EP 159 Inside the Polygraph Room: What the Body Reveals When Words Lie with Alan Saquella

🎙️ Episode Summary

Inside the Polygraph Room: What the Body Reveals When Words Lie

with Alan Saquella

“A polygraph isn’t a lie detector — it’s a physiological monitor. The body reacts long before words do.”
— Alan Saquella

Polygraph tests are often misunderstood — portrayed as simple “lie detectors” with jerking needles and dramatic reveals. In this episode, polygraph examiner and investigator Alan Sequella takes listeners inside the polygraph room to explain what really happens when someone is questioned under pressure.

Alan breaks down the science behind polygraph testing, explaining why it doesn’t detect lies, but rather measures physiological responses driven by the autonomic nervous system — the body’s fight-or-flight response. Together, we explore how stress, fear, deception, and even half-truths manifest in the body, and what skilled examiners look for beyond the machine itself.

The conversation goes far deeper than technology. Alan shares real investigative stories, including cases where minor details uncovered major crimes, how trained individuals have attempted to defeat polygraphs, and why human judgment and preparation still matter as much as the data. We also examine the critical role of rapport-building, interview room dynamics, and modern interrogation techniques — especially where coercion must be avoided.

The episode expands into insider threat, behavioural indicators organisations often miss, and how decades of investigative experience inform early warning signs. Looking ahead, Alan discusses how AI, biometrics, and behavioural analytics are shaping the future of truth verification — not as replacements for investigators, but as force multipliers.

This is a grounded, experience-rich conversation about deception, human behaviour, and the responsibility that comes with seeking the truth — essential listening for security professionals, investigators, leaders, and anyone working at the intersection of risk and people.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/alan-saquella-cpp/

Security Circle ⭕️ is an IFPOD production for IFPO the International Foundation of Protection Officers

Transcript

0:01

Welcome to 2026, and what a great way to start this year, and with a great conversation with Alan sla. Who is notorious if you don't know him for his work on lie detector machines. I found you a real expert and I dig deep on the myths around lie detection, you know, the movies and why lie detector professionals always look really nerdy and I also ask the question around the jerky needle on what it really means. But look, before that, I just want to say how grateful I am for the contributions from amazing guests and listeners all the way to this point, episode 159, and we still have so many guests for you to entertain and inform. You know that vitamin shot. For the security brain, we are listened to in 2,218 cities around the world, 134 countries, and I'm overwhelmed at the thousands of downloads we get every single month. The security circle is now in its fourth year of production, and what a great journey. Scheme. The security circle is in the top percentile of only 2% of all podcasts reaching a hundred episodes, and we think that's super spec. The Security Circle won a security and fire excellence award. Also, we won the David Clark Award for exceptional contribution to the security sector, and I'm just so proud to deliver to you week on week, great thought leadership, and inspiring security professionals at the top of their game. Now let's get back to Alan. If you enjoy the security circle podcast, please like share and comment or even better. Leave us a fab review We can be found on all podcast platforms. Be sure to subscribe. The security circle every Thursday. We love Thursdays. Hi, I'm Yolanda And welcome to the Security Circle Podcast, produced in association with IFPO, the International Foundation for Protection Officers. This podcast is all about connection, bringing you closer to the greatest minds, boldest thinkers, trailblazers, and change makers across the security industry. Whether you are here to grow your network, spark new ideas, or simply feel more connected to the world of protection and risk, you are in the right place wherever you are listening from. Thank you for being a part of the Security Circle journey..

Yoyo: 2:51

Alan, you are quite well known in the security, uh, circle, aren't you? Welcome.

Alan: 2:56

Well, Yolanda, thank you for having me here. It's great to be with you.

Yoyo: 2:59

Oh, Yolanda, sounds very formal. Alan, I thought we were closer than that.

Alan: 3:05

Well, it's just only a second time we've had a conversation, but, yeah. But, uh, I'm sure I'll warm up as we get moving here.

Yoyo: 3:12

Well, I hope to warm you up. What can I say? I need warming up. It is very cold where I am at the moment. So, uh, let's get started. You are, a quite an intriguing person. Actually. I know that you have a background in Polygraphy, polygraph. Uh. In fact, I'm gonna just kick straight off and say, look, you know, for, for people who only know polygraphs from movies, what's the biggest myth you'd love to correct for the professionals out there once and for all?

Alan: 3:43

That, that's a great question, Yolanda. I get this all the time and I do all kinds of presentations and actually demonstrations. I think I did 12 of'em this past semester, but, but the biggest myth is, it's a lie detector and really it's not a lie detector. What it is, is a physiological, uh, monitor of what's going on inside your body when we're asking questions. So when we ask questions, we're looking for physiological change in your body, and that would include blood pressure, heart rate. Galvanic skin response was a sweat duct activity as well as respiration. Uh, we can monitor a couple other things, and that's based on the fight or flight response. So what we're looking for is when a person lies about something they're concerned about, they go into a fight or flight response. The, the polygraph Justin and submit and records that on the screen and then the examiner has to interpret it. Is there a strong enough response to consider that considered response deceptive? So it's not a lie detector, it's a physiological change in your body detector, uh, which we attribute to deception or lying.

Yoyo: 4:50

Well, we have had many guests on the podcast including, you know, former intelligence operatives who are skilled to try and detect unusual behaviors, in human body language. But what does the body actually do when someone lies? And what does a polygraph examiner look for beyond the machines lines on the screen. And we always see them, don't they? Squiggle, squiggle, squiggle like an earthquake is happening.

