tactics for extracting answers from suspects include dividing and conquering, for instance by being so nice that your fellow automobile passengers urge you to simply answer the cop’s questions so that everyone may return to their own business. I prefer the inconvenience, rather than speaking; haiku is better than verbal diarrhea; full silence is the best. Police can also give you false hopes that by “cooperating” with LEO, you are more likely going to be released soon, to go about your daily business.

The start to your great defense against Virginia felony, misdemeanor and DUI prosecutions is one call away, to top-rated Fairfax criminal lawyer Jonathan Katz, to set a free in-person confidential consultation with Jon Katz about your court-pending prosecution, at 703-383-1100, Info@KatzJustice.com, or (text) 571-406-7268.