A Comparison of US Police Interviewers’ Notes with their Subsequent Reports

摘要

Investigators often take notes during witness interviews, which may be used whennreconstructing interviews and writing reports. Little research has evaluated the contentnof interviewers’ notes and how (accurately) they are transferred to reports. ThirteennUS police investigators’ notes from a witness interview were evaluated and comparednwith their subsequent reports. Results indicate that although information contained innnotes is accurate (98%), a high percentage of interview information (68%) is omitted.nNotes focus mainly on witness responses while neglecting interviewer questionsutterances. Although 94% of information contained in notes is accurately transferrednto reports, interviewers fail to account for 40% of crime‐relevant information in theirnreports. On average, reports contained a larger percentage of witness informationnthan the notes, but police officers failed to account for how information was originallynelicited via their questions/utterances. Subsequent interview reports also contained anhigher percentage of peripheral crime details than notes, contributing to a decreasednomission rate (28%) from notes to reports. Taken together, results indicate thatninterviewer notes and reports provide a fairly accurate picture of witness responses.nHowever, they present a skewed picture of the entire interview content by omitting anhigh percentage of interview content and their own questions/utterances. Copyright ©n2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.