Alan: 5:15

Oh, absolutely. Right. So polygraph examiners, uh, like forensic linguistics or even intelligence agents, we we're also trained in interpreting verbal and nonverbal signs of deception. And we do a pre-test interview first. So pre-test interview is where you get an opportunity to explain your answers before we actually hook the person up. Uh, because once you're hooked to a polygraph, you can only answer yes or no. There's no discussion at that point. So the polygraph basically works, um, by monitoring changes that are controlled by your autonomic nervous system. So autonomic, believe it or not, is automatic, and that is basically where the fight or flight comes in. There's two sides of your autonomic nervous system. There's a parasympathetic. Probably getting a little more technical than you want to know, but parasympathetic is what's in charge right now as we're sitting here talking to each other. Sympathetic kicks in, um, when, uh, there's a fight or flight. In other words, adrenaline's pumped into the blood, you, your heart rate goes up. You breathe more to get oxygen into your blood so we can pump that blood to your, to your extremities and prepare you for fight or flight. Now, in addition to that, while you're in a, uh, fight or flight response, there's certain things in your body obviously that change while other things get turned off. So we turn off the production of, uh, a saliva. Your pupils will dilate again. You're gonna stop digesting food because your body needs all the energy to run or fight. So similar to, uh, intelligence agents interrogators, forensic linguistics professionals, we're also looking at verbal and nonverbal signs as deception, as well as what we call micro expressions, uh, while we're doing the pretest interview. During the post, uh, during the actual polygraph and then the post-test interview. So what most people don't understand is after the polygraph, after there's been charts run. If the examiner determines deception is indicated at one or two of the questions, he has to find out what caused it. That's the post-test interview and that that's in a pre-employment polygraph exam. He'll wanna know what the person's thinking about, is there something they withheld? If it's a criminal exam, we're gonna find out in that post-test is if, uh, they're holding something back. And I have plenty of examples where I had to go into, let's call it interrogation post-test.

Yoyo: 7:42

You know when you were talking about fight or flight just now. I was thinking about when I was in the police, and it's true. You know, when you look at fight or flight, you never need to use the restroom if you're in fight or flight. Yes.'cause that's, it's also another one of your, you know, critical functions that kind of switches off. And after an incident, you can find this really urgent need to use the restroom, because your body's kind of switching back on again. In fact, that's how we found, Burglary victims, elderly, burglary victims were always very vulnerable to, having a heart attack post-event when the adrenaline stopped. Their body was trying to, turn back to normal. We always knew that that adrenaline injection could have some very adverse health effects. The human body is quite miraculous, really what's, harder to detect. I'm putting myself in the shoes of my listener now, and I can imagine there'll be thinking, Hmm. Yo-yo, ask Alan, what is harder to detect a lie or a half truth?

Alan: 8:47

Well, that's a great question. A lot of it does go back to the examiner and the pretest interview. So in the pretest interview, we have to convince the examinee that if they're lying, we're gonna detect it. And the way we do that also is by doing a stimulation test, we stimulate their autonomic nervous system with a known lie. So, for example, in a pretest interview, I have. I'll take an eight and a half by 11 sheet of paper. I'll write five numbers down on it. I'll say, okay, mark, whatever his name is, circle one of these numbers. Then I'm gonna ask him to lie to it. When I ask him, did you circle the number three? Did you circle the number four, the 5, 6, 7? If they circle number five, I'm gonna say, mark, make sure you lie to it. Don't, don't tell me. You circle it, you say no. So again, we're gonna go through this exercise. It gives us an opportunity to see what they look like when deceptive. And when they're not. Now there are different results. You can have what we call deception indicated. You have to have a certain response level to be considered deceptive. You could have NDI, no deception indicated, so we didn't have any response to a relevant question. You can also have what we call inconclusive, and that's, that kind of goes back to your question like a halflife, we don't get a response if the, if it's not strong enough response, it could become an inconclusive. Unable to determine and inconclusive as if you didn't even come in and take it. And, and sometimes an inconclusive can be caused by the examiner not doing a good job on a front end in a pretest interview. Or the examinee maybe didn't sleep tonight before, or is heavily medicated. So it dampens your autonomic nervous system's ability to respond. So when I, uh, have, if some of our students go to apply for different jobs or required to take a polygraph, I always coach'em. I say, make sure you get rest, don't medicate. It's, you know, follow your normal routine, uh, and don't exert yourself 24 hours before. Get a good night's sleep. If you do that, you should be able to get through again. If you're not deceptive, now I know what your next question's gonna be. It's gonna be, can you defeat the polygraph?'cause I get asked that all the time. Right. It's,

Yoyo: 10:58

it's the, actually, it actually, the question is, have you had anyone completely surprise you by beating the machine? What did you learn from that encounter?

Alan: 11:08

I'm gonna give you two examples. I'm gonna give you one that's probably the most notorious in the United States. Her name was. Anna Montez. Anna Montez was a, uh, spy. She actually worked for the Defense Intelligence Agency in the United States. Uh, and she was trained by the Cubans. She was stealing government information and giving it to Cubans, which ultimately made its its route to Russians. But any event, she was trained on how to defeat the polygraph. And so through training, and a lot of practice, uh, Anna. Clinched a body part at the right time, at the right amount of pressure to cause a blood pressure increase in heart rate change. She also keep in mind, had to control her breathing to make it look legitimate and real. Now a real autonomic nervous system response. A real flight or flight looks very different from somebody that intentionally moves, shifts, or controls her breathing. But Anna was trained. And it was in the mid 1990s to defeat the polygraph. Uh, and she actually did, uh, in, in that time, later on, after September 11th, probably by the third week in September of 2001, she was finally caught. And part of her agreement was that she would tell us how she actually defeated it. And, uh, of course she was clenching her butt muscles. Um, so actually after that we added to the polygraph, now that it's fully digital, uh, a seat cushion so we can detect. Flexing there, right? It's kind of funny, but also some folks were used making fists with their toes. So we also have a foot pad. Now we have'em take their shoes off, put it on a f on you gotta put'em fat on the floor, as well as sit on the seat because of anon test. And so, uh, it really, uh. It helped us, you know, obviously look for those countermeasures. So today we have a lot more than we had. Even when I started, I used the old analog system that had the paper rolling by with the pen squiggling on her. Like you mentioned, we've gone, you know, completely digital. We have additional attachments so we can detect some of those things. So that was probably one of the most notorious, uh, cases. Now, the other, the other thing related to me specifically was I was beat once that I know of where it was a pre-employment polygraph and, uh, the person was applying for a job at the city at that time. We polygraphed everybody at the police department. In any event, um, he, I, I gave him a pass and he wound up stealing an 18 wheeler and taking off across the country. Later on, uh, of course when I found out about it, my supervisor pulled the charts and said, sequela, what happened here? Uh, as I looked back at the chart, it was more of an inconclusive of. There's no doubt he was either medicated or something else. Uh, I missed it. Uh, I gave him the benefit of the doubt. I was tired. It was the last exam of the day. Of course, human error, right? I had to interpret the chart and I didn't interpret it properly, or I was in a hurry and I missed it. So of course today you have more controls in place. The polygraph's much better because it's digital. It actually does have numerical scoring now, so you don't have to have as much human eyes on it. So it's a little better. Uh, and you know, but that was a good example. Could have been a lot worse. It could have went out and killed somebody. But in the event, yes, I've been beaten.

