Interviews & Interrogations

With the latest crimes sweeping the news media and creating a stir on social networks let me shine some light on one of the meme’s I keep hearing and reading: “Could these crimes be stopped in advance?”Quick answer: Unfortunately most of the time; no.The FBI contacted and interviewed Tamerlan Tsarnaev well before the Boston Bombing.https://www.cbsnews.com/news/did-the-... gunman of the Pulse nightclub, Omar Mateen, 29, of Fort Pierce, Florida, was interviewed by the FBI in 2013 and 2014 but was not found to be a threat, the FBI said.https://www.cnn.com/2016/06/12/us/orl... F.B.I. received a tip about Nikolas Cruz (the Parkland, Florida school shooter) but they did not forward the tip to local field office.https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/16/us... above information does not depress or concern me; let me explain further.Why? Because we have a constitution with rules and procedures to protect the individual (unless you fall into the FISA court I guess.) Let’s say you get angry (choose any topic) and tell your neighbor in a heated moment that you want to “kill” someone.Is that enough to get you thrown into prison? Let’s hope not. Do you have a history of violence? Do you have an arrest record? These things may help in coming to a personal conclusion but was a crime committed here and is it enough for a jury to convict?That last one is THE big question and one that was probably discussed and reviewed in the above cases. With the known AND provable evidence at hand could an investigator/attorney get a conviction? (Please, let’s not even consider all the political questions that the district or federal attorneys begin to ask themselves!)I guarantee that if not, then every investigator hopes that the contact alone may change behavior.Right? You may be angry that your neighbor called the authorities on you but maybe you WERE “just blowing off steam” and have no intentions on carrying out the violence you bragged about; maybe that will cause you to cool off and understand that you should think before you speak. Should your rights be taken away for this one incident?However; the flip side of the coin is maybe this contact by police sends you further over the edge and is the “straw that breaks the camel’s back” so to speak?Another item I think worthy of pointing out is that the FBI is after all FEDERAL and therefor has limited number of potential crimes under their authority.A little FBI history for you: While the congress created federal authorities and ever expanded their power, the FBI was not begun until the year 1908.They had a tiny amount of power and even a smaller staff until two huge things converged in 1924 when J. Edgar Hoover took over control of the FBI and prohibition became a boon to criminal enterprises. The FBI was concerned about the amount of local communication between agencies and allocation of forces (maybe one county went after a criminal while another ignored them.) Hoover was a driving force in getting congress to pass new federal laws giving his organization the ability to grow in stature and power.Personally I find too much power in Washington and wish it were not so, look at the politicization of the FBI and DOJ over the last few years.Anyway, how about local authorities? https://www.naplesnews.com/story/news... here was an opportunity missed and I guess that it happens over and over in towns and cities all across the country; but I don’t believe that it is always due to incompetence or lack of concern.You see stories where the power of the government swings into full force to take possessions (cars, guns, and homes) even children from people where it appears extreme, and then see a situation like Cruz where people seem to run away from an obvious issue (that’s obvious to us after the fact, correct?)What I would like you to do for a moment is to put yourself in the chair of the investigator siting across a table from a subject. What evidence do you get that makes you believe a person should be “locked up.”Let’s pretend that the subject is combative and you believe he/she may be dangerous!Great what proof is collected? Seriously, unless the person says some self-incriminating things and then allows you to search their home where you find bomb making materials lying around, what do you get from a conversation?I’ll tell you because I have done this myself…you get a feeling…a “vibe” and that’s usually a best case scenario. But folks let me tell you, this can’t be enough for a country based on individual freedom.What I did was for businesses, and many times it was not even enough to get someone fired.In business you have rules, sometime unions too. My lord people, workers often get 2 or 3 times getting caught under the influence at work before you could fire them, God forget if they were smart enough to tell their managers and go to HR admitting to them that they had a drug or alcohol addiction!One such case I had to interview a subject that had threatened someone with a box cutter. The witness/victim did not want to press charges but was concerned about continuing to work with this guy.My ultimate problem with the suspect was that he tried to say that he was “just joking” and from other witness interviews I could determine that this man WAS upset and on edge; not just about work but he appeared to have a bunch of personal problems going on in his life. I forwarded his name to the HR department to see if they could offer counseling and encouraged this individual to contact the union to ask for the same if he wanted help.Remember this guy said he was fine and just joking around; horseplay that maybe went too far.I suspended this individual so that we could ensure a complete investigation; evaluate the information, as well as to allow the guy to cool off and possibly go look for counseling or something. I have no idea if the company would have fired him based on the “weak” victims’ statement and my “feeling” after the interview.He went home and killed himself.Cold analysis: This subject could have “lost it” at work and hurt or killed some innocent; good case.Human side: Did the suspension with possible loss of work compounded with personal issues send him over the edge?Don’t simplify these horrific crimes by allowing some talking head on TV convince you that a police contact or FBI interview could or would make a difference, you have too high of expectations if you believe this. Almost all arrest are after the crime, not before; if you want to believe in these theories may I suggest the movie Minority Report with Tom Cruise: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0181689/... I spent 1000's of hours sitting in chairs across from "suspects" and due to my investigation have spent many hours testifying to judges and juries; if you have any questions please feel free to contact me via Facebook or this page!