STRATEGIC LAW ENFORCEMENT INTERVIEWING COURSE (SLIC)

(3-days)

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This 3-day course is only open to Law Enforcement Personnel and is certified by the Virginia Department of Criminal Justice (DCJS).  

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Lena teaches her signature non-accusatory, rapport-based strategic interviewing method that she has developed over the past two decades. Not only is certified in Instructional System Design and curriculum development, but she has conducted hundreds of interviews and interrogations; she didn't just observe them.  From her detainee interrogations in GTMO after 9/11, to her work on cold cases with HBO, to her litigant interviews as an expert witness n t a TV show for three years, and her expert guidance and mentorship on criminal interviews, you are learning from an interrogation expert. 

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Lena teaches participants six core competencies:

1. Using non-accusatory questioning techniques to include elicitation to create a safe environment for Persons of Interest (POI)s, to tell the truth by instilling hope instead of futility, building rapport, gaining trust, assigning positive traits, and being non-judgmental

2. Obtaining truthful information, motivations, and intent – not just a confession

3. Remaining objective and aware to enhance focus, concentration, emotional control, and observation skills while eliminating assumptions, biases, and subjectivity

4. Avoiding the misinformation effect and false confessions 

5. Using the, “Don’t Tell, Ask,” practice; never tell your suspect what they did or why they did it if you do not know

6. Accurately detect both verbal and nonverbal indicators of deception using proven techniques.

 

Being a human behavior expert, she knows how to get anyone to want to open up, be forthcoming, and be honest.  You will learn 

• How to STRATEGICALLY PREPARE for an interview: Participants will learn how to fully prepare for an interview. We will discuss topics such as desired traits of a successful interviewer, room set up, recording devices, legal issues, note-taking, working with multiple interviewers and interpreters, creating flexible questioning outlines, using ruses, profiling your interviewee, and perfecting your approach style. Participants will learn how to structure an interview by using the hourglass technique to ease concerns and increase cooperation. By preparing for the “what ifs,” interviewers can effectively handle unanticipated situations such as when the interviewee shuts down, refuses to talk, or becomes irritated and confrontational. 

• How to Build a DEEPER LEVEL OF RAPPORT: Every interview, no matter how much time you have, must include attempts at establishing rapport with the interviewee.  A suspect will not tell you the truth if they do not want to. Also, rapport will create and maintain a non-accusatory atmosphere to help gain trust, cooperation, and information.  Rapport is essential and no interview should be conducted without it. Participants will see the consequences of a real-world interview there the interviewee shuts down and the interviewers were unsuccessful at obtaining information.  Participants will also see a real-world example of how rapport led to a confession of murder and the location of the deceased individuals. Participants will learn body language dos and don’ts to gain trust and cooperation, they will learn how to assign positive traits to persuade people to trust you, open up, and tell the truth.  

• How to use ELICITATION techniques to get what you want WITHOUT ASKING FOR IT: Participants will also learn elicitation techniques to relax the interviewee and obtain information without having to ask questions. Elicitation is an operational tool that exploits aspects of human psychology; certain aspects of which make human sources vulnerable to elicitation techniques. Elicitation is an effective tool to gain information indirectly so that you do not have to ask a question.  Asking questions can sometimes sound accusatory and sometimes identify what we don’t know.  Too many questions can make the interviewee feel like they are being interrogated. These elicitation techniques will encourage an interviewee to provide more information because elicitation conceals our true intentions and objectives, thus, keeping the interviewee relaxed and calm. 

• How to perfect your QUESTIONING TECHNIQUES: Participants will learn how to effectively extract information by using non-accusatory questioning techniques to fully exploit truthful information. Participants will learn to use effective question types and techniques while avoiding ineffective question types that waste time, cause frustration, feed information, and can trigger false confessions.  By asking good questions participants will collect pertinent, non-biased information, increase positive relationships and avoid the misinformation effect. Participants will be given four go-to questions to ask when they suspect a person is lying to them and three go-to statements to say once they spot the lie to get to the truth. Participants will be tested on their questioning skills in classroom exercises. Participants will also analyze and critique interviewing techniques in real-world case studies.