Yoyo: 14:39

Alan, do you know that you look like a polygrapher if we were to go buy movies?

Alan: 14:46

Well, I, I don't know, but uh, I do know I've seen a lot of those movies and it's one of the things that when I watched Hollywood and how they depict polygraph examiners, you know, it irritates me.'cause they never have the attachments on. Right? Uh, they're asking questions where they expect the person to give a statement while they're hooked up.'cause you can only answer yes or no. So I cringe when I watch any shows with polygraph because I'm critiquing them.

Yoyo: 15:12

Yeah. But I think as professionals, we all do. You know, I remember when I was joining the police and we were all learning the. The, you know, how to read Summit like in the States, it would be your Miranda rights In the United Kingdom, it's, you know, you are giving someone their rights following arrest and you, we would watch a program together, you know, police training, we'd be like, ah, that's not even a lawful arrest. And I think as professionals, it just goes to show how far away we are in terms of knowledge compared to somebody who is not. An expert. So I think that's in fact complimentary that they didn't get it right. It just goes to show, doesn't it?

Alan: 15:49

Yeah, I think so. But the other part is, it's entertainment, right? So, they're, they want it to be more interesting than it is. And in a polygraph setting, it's pretty dry and boring.'cause it has to be very sterile environment. So if you did it exactly how is it supposed to be done? Uh, you'd probably get a lot of people falling asleep watching it, so they gotta dramatize it a little bit, right.

Yoyo: 16:10

Well look, talking about dry and boring, I was gonna ask you, what role does rapport play in eliciting sort of truthful information, even from people who don't want to talk and does rapport building and rapport play figure into the whole, polygraph experience?

Alan: 16:27

Absolutely not only in the polygraph experience, but also in interrogations. So the mo, the father of Modern Police interrogations was known as Johnny Reed. Johnny Reed, uh, has a school, interrogation school and a polygraph school. And the Reed, the Reed Technique is kind of an abrasive pro approach, police interrogation approach that has recently been scrutinized, uh, because it. Could cause forced or coerce confessions. We never want that. And so,, today everyone's migrating to what we call an emotional approach where we're actually, uh, taking the focus away from the subject or the suspect and putting it on the victim and everybody else. And that does involve quite a bit of rapport building. So if a guy walks in, you're gonna talk to him. You wanna try to. To build some kind of connection, uh, to break down that wall because the moment you bring'em back in for a polygraph, or if, if you're a detective and you're interviewing the suspect, you have to establish some sort of rapport. You already have credibility built because of your position, but we want. Diffuse'em, and we, it's so important we do that on the front end now with the, uh, more modern interrogation approach, which includes like, like you mentioned, rapport building. And it is very, very critical, uh, that we follow this process. And that's what I teach. I teach what we call the emotional approach. I teach it to our students at the university. I just got back from Oklahoma where I, I taught, uh, 80, uh, uh, detectives, investigators from the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigations, this technique. And what was interesting is most of them were retrained. Uh. People, uh, professionals, the harsh direct approach, and I'm saying switch. I want you to try this and see if it helps you with your admissions. You'll also get less co complaints, claims of coercion, force confessions, and you'll find that, uh, you'll build more rapport and build better statements and obtain more confessions.

Yoyo: 18:28

Do you know, I'm gonna get asked, what does a polygrapher look like then? Yoyos?

Alan: 18:35

Well, you know, I, it could, you look like Robert De Niro, right from the movie Make the Paris. I'm gonna

Yoyo: 18:39

say he's always gonna be the intelligent looking guy in the room. You know, the kind of nerdy, intelligent type. Um. But look, I have a question for you. In a high stakes interview, let's picture this. What's the first thing you train investigators and detectives to look for? The moment the subject walks in?

Alan: 18:58

One of the things I, I talked to all of'em. I said, there's no substitution for a thorough investigation prior to an interrogation or interview. I go, if you go in cold, it's gonna be very difficult for you to do anything, because you don't have enough information. So I always say in advance, get as much information as you can. The who, what, why, where, why, how potential motives, uh, a background check. Do as much as you can get. Or, or get as much as you can from whoever did the work up before you're talking to him, whether it be an arresting officer, whether it be a detective that's passing this on to you. And then, because that's gonna help you establish, uh, not only credibility, because you're gonna be able to explain how you've done investigations like this in the past. You're also gonna have a better chance of building some sort of connection, rapport. So learn as much as you can prior to going in. That's so critical. The next thing I train'em on is room set up. Uh, the other thing you look at in a, uh, in a most. Television and Hollywood interrogations is room set up. And this is typically wrong. Um, you don't want anything that could be a distraction. Do you want, you don't want reminders of punishment. You don't want, you wanna remove signs of authority, like your badge, your gun, your handcuffs, uh, in tv, they're always wearing them. Or most of the time they are and are. If you really want to build rapport, minimize the seriousness of what they've done in their own mind and, and build credibility, you've gotta take those, those signs of authority away. And you also have to help build a connection in a room that's not, uh. So sterile. Now, in some cases where you're dealing with someone who's, uh, highly violent, or if you're interview interviewing a prisoner, that's a different story. But when you're doing an investigation and you don't know if the guy did it, uh, you do have to follow that approach. So, proper room setup, there's a lot of do's and don'ts and what should be in a room, who should be in a room, positioning of the chair and table. I go through all of that. Uh, even the types of chairs you use. I, I remember doing interrogation where, uh. We both had chairs with wheels on'em. Uh, that's a no-no. I was chasing that person around the room. Every time I get close, they back up. I couldn't. And, and, and that's a distraction. Yeah, it's funny. Um, until they got stuck in a corner and they couldn't back up anymore, then I was able to continue. Uh, or what happens when the suspect sits up on the table? Mm-hmm. You know, I, I, I, I give that example that happened to me once. What happens? What do you yank'em down? You, you try to talk'em down. Could you come down and talk to you? Um, and they wouldn't. So what do you do? You know, I asked that question. Well, what I did is I got up on a table and sat with'em and continued the investigation. Think about the power of psychology. They're looking down at me. Okay? If I sat down at the chair, uh, they have control. I need to get up there. And so I just got up on a table and con and continued with the interrogation. So there's a lot of things you have to do, um, and you have to be very flexible on a fly. Uh, but preparation again is so important when you can prepare.

