Interviews and Interrogation Interview and Interrogation

According to Borum, Gelles and Kleinman (2009) law enforcement interrogators historically have made a distinction between the concepts of an interview and an interrogation. One commonly understood difference is that the purpose of an interview is to gather information, whereas the primary purpose of an interrogation is to garner a confession from a suspect who is presumed to be guilty.

Another difference (Inbau, 2001) involves the presence or absence of an accusation during the interaction. An interview is non-accusatory. During an interview, the investigator is encouraged to adopt a neutral and objective attitude and is instructed not to accuse the subject of wrongdoing. By contrast, an interrogation is accusatory. The interrogator will often begin an interrogation by directly accusing the suspect of committing the crime that is under investigation, and the entire interaction will revolve around that accusation.

Inbau (2001) notes the goals of the two processes are different. The primary goal of an interview is to gather information that is relevant...

This information includes the who, what, when, where, why, and how of any criminal investigation and can also involve assessing the credibility of the source of the information. The goal of an interrogation is not to gather basic information regarding a crime and a suspect's potential culpability but to learn the truth about the details of the crime from someone who is suspected of committing the crime. This truth will often involve the confession of the suspect who is interrogated.
Another distinction between interviews and interrogations is that interviews tend to be flexible and free flowing interactions, whereas interrogations are generally more tightly structured. An interview is a dialogue between the investigator and the subject. It is a question and answer session in which both parties may ask questions and give answers. The investigator normally has several key points that he or she wants to cover, but these points may be altered as the dialogue unfolds. In contrast, an interrogation involves active persuasion on the part of the interrogator. As a consequence, the investigator will dominate…