Summary – The 40-Year Search for Beverly’s Killer, By: Wendy Gillis, 2014
After 40 years of a cold case in Beverly Smith’s murder back in the 1970’s, many police officers try to piece to the puzzle together over time (Gillis, 2014). They have made 3 arrests, over 40 years, one man was let go early on in the detention and the other two arrests was a neighbor at the time, Alan Smith (Gillis, 2014). In 2007 Inspector Dave Kimmerly took Beverly’s case and they started from scratch (Gillis, 2014). He had his first lead on Alan Smith from an interview with his ex-wife – which was eventually retracted and his charges dropped (Gillis, 2014). Just months after Durham Region police employed an undercover sting to extract a confession from Smith (Gillis, …show more content…
Smith’s ex-wife and daughter both claimed after the years of silence that Alan went over to Beverly’s house to buy some weed (Gillis, 2014). There was a video showing the interrogation of Alan Smith in 2008, it was shown Kimberly was very calm and trying to do most of the talking (Gillis, 2014). This interrogation was an example of the Reid Technique when questioning (Vettor, PSYC 3320, October 20th, 2015). This technique is meant to, “assess the credibility and extract a confession of guilt” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, October 20th, 2015). It is also an, “accusatory process where the investigator tells the suspect they’re guilty” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, October 20th, 2015). Which Kimmerly said in the beginning of the taped interview –it was not directly said, but it was alluded to why he was being interrogated because multiple people said he was the one that killed Beverly (Gillis, 2014). This process is also guilt presumptive which was exactly how Kimberly was talking to Alan. In the “Reid Technique there are 9 steps to come to a guilt confession” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, October 20th, 2015). In this process step 3, 5 and 6 are all about dealing with a passive subject, which was exactly how Alan was reacting in the video ( Vettor, PSYC 3320, October 20th, …show more content…
After retrieving the confession they should have used the Statement Validity Analysis to assess the credibility of the story (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). “SVA is the most widely used technique for assessing credibility” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). “It’s based on the undeutsch hypothesis, that statement based on memory of an actual experience, differs in quality from a lie” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). “There are four steps: case-file analysis, semi-structured interview, criteria-based content analysis and evaluation of CBCA” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). Therefore while Alan was giving the confession and explaining the story – the police would first evaluate the case and makeup a hypothesis to see if it is experienced based or not (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). Then after the interview they do the CBCA and dictate whether or not he was being truthful in each criteria in each category (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). For example: they could evaluate if he had his confession in a logical structure, or evaluate the descriptions of interactions as well as contextual embedding (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). Many other criteria’s in the CBCA that could make a difference in determining his credibility of the confessions. Regardless of how they got the information, doing a credibility analysis would be able to give a better
After 40 years of a cold case in Beverly Smith’s murder back in the 1970’s, many police officers try to piece to the puzzle together over time (Gillis, 2014). They have made 3 arrests, over 40 years, one man was let go early on in the detention and the other two arrests was a neighbor at the time, Alan Smith (Gillis, 2014). In 2007 Inspector Dave Kimmerly took Beverly’s case and they started from scratch (Gillis, 2014). He had his first lead on Alan Smith from an interview with his ex-wife – which was eventually retracted and his charges dropped (Gillis, 2014). Just months after Durham Region police employed an undercover sting to extract a confession from Smith (Gillis, …show more content…
Smith’s ex-wife and daughter both claimed after the years of silence that Alan went over to Beverly’s house to buy some weed (Gillis, 2014). There was a video showing the interrogation of Alan Smith in 2008, it was shown Kimberly was very calm and trying to do most of the talking (Gillis, 2014). This interrogation was an example of the Reid Technique when questioning (Vettor, PSYC 3320, October 20th, 2015). This technique is meant to, “assess the credibility and extract a confession of guilt” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, October 20th, 2015). It is also an, “accusatory process where the investigator tells the suspect they’re guilty” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, October 20th, 2015). Which Kimmerly said in the beginning of the taped interview –it was not directly said, but it was alluded to why he was being interrogated because multiple people said he was the one that killed Beverly (Gillis, 2014). This process is also guilt presumptive which was exactly how Kimberly was talking to Alan. In the “Reid Technique there are 9 steps to come to a guilt confession” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, October 20th, 2015). In this process step 3, 5 and 6 are all about dealing with a passive subject, which was exactly how Alan was reacting in the video ( Vettor, PSYC 3320, October 20th, …show more content…
After retrieving the confession they should have used the Statement Validity Analysis to assess the credibility of the story (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). “SVA is the most widely used technique for assessing credibility” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). “It’s based on the undeutsch hypothesis, that statement based on memory of an actual experience, differs in quality from a lie” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). “There are four steps: case-file analysis, semi-structured interview, criteria-based content analysis and evaluation of CBCA” (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). Therefore while Alan was giving the confession and explaining the story – the police would first evaluate the case and makeup a hypothesis to see if it is experienced based or not (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). Then after the interview they do the CBCA and dictate whether or not he was being truthful in each criteria in each category (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). For example: they could evaluate if he had his confession in a logical structure, or evaluate the descriptions of interactions as well as contextual embedding (Vettor, PSYC 3320, November 3rd, 2015). Many other criteria’s in the CBCA that could make a difference in determining his credibility of the confessions. Regardless of how they got the information, doing a credibility analysis would be able to give a better