Yoyo: 22:00

So in British policing, and certainly through the detectives training I had, we were taught to not raise ourselves to a,, a higher. Position. And that's because this is what they consider to be oppressive. Like, yeah, we're not allowed to ask the same question three times in a row or any more than three times. Did you do it? Did you do it though? But did you do it? Did you do it? Like it's because ultimately that can coerce people into just saying yes, uh, just to get rid of you. And we were watching like old, you know, Cagney and Lacy film clips. Like this is how we don't do it. You know, and it's interesting how things have changed, but for those that are listening, the very discerning security professional who'll come across, you know, the need to get interviewed technique, right? In many different circumstances. What is a question, uh, structure or interview technique that security professionals should use for, you know, far more often?

Alan: 23:00

Well, again, I'm gonna go back to the emotional approach, and what that includes is an introductory statement. An introductory statement is actually, uh, gone through by the investigator to Detective Weber, and if they're doing it right now, this may seem a little bit long too. It's about a five minute introduction where the investigator investigator's talking the whole time and there's an, I like to call it an eight step process. It in a, it's made up of who I am, what I do for the organization or police department, uh, how I've been involved in numerous investigations. Again, that's a part where you would be describing investigations very similar to what the suspect is there for. So that's helping you build credibility like you've been there. Uh, in, in the first two parts, you're also gonna minimize the seriousness in their own mind of what they did. We call a minimization statement. So if I'm investigating, let's say an embezzlement case, and let's say the person is accused or suspected of taking a hundred thousand dollars from an organization, a minimization statement in part two would be, you know, my job is to investigate, uh, claims of money being taken from an organization. However, my biggest concern is when someone takes a million dollars or more. Now you'll, you'll, if they're being investigated for a hundred thousand dollars Eman case, but I tell'em my biggest concern is when, uh, an organization is losing a million dollars or more. What did I just tell him? I just minimized in his mind what he did. Uh, is is considered small, and so that's called minimization. Then we get into part three. I've done thousands of investigations related to these types of things, and I give examples of different types of embezzlement cases. Again, we're not gonna use the word embezzlement, but we're gonna talk about other types of. Embezzlement that I've investigated from that phase, we go into what we call, um, the investigative tools that are used to catch people that are involved in these things. You know, mark, because we expect these types of things to happen in our society, we use different types of investigative procedures and tools to help us identify who's involved. We may use, uh, CCTV covert cameras. We may, we also have a a one 800, uh. At, uh, ethics Hotline where a person can call in anonymously. We may also partner with our cyber folks who can do some forensics on the computer that was used to take money from the organization. Uh, we may also have somebody hired and put'em in side by side as an undercover to observe and then report, you know, with all the investigative tools that we have. We'll see what's happening, but we don't always know why it happened. And we switch to the next step, which is called rationalization. That's where we talk about. Why people do what they do. And again, the whole time we're building a theme and it's about everything that we believe they did without actually bringing them in yet. So step five is. You know, we know that because when people get involved in taking money from an organization, it's because they might've gotten into some situation or problem. And so we'll go into, uh, the different motives of why a person might do it. And in the middle of those motives, we pick like five we'll sandwich what we think is the reason they took the money. So from our investigation, let's say they have a gambling habit, we might say something like, you know, sometimes a person gets addicted to, let's say gambling, they go to. Casino and they keep winning, then they lose, and now they're trying to make it back up and they can't, so they start taking money to try to recover it. That's an understandable thing. Anybody in that situation might've done it. Then you go on to the next phase, which, which we call, um, giving'em a, uh, we call it the test for submission, where we're giving'em a two person example. A, an example of a person that's a hundred percent truthful who had a gambling problem, and the person who's not truthful and who's not willing to be cooperative, then we'll ask'em based on those two scenarios, which person do you think I would be more sympathetic to or want to help through this situation? The person who is truthful and on, uh, truthful and cooperative of the one who's not, they'll always pick the one that was truthful. Then we go to what we call a transitional statement, which is keeping that example in mind and everything I just mentioned to you. I do now want to ask you some questions specifically related to you. Now I wanna bring it to them. Then I'm gonna ask'em, this is your original question type of question. We're gonna ask an assumptive question. So if our investigation shows that we, um, we're pretty darn sure the person's involved, then we're gonna ask'em the assumptive question like this. So Mark. Tell me, when was the last time you took money from the company that was not yours? This question is asked and expected to do exactly what you did. It's gonna back'em down. Right. We're, we're hoping for a pause, just like that. And think about it. If a person took money and you ask'em, when was the last time you took money, it wasn't yours, uh, they're gonna think about, okay. Should I tell'em when was the last time I did it? What have you? So we're hoping for a pause, and then we're gonna take advantage of that pause by saying an exaggeration. We'll follow up on exaggerating, uh, statements. So the question is, when was the last time, mark you took money from the company, it was not yours. Pause. Was it today? Well, no it wasn't today. And usually that's the type of response you get. And what is that? That's an admission. Then what we're gonna do is go back and say, we're gonna reinforce that and say, you know, mark, thank you for being truthful. My investigation agrees with that. It wasn't today. So when was it? Mark? And then you're gonna throw out the actual. Or a suspected date and then that once you got that first submission, which is the hardest, then we try to get'em to tell us the very last time. Well, it was last Thursday. Well, how much did you take last Thursday, mark? Well, it was about$1,500. Well, mark, what'd you do with the$1,500? Well, I spent some of it on a tv, some for my car. Then I'm gonna start to use lock-in questions so he can't back his way out. Which would, asking them what you used the money for. And once we're done with that, we know it was last Thursday. Now we have to go back to how many times when was the first time and develop a timeline number of incidents. Now, if you, if you did a thorough investigation beforehand, you probably had a certified fraud examiner that gave you a spreadsheet with all these bank deposit losses or whatever it might be, and then you could kind kind of go through that document with him. Now that's a, an example of how we would do an. An interrogation on a suspect, an embezzlement case? It would, it, it applies to all types of cases. So if it's stalking, if it's a stalking case, you follow the same thing. You gotta still use a minimization statement because if you don't, they may not be willing to be truthful. So, in a stalking case on the front end, you might say something like, my biggest concern when I'm investigating things related to this is when someone is, is stalking somebody with the intent of killing them. Well, we know from the investigation their intent was just to get closure, let's say, uh, a bad relationship or they just wanted their, they have a celebrity crush, whatever it may be. Um, we know their intent was probably not homicide. So immediately by stating. Our biggest concern is when someone's following someone around with the intent of killing them, they're gonna say, oh, it wasn't me. I just wanted their signature, or whatever it may be. Again. So the, the same technique applies to every type of case, or, and, and it works very well with the exception of those who've been through a lot of interrogations, the, you know, hardened criminals on the street. I've had, I've had criminals look at me that, who were on parole and said, Hey sequela, I know where you're going. What do you think? I'm stupid. If I say anything, I'm going back to prison. You know, they're not gonna, they're not gonna talk. So you have to go a little more direct, uh, and with those suspects, but for the most part, which is interesting'cause the authors of this technique are wick land. Ow. They say it works on about 95% of the population. And I think I, I would've probably agree with it'cause I've used it on every case. I've had a chance and I'm in the 93 percentile as far as, uh, confession rates. So I would say it's pretty darn effective. And when it doesn't work, you either got a hardened criminal or you didn't have enough evidence. Really, you should, maybe you have the wrong person you're talking to, and that's not good either. You don't really wanna be interrogating an innocent person if you don't have to.

