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92 Deception at Work

OJ SIMPSON AND THE BRONCO

Tom Lang: And where did you park it when you brought it home?
OJ Simpson: Ah, the first time probably by the mailbox. I’m trying to think, or did I bring
it in the driveway? Normally, I will park it by the mailbox, sometimes …
Tom Lang: On Ashford, or Ashland?
OJ Simpson: On Ashford, yeah.
Tom Lang: Where did you park yesterday for the last time, do you remember?
OJ Simpson: Right where it is.
Tom Lang: Where it is now?
OJ Simpson: Yeah.
Tom Lang: Where, on …?
OJ Simpson: Right on the street there.
Tom Lang: On Ashford?
OJ Simpson: No, on Rockingham.
Tom Lang: You parked it there?
OJ Simpson: Yes.

In this case, Mr Simpson’s generalization that the car was ‘normally’ parked on ‘Ashford’
was flushed out by specific questions, revealing that it had been parked ‘on Rockingham’
where it was found in a blood-drenched state. The interviewer should have pressed home this
deception by asking, ‘Then why did you try to mislead us by implying that you had parked it
on Ashford?’ In a very poor interview, he did not do this and in fact had no plan to bring OJ
to the pivotal point. Had he done so, the result of his criminal trial might have been totally
different.

Responding to a specific allegation with a generalization is a sign of deception

Suppressing guilty knowledge

The fact is that in most cases the liar knows too much, has to suppress the truth and has to be
careful he does not inadvertently leak clues.

KNOWING TOO MUCH ‘I had nothing whatsoever to do with the
removal of the files and I can account for
Some sensitive files were stolen on a every second of my time last Saturday 14th.’
Saturday from a storeroom in company
Y’s offices. Employees were told only that He knew and said too much and he later
‘information’ had been stolen over the admitted his guilt. It is a great shame that
‘weekend’ and asked to write down in free not all cases are this simple.
style all they knew about the thefts. One
statement said:

Liars always know too much

The way a subject reacts to documentary and other exhibits (which have a powerful visual
impact on the right hemisphere of the brain) can also tell you a great deal about his guilt or
innocence, as in the following example.