Mark McClish is a retired Supervisory Deputy United States Marshall with 26 years of federal law enforcement experience and a specialist in statement analysis. He has spoken at numerous law enforcement conferences and has trained a variety of law enforcement agencies and military organizations to recognize the tell-tale signs of deception. He joined Ian Punnett (Twitter) to discuss statement analysis and how it is used to detect the truthfulness of a person's words, either verbal or written.
Statement analysis is the process of examining how someone phrases a statement in an effort to determine if he or she is being truthful or deceptive, McClish explained. "People will always word their statements based on all their knowledge, which means their statements may contain information they did not intend to share," he said. Specific words can provide insight into what someone claims happened. For instance, when people use 'just' to minimize their actions it usually indicates they have done more than they're willing to tell, McClish revealed.
In the case of a denial, suspects may say 'I'm innocent' or 'I'm not guilty' but this is not the same as saying 'I did not do it,' he continued. Written statements can be analyzed for word usage as well, with special attention to what has been crossed out. "People's words will betray them," he added. Verb tense can also help determine the truthfulness of a statement. If it is coming from memory, it will be in the past tense, McClish pointed out, noting present tense indicates the story may have been fabricated.
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Open Lines followed in the latter half of the show. Geno in St. Louis shared his conspiracy theory regarding COVID-19. As part of his research, Geno looked up countries most effected by the coronavirus and cross-referenced it to nations where the stock markets have recently been the most tumultuous. According to Geno, Russia is on neither list. "Russia isn't being really affected and they're not being effected from a monetary standpoint either," he said. "Some entity, maybe a country... made money off of this thing," Geno suggested.
Mitchell from Seattle phoned in with a startling announcement. "I believe I had this coronavirus... I'm pretty sure this wasn't the regular flu," he admitted. Mitchell reported a pre-existing condition of asthma and how this virus attacked his lungs. "It was trying to fill my lungs with mucus," he said. Carl in Wichita Falls, Texas, revealed a way to kill the coronavirus on a mass scale. Use O3 oxygen generators and disperse through municipal waterworks, as well as put in vapor form to run through HVAC systems in buildings, he explained.