Yoyo: 31:18

Let's go to Mark who says, I know where you're going with this. You think I'm stupid. I'm not gonna ask that answer that I'm gonna end up in prison. This is a guy, the personality type, who he wants to be thought of as intelligent, you know? So he has to almost be handled as though he is intelligent. Yeah,

Alan: 31:35

of course. Yeah. When you're dealing with, especially when you're dealing with sociopaths or even narcissists, remember, they're smarter than us. At least they believe they are. So in those types of cases, you gotta flatter'em, you know, and say, mark, I've never seen anybody do anything like this. This is pretty sneaky way, you know, so they like to be praised and flattered. Uh, and then you might have a slip right there. And once you get'em, then it's gonna be tough for them to back out. So sometimes you have to go that route. If it's somebody that's. On parole, they're probably going to more difficult. So you're have having to go more direct on'em. Say, you know, mark, just for the mere fact that I'm talking to you today, I could have your probation violate your parole violated, and you could be back in. I'm gonna be, I wanna help you through this situation. And I had a case like that. It was a burglary case where the guy told me that, uh, it was a case where b. Phoenix here. Um, a a a dry cleaning location actually would, uh, clean and house mink coats for these very wealthy people from Minnesota. They come to Phoenix and have their, their minks. Dry cleaned. Anyway, there was a burglary, uh, coats were taken. He was our primary suspect. I was interviewing him and he looked at me. He said, Hey, really good job with that interview, but I'm not telling you anything.'cause I'm, I'm not going back to prison. So, um, I tried to direct approach. He goes, no matter what I say, I, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not going. I'm not buying. So I had to switch gears and try something else. And in that particular case, I said, okay, mark, let's say his name was, I can't remember. The company's more concerned about recovering the man coats. There's not much they, so I'm trying to hook us, uh, let's say a sympathetic side. This investigation is gonna continue, mark, whether or while your cooperation. And I can tell you this is gonna get pretty ugly for you. Uh, your parole officer's gonna get this information, uh, and he'll have to decide whether to violate. Now I do know this, the company will drop charges if they mysteriously show back up the man codes. Uh, but that's up to you. If they just happen to show up one day, um, we'll be, uh, they're not gonna pursue it. And then of course, that might be good for you. And so I ended it'cause I couldn't go anywhere. And sure enough, they showed up that evening. Of course we were watching surveilling and arrested him, so it worked out. We didn't need a confession. But in any event, sometimes that's what happens. You have to play different games, you know? In the United States, you can trick and, and, and in some cases use deception with interrogations. By the way, there's four states now in the United States. You cannot do that. And there's more states considering it. So, um, you, you know, we just, we'll have to play by the rules. Whatever the rules are when Yeah, change.

Yoyo: 34:21

Let's look at insider threat. Another area that you look at with your background. What are the early warning signs of an insider threat that organizations consistently miss? And what benefit have we got of decades of knowledge and information to be able to answer that question?

Alan: 34:40

Um, that's a great question and it really depends on the motivation. So, uh, if an insider threat is motivated by financial purposes, right, let's say financial, then we'll stick to something out, move over to another area. Financial is gonna be typical of any embezzler. You're gonna have financial problems. They're gonna be always there at work. They don't wanna be, they won't take time off'cause they're afraid they're gonna be caught. Uh, you might see them, uh, spending a lot of money on, uh, you know, large, expensive items. So they're living beyond their means. Um, they have habits. Uh, you'll start to see the red flag, what I call behavioral indicators from insider threats, let's say from a financial standpoint. On the other hand, if it's a situation where the person is disgruntled, uh, and is not real happy with your organization, so maybe their, their intent is to be, uh, sabotage or to do something, uh, to hurt the company but not financially, uh, that goes back to. And what I call a pathway to violence. The pathway to violence. And it may be violence against the organization, not an individual. And it could be a situation where that starts with a grievance. They weren't treated right, they missed out on a promotion, uh, whatever it may be. That's the grievance, and they feel like. Uh, they're not, their issues or concerns are not being addressed. So now they're looking for a way to retaliate. So there's like a five step process that they go through before they finally act. People don't just do things on a spurt of moment, whether it be in embezzler, whether it be somebody who plans on, uh. Committing some sort of violent act against the person or the company. There is a grievance process that then ultimately leads to action. So along the way, you have to look for those behaviors as well, that they may be working alone, they may be, uh, researching things. Of course, uh, it's important for security teams to be monitoring different types of behaviors. Uh, and of course in the United States, if we have suspicion and you're, and you're working on a company computer, we can remote in, find out where they're going, do some forensics on where they've been going on, on the web, uh,'cause that'll help us determine if they are in fact scheming to do something. So you gotta look at the behaviors, you gotta look at their work behaviors. And you have to be proactive. You know, the problem with insider issues, we tend to be reactive and we wait until an event occurs, then we go back and assess, okay, what the hell happened, what went wrong? Uh, and then, uh, oh wow, the guy just snapped. Well, no we didn't. Uh, there was a lot of indicators on the front end that we didn. Pay attention to. But then when you go back and look, you see all these issues. You know, the typical guy that was bullied and was a loner and worked in it, and then he decided to act out and, and download, uh, some sort of, uh, uh, virus or something else, or, or worse. And we've had people that, in my last organization that sabotaged our fiber and took down the whole city, uh, you know, and because they felt like they weren't being treated right. You know, so you gotta go back to behaviors, how people are responding, how they're acting, what types of things they're doing. Uh, so we have to do a better job monitoring employees from the insider standpoint. Now how far can you go?'cause you got privacy issues, right? But when you work for an organization, at least in the United States, we have a right to inspect anything that's ours, whether it be a laptop or locker, whatever it may be. And we really need to have a policy and expectation on the front end. When they first start and they're onboarded, they sign that, that, uh, employee handbook and they know that they could be checked at any time.