• How to DETECT Verbal and Nonverbal DECEPTION AND IDENTIFY THE TRUTH: Participants will learn how to read body language and how stress affects body language. Participants will learn about the different types of liars and the correlation between nonverbal indicators of deception.  By using my ‘Rule of 3’ to accurately detect verbal and nonverbal indicators of deception, participants will be able to observe the indicators taught to them in class, in others. Participants will be tested on their observation and detecting deception skills through videos and classroom exercises. 

• How to conduct thorough STATEMENT ANALYSIS: Statement analysis is a term coined by Mark McClish, former U.S. Marshall. It is an accurate way to detect deception in both written and spoken statements. Participants will learn how to conduct statement analysis in order to identify indicators of deception. Participants will be required to conduct a thorough statement analysis in a classroom exercise.  In the final exercises, participants will accurately, and quickly, detect deceptive indicators, both verbal and nonverbal, in each other by assessing baseline behaviors then analyzing all possible indicators of deception, matching their verbal and nonverbal responses, while conducting statement analysis and formulating follow-up questions to catch others in their lies.

• How to Successfully TERMINATE an Interview: Participants will learn how to end, or terminate, an interview on a positive note so that the person feels good about confessing and looks to the interviewer as the person who released the burden of guilt. Participants will prepare to leave the interviewee open to follow-on interrogations or interviews and re-contact.

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This course requires active participation; it is not a series of lectures. It is designed to put the participants in uncomfortable situations to see how they react and how they can effectively utilize their new skills. During this course, the participants will conduct detecting deception and questioning exercises on each other, so there are no role players. Participants will see real indicators of deception and have to determine lies and gather information from unwitting participants. Participants will receive a training certificate.  

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Please contact Investigative Concepts​ to register for a class, host a class, or for more information.

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LEADERSHIP SKILLS COURSE (LSC)

for Law Enforcement Supervisors

(3-days)

                      

Lena is certified in PSYCHOLOGY OF LEADERSHIP from eCornell University, ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE MANAGEMENT, Barry Oshrey's ORGANIZATIONAL WORKSHOP, CHANGE STYLE INDICATOR, CHANGE NAVIGATOR, and DECISION STYLE PROFILE. She created this is a 3-day course specifically for supervisors in Law Enforcement. In this course, participants will learn how to become transformational leaders in a law enforcement organization. A transformational leader is visionary and can clearly communicate the organization’s vision to the workforce in order to successfully direct the execution of the organization’s mission statement. Transformational leaders have the foresight to identify future challenges and how to handle them, they are constantly engaging the workforce and involving them in important decisions and mission planning, and they help the workforce perform their best so they can continue to grow professionally as subject matter experts and as future leaders. 

 

During this course, we will discuss the three types of leadership models, leadership styles and the organizational climates they create, Steven Covey’s seven habits of highly effective people, how to provide feedback effectively using a well-known and established model, how to overcome communication barriers that personality preferences and preferred communication styles can create, how to identify individual change style preferences to effectively handle organizational changes and lead people through change, how to successfully coach others using a proven coaching model and how to utilize effective communication skills that directly impact the cohesiveness of an organization and how it is aligned to the mission and overall strategic vision. Participants will also learn about systemic conditions inherently present in all organizations and the communication barriers that these conditions can create which can contribute to a breakdown in partnerships, the key to any organization’s success.  

 

This course will cumulate with a final capstone activity in which the course participants will be required to identify a real-world challenge they want to work on using the skills and models outlined in this course.

 

Participants will leave with an invaluable skill set to enhance their leadership capabilities. Participants will gain a deeper understanding of themselves and the people they interact with on a day-to-day basis helping to promote trust and respect while encouraging motivation and success in the workplace and amongst the workforce. 

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