Yoyo: 38:22

With the advances in AI biometrics and behavioral analytics, Alan, where do you see the truth verification field going in the next decade?

Alan: 38:33

That's a very good question because, you know, as of today, you know, lie detection with polygraph, you know, that's the best thing we have. But there is some cool advances coming. And so, you know, I can go to Israel where at the airport when you leave, you're being, you're asked questions on a monitor. Before you advance. They're actually looking at you and monitoring you. They're looking at some of the micro expressions at the same time. They're also, um, looking at how you respond, how long it takes you to respond, the the answer you selected to the question. Because we know that people that are being deceptive or deceitful respond differently. They respond slower. They may change their answers. So we're gonna lead'em down a path if they don't do well on that. First screen, then they gotta go talk to somebody. In the United States, we have very similar, uh, systems. One of the organizations is called Forensics. So forensics worked with Georgia Tech software engineers developed, uh, something very similar where let's say there's an investigation you actually get on the screen. You're being monitored and you're asked questions, same thing. You're being monitored. We know that a person is being deceptive, is gonna respond differently than a person who's truthful. And we're also looking at, uh, how long it takes on to respond and what they select, et cetera, both from a pre-employment standpoint, but also an investigation standpoint. So ai. Is helping us predict, uh, which people we should advance or those that need to be through, go through a second screening. Let's say I used it in an investigation, uh, in Tampa, Florida where we had 80 potential suspects. I'm not gonna interview 80 people. Uh, so I ran'em through forensics and narrowed the suspect pool way down to a handful. Those are the only ones I needed to interview. And so, uh, yes, you're gonna see a lot of this coming because it helps, uh, actually do the things we already know, but it's doing it faster. It doesn't get tired. Uh, it gives us some good predictive analysis. Helps give us good direction. It's not the end all, but it's, it's better than what we have and it's getting better.

Yoyo: 40:41

Alan, once Your way to get on the Security Circle podcast is to write a book. And you contacted me, didn't you, to tell me that you'd written a book before I ask you five questions. Most people would never ask you about your book. Tell me, did you always have a book in you or was this something that came up rather unexpected?

Alan: 41:04

That's a really good question. So it, that did come unexpected. So when I retired, uh, from my last company, I was a security director, uh, and Investi Director of Security Investigations for a major telecommunications company. I was too young to fully retire, so I actually started teaching adjunct, and now I'm full-time at the, uh, riddle Emory Riddle Aeronautical University in the College of Business Security and Intelligence. And one of the classes that I I was teaching was called Security Investigations. Now, the textbook that I was using is very good because it follows the same path that we train our investigators. Uh, in investigations you follow what we call a plan, and it's an acronym for an investigation preparation, learning analysis notification. It's very similar to the intelligence cycle. We, we kind of follow the same path. The textbook was 20 years old and there was some old technology in there, and it was purely by accident. One of my students raised her hand and said, Hey, sequela, what is a 35 millimeter film camera? And I just kind of started to laugh. Uh, but everything's digital for these kids, right? And, um, they said, you know, Sequoia, this is a pretty old book. This book was written before we were born. I think maybe you ought to think about, uh, maybe reaching out to the author and see if he'd rewrite it. And so that's what I did. And I reached out to, uh, Dr. Nicholson who wrote the text. He's a retired FBI guy. And, uh, he, I talked to him about it, told him I love the concepts, but the technology's too old. And he said, I'm too busy. I'm consulting. He goes, how about you write it? And I thought, wait a second. I'm pretty busy, but I love the text. I go, okay, let's come to some terms. So the way it worked was I would write a chapter, send it to him, uh, once he approved it, it would go to the editor. And we did that and got it done. And we started in February, got it done in August, and I had it ready to go by the fall of 2023. So no, there was no plan. It was purely by accident. But at the same time since then, now I write a lot of articles as well. So I write for, uh, three different magazines and, uh, periodically I get interviewed, like on this podcast, uh, where I share my, um, my information as well. And it's all about the next generation. Yolanda, for me, it's about. Helping those who are going into the field, and I'm, I'm excited for them, the next generation, because they got ai, they got all this cool tools that we didn't have. And so I'm a little jealous. I wish I could start over, but I can't. So instead I'm gonna help them and, uh, maybe I'll live vicariously through them as I, I learn about their experiences, but the textbook helped me and it's helping them. And of course, uh, I think it's a good thing.

Yoyo: 43:47

Your book Security Investigations, a Professionals Guide, you co-wrote with Larry Nicholson, and it was only a couple of years ago. It's a comprehensive guide to security investigations aimed at corporate investigators, private investigators, and law enforcement, covering topics such as workplace investigations, technology related crimes, interviewing, evidence collection, and case management. I mean, Alan, which is your favorite.

Alan: 44:15

You know, my, as far as those topics, I would say, um, I like all of it because when you're doing investigations, you need to know all of it. But as far as the types of investigations, certainly internal insider crimes are my favorite because one, uh, most of'em involve sabotage, espionage, embezzlement. Uh, workplace violence. And so I like dealing with those types of crimes because one, they're, they're contained within a, a corporation for most part, and they're easiest to solve when you're dealing with investigations in a corporation, you have boundaries. It's not like, uh, crimes going on in society. Whereas anybody can be a suspect, it's a lot easier to solve'em. I, I, I just, I'm turned on by white collar crime, love solving crimes against corporations because it helps keep'em, uh, relevant and in business. And so, uh, I spent a lot of time investigating corporate crimes and I would say those are my favorite types of crimes to investigate.

Yoyo: 45:14

Can you describe a time in an investigation when a seemingly insignificant detail, something most people would overlook, completely changed the trajectory of the case?

Alan: 45:27

You know, that is another great question. So when I teach interview techniques and tactic, there's, there's a section in the interrogation called development of the Admission, and where that, what that is, is, let's say, let's go back to the, the example of Mark. So Mark is the embezzler. Let's say, uh, we, we got him to admit to the embezzlement, but there is a little bit out here. Let's say there was also a tip that Mark was involved in something else, so. What a lot of investigators don't do, and especially with the direct approach, the direct approach creates a barrier and it, it prevents the suspect from wanting to give you information, uh, the emotional approach. You've built rapport, you've built credibility. They're soft, they're pliable. We wanna take advantage of that. So now we're gonna shift gears and ask'em about that suspicion, whereas it doesn't happen, even though it may be only a suspicion. Let's say this guy is involved with uh, or suspected of also being involved with, uh uh. S let's just, I'm trying to pick up an example that one had happened. He was also dealing cocaine on a premise. It was just a, a slight suspicion. So the way we would, we would transition and say, mark, thank you for being truthful about the money you've taken from the company in the course of our investigation, which we discovered some other things I need to ask you about. So what I'm doing, I'm setting him up for the next assumptive question. So I would say, mark. When was the last time again? I'm gonna go right to the assumptive after I made that transitional statement. Mark, when was the last time you sold cocaine here on the company? Property Pause. Was it yesterday? No, it wasn't yesterday. Uh, okay. Again, we went off of suspicions. I threw out that assumptive question and he paused and I threw out an exaggeration and no, it wasn't yesterday, which is basically the mission he has. So now we have to arrive at, when was it so. What I have found over the years is a lot of novice investigators, those that were trained, were read. They don't know how to expand or develop the admission to look at other crimes. It could even be a serial burglar, for example. Uh, if you, if you catch a guy on a burglary. Well, we wanna know about the rest of'em too, if we can. If we get'em to admit to the one, let's get into the others. Let's use that transitional statement. Let's ask it another assumptive question. And again, a lot of those other assumptive questions are gonna be based on suspicions of other activity they were involved in that your investigation uncovered. Uh, again, it goes back to was there a thorough investigation done on this guy? Again, the more intel you have, the more questions you can, can ask.

Yoyo: 48:07

Now I wanna take you back. What was the very first invest investigator? Oh, I, I almost went bit Sean Connery Then what was the first investigation that you ever worked on where the human side of the story stayed with you long after the case was closed?

Alan: 48:24

I do have one and it's one I'll never forget, and I was very young at the time. It was actually, it was a polygraph, where I was actually testing a, an 18-year-old kid. He, uh. Had deception indicated to a question that was worded. Have you been involved in a serious undetected crime? Now, if you think about an 18-year-old boy in the United States, what's the worst thing an 18-year-old boy could do? And I, after I ran two charts, so when you do polygraphs, you run a chart. If you have deception on a question you would ask. After you turn off the machine, let the air off of the blood pressure cuff and say, Hey Bobby, is there any question bothering you here?'cause you don't wanna point the question out because it may, give a false. Positive on the next chart. No, there's nothing bothering me. So then you run the exact same questions again. Now we had an even stronger response to the same question, so now I know there's not something that just popped into his mind. There's something relevant there. So I said Bobby, after the second chart, I said, Bobby. Uh, you're having a problem with this question and you can't pass the polygraph unless you tell me what it's You mean I can pass this polygraph? Yeah, you can.'cause I can alter the question. I'll say, other than that incident, have you been involved in a serious undetected crime? And so I start rattling off everything I can think of that an 18-year-old might have done from underage drinking. Sm, uh, using drugs, selling drugs, shoplifting, whatever. He kept saying, no, it wasn't that. No, it wasn't that. So at least I know I'm onto something and I run out of ideas. So I said, Bobby, I can't help you. I'm just gonna go ahead and turn this report in. It's failed. You won't be getting the job at the city. Uh, at that time, we were doing polygraphs on everybody, uh, that applied for a city job, not just police candidates. And I go, um, you're gonna have to give me more. He says, okay. I, I met a guy and I gave him some money. How much did you give him?$3,000. What did you get in return? And then I started going off drugs stolen. It was$3,000. Was it a motorcycle? A car? No. No. What that, what that, well, Bobby, uh, I, what can it be?'cause I ran about ideas. Well, I really didn't get anything in return. What do you mean to get anything? I didn't get anything. W why did you give him the money? Well, he was providing a service. Uh, and so I'm thinking, oh, okay, what is he doing laundering money? You know, I, I had no idea. So I said, okay, Bobby, forget it. Uh, I'm just gonna turn this report and you're not getting a job. Okay. I'll tell you. He basically met, he met. A guy, he was given an envelope for a member of his family. He said, meet this guy at this cafe in Santa Maria, California. He was not supposed to open the envelope, but he did. He was a 17 at, at the time, very nosy, counted the money. It was actually a mob hit. So he carried the money to meet a hit man. They had a 17-year-old kid do it. In the event he was caught, uh, he had no history. They figured, uh, he could have. Come up with some story, but it turned into a, a really thorough investigation between our city and Santa Maria Police Department up in California. It was, so we called up, it was an unsolved homicide, sure enough, and so just a simple pre-employment polygraph with an 18-year-old who had a strong hit on a serious undetectable crime. Question opened up this big case, and it's very interesting about polygraph in a pre-employment polygraph if the examiner's doing his job properly. In the pretest interview, you'll get people to admit to things, and I've had people admit to things that you would never suspect they would admit to because they want to pass the polygraph. It's part of the interrogation processes. You know, you're trying to, uh, get them to tell you everything before you hook'em up. And then. If you do get deception, you gotta get what's behind it. And Bobby's case, it was a simple, um, job of carrying$3,000. That's a pretty cheap hit, you know, if you ask me. But that was back in 1989, a long time ago.

Yoyo: 52:13

Wow. Yeah.

Alan: 52:15

Yeah. That was probably most, and that's the one I carried with me.'cause here's a kid ruined his life. Uh, and of course good news is it solved the homicide, it broke up the, the ring up there in California. But, uh, that's one I'll never forget.

Yoyo: 52:29

So, um, as a detective in training, I loved the interview techniques. Um, I went quite far as well. I had enhanced interview skills for being able to interview children. You know, ascertain facts of cases where they were victims and certainly into sexual offenses where the interview style needs to be an awful lot more softer and, and very, very different. And, and like you, you know, learn the power of that first recall first account, just sitting back and listening and it's hard, you know, because we all love to talk, don't we? Um, I remember interviewing somebody once though, and I, it was the first time I really felt out of my depth because this man was a violent man and he was brought into custody because he had tried to run over a female police officer in his car. So we already knew he had proven, um. Proven attempts to, to seriously harm a human. Um, and he was also, um, wanted for what we call disqualification in driving. So he didn't have all of the right car documents to be able to drive no insurance. Um, nothing like that. Um. And the, the job came to me to interview you in custody. And we sat down and we did the normal, you know, play the tape, goes the buzzer like this, and then you introduce yourself as the lead investigator and the second investigator introduces themself. And the first thing you do is say, can you start by giving me your name with a Dr. Your name and date of birth? And there is a bit of a language, um, warning here, but he literally leaned into me and he said, in a minute, I'm going to punch your fucking teeth out. And my heart literally sank.'cause I thought. I thought, shit, this guy is serious. And I really, really felt, I felt scared for the first time in the law. And I'm in police custody. I am in the secure room. I've got strips around the room, which are panic alarms. You know, we position the seatings so that the suspect is always in the corner of the room. We are near the exit door. Uh, but nevertheless, I kind of, you gotta kind of fake it till you make it. So I tried not to show fear, and I, I don't think I did. I just said I. Then we'll just end it there, shall we? I looked at his legal representation, who was literally trying to crawl under a chair, and, uh, and I really think he would've done if he could've done it. And he was a bit of a poacher term, uh, poacher termed, uh, uh, what do you call it, uh, something gatekeeper where. He was a police officer and he, when he retired, he went and did his legal, uh, qualifications and he became, you know, our nemesis almost in custody. And, and when I saw him shit himself, I was like, thank goodness it's not just me. So I sort of pressed the button and I said right then, and I just left him in the room with his legal representation, came out and said to the custody sergeant with this kind of like, hand across my throat. Yeah, that ain't gonna happen. We never did interview him because we had the threat then and there, you know, that that was evidence. Have you had any situations like that where you've met someone that you know, would brutally hurt you in a, in an interview situation?

Alan: 56:00

Yeah, I actually been hurt in a, actually a polygraph where, and so when back in polygraph school, of course back in the day, we remember the paper is rolling out, we have the pens and so you actually mark on the chart. So I had a little cup holder with my pens and. Other things in there, which I probably shouldn't have. So I have a nice scar right here where I took a pair of scissors in the arm, uh, you know, stabbed with it, you know, during a polygraph and post, uh, interview interrogation. So, yeah, it happened too quickly for me to, to even know it'cause he grabbed it as I was disconnecting him and he stabbed me in the arm. And so. Those, you know, you don't think about that.'cause back then you needed those tools and instruments there for paper polygraph. Uh, but today you wanna keep everything in drawers. Of course, it's all digital. I mean, they could pick up the laptop and throw it at you. Uh, but, uh, you usually have some sort of warning'cause you had the warning so you're able to get out. So I, you know, I've had one of those, uh. And I've had others, uh, that were non-custodial, which just tell me to f off and then they just walk out. Uh, which, you know, that's okay too. Uh, but, uh, you know, not,

Yoyo: 57:14

not,

Alan: 57:14

uh, you know, that was the only one where it was violence.

Yoyo: 57:17

I, I, I pity the full Alan, anyone that tells you to f off. Yeah.

Alan: 57:24

Yeah, it, it's, it's still fun and you gotta laugh it off.

Yoyo: 57:28

My, uh, last question to you is around who you are because of this work. So, the reason I ask this question is because all of that training that I had in being able to detect someone's dishonesty has carried over into my personal life. So whenever boyfriends have lied to me, I've always found it probably a lot more. It angers me more than it ever used to because I've always said, you know, don't lie to me. I've got skills. I've got skills. But what I sound like, I've got skills. I'll be able to spot you lying to me, especially if you're a bad liar. If you're a bad liar. It's gonna be so disrespectful. It's like, I, I used to try, you know, catch criminals lying for a living. What makes you think you can slip a lie past me? And I'm talking about proper lies I haven't smoked today, really, you know, and you can smell it on them and all that kind of stuff. You just know they're lying and it's a really bad light. So I've carried that over and, and, and I'm aware that it's, you know, knowledge is sometimes. A handicap as well as a superpower. Who are you because of the work you've done and how has that spilled over?

Alan: 58:41

Well, I would say I, I'm the same way with, with that, you know, I go to parties and I come out with all kinds of information.'cause what do people like to talk about as themselves? And I don't wanna tell'em anything about me. I like to work a room, get to know as much about anybody in a room. They think you're wonderful because you're flattering'em, complimenting'em, and then you move on. So, you know, unfortunately I do that. It's just second nature. It's like a light switch. Switch, switches on, Just very interest. I'm just interested in people and, so naturally, I do that. Uh, so it has spilled over into my private life and, and I do have a lot of, uh, female friends that actually call me that are in the dating game, looking for me to help them out. I'm sure that happens to you as well. Hey, can you help me out? Can you run a background on this person? I go, I'll even put'em on a polygraph if you want. But I got one right now. She's divorcing. And I said, listen, you shouldn't listen. Don't even think about dating for a while. You should just figure out who you are. Get your life together. But when you're ready, come see me. Uh, we'll, uh, we'll make sure we get, we do at least a good screening job on'em. Um, but, certainly. You know, I'm, I'm very cautious with everything. I don't like big crowds. Uh, I, I do,, you know, certainly enjoy people. I'm, uh, I'm people person. Love to talk to people, but I am accused of analyzing, uh, people or my wife, uh, says to me, don't interrogate me because she knows what I'm doing. So, uh, but again, but today it's all about helping the next generation. So I am so excited to mentor and help these students, uh, move on to careers because again, they're coming in at a good time. While most people are concerned about ai, I think this is gonna actually help our career path.

Yoyo: 1:00:30

Yeah, I love that about your bio, actually about giving back to the next generation. So keep up the good work, Alan. it's been truly remarkable listening to you. I've You have been a rockstar. Thank you so much for joining us on the Security Circle podcast.

Alan: 1:00:46

Thank you, Yolanda. It's been great to be here with you.