Planning & Zoning Commission - Regular Meeting

It's time now for Countywide, a presentation of Yavapai Broadcasting News. You'll hear about the interesting issues and happenings that affect all our lives. Here's today's Countywide.

Welcome to the program. It is countywide. And I'm Brad Miller. And we're happy to welcome for part two of a two-part segment, Alan Sequella, assistant professor at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott. And happy to say a good day to you. And thanks again for stopping and seeing us, sharing some of your valuable time with us. We chatted last time really about your background and what it is out there on the very leading edge and now teaching students who will be our leaders in the coming years, perhaps working for the federal government or in the private sector. And that is preventing criminal activity, especially in tech and high tech and those kinds of things. Did I get that part right? Oh yeah, Brad, absolutely. Okay, so we're following along there. And fascinating in our first segment, it should be on YouTube any day if it's not yet today. And now on part two of the program, we're going to roll up our sleeves and talk about polygraph testing. We've all seen it in the movies and on TV, and I want to find out where reality ends and the movies kind of begin. And Alan, is expert a word we could use for you and your knowledge of polygraph testing?

I'm a polygraph examiner, so you keep your credentials up by recertifying. Even though I don't run any regular exams anymore, I want to keep my certification up just in case. But yes, I've been a polygraph examiner since the mid-1980s.

Now, most of us are going to have some kind of an idea of polygraph test. You get wired up. They put a heart monitor on you and some different kinds of things. And then you are asked different kinds of questions, some of them very pointed, some of them to lead you off course. And at the end of it, the polygraph machine is going to say he was lying about this. He told the truth about that. How close is that to how it really works?

You're close. So the polygraph does, in fact, monitor what's going on inside your body. So the polygraph itself doesn't make the decision. The examiner has to interpret the results. So just to give you an example, the polygraph will be looking at your heart rate, your blood pressure, sweat duct activity, and respiration. Those are the primary things we monitor. There's a pre-test interview where we actually spend time with the examinee going over the questions that are going to be asked in advance. In case the person has something they want to share, let's say they're applying for a police job at a police department, we need to get all that information out front. And then when we ask them questions on a polygraph, they can only answer with a yes or no. There's no discussion. So that goes on in a pretest. We run the chart, which is a series of questions. They answer yes or no. After they answer yes or no, there's a 20-second gap between these questions. What we're looking for after they answer yes or no is a physiological change that we're monitoring. Is there going to be a blood pressure change, heart rate change, sweat duct activity change, respiration change? All of those things are controlled by what we call the autonomic nervous system, and there's two parts to that. There's the parasympathetic and the sympathetic. Now, the parasympathetic is that part that's keeping us digesting our food. As you and I are sitting here right now, the parasympathetic is in charge. The sympathetic kicks in during a fight or flight response. Now, everyone knows what a fight or flight is. So you're walking down the street, someone jumps out at you with a knife, you're going to run or you're going to fight. Your body prepares you automatically. You don't have to think about it. It's just a natural reflex. All those things change in your body. When a person lies about something they're concerned about, they go into a fight or flight. So that's what we're looking for. We're looking for that blood pressure, heart rate, sweat duct activity, respiration change at the answer of yes or no to the question. And if we don't see a response, then the assumption is they're not holding anything back. Right.

You see a lot of times, and here again my experience is on television and movies, where there'll be questions that really kind of have nothing to do with the matter at hand. Those aren't necessarily to throw the person, but what, to relax them and get a baseline?

Yeah, so we have a handful of different types of questions. So the first one would be, we call them innocuous, irrelevant questions. Is your first name Brad? Yeah. Another one might be, are we currently in the state of Arizona? Those are in there. You're going to always see those on the front end of the exam. The novelty of the exam is going to cause stress to everybody. So we'll ask you those. We know you're Brad. We know we're in Arizona. We're not really monitoring. We're basically setting up the tests, getting you going, getting you comfortable, yes, to relax you. Right. And then we get into the relevant questions, the questions at hand, like if it was a criminal case, did you shoot John Jones? Right. Do you know who shot John Jones? Do you know where the gun is that shot John Jones? So there'll be a series of questions, probably four, related to a specific issue. We also have what we call a comparison question, which is what I would like to call a known lie question. We're going to get you to lie to something. We want to know what you look like when you lie. We'll compare the known lie response to the relevant response. And so that's how we determine whether you're being truthful or not. Okay, okay. In your experience, has anyone ever beat this thing? That is a great question, and the answer is yes. So there's probably one of the best female spies in the country. Her name was Ana Montes. She worked for the Defense Intelligence Agency. Now, Ana was stealing government information and giving it to the Cubans, of course, ultimately to the Russians. Anna was stealing this information strictly out of ideological purposes. She wasn't even getting paid. She was trained on how to defeat it by applying the right amount of pressure at the right question for the right amount of time. And she actually defeated the polygraph in 1994. She was not caught until about three weeks after September 11th. She finally got caught. And part of her plea agreement was to tell us how that happened. She told us she flexed her butt muscles at the right time. So it is funny. But we actually have a seat cushion now. So those are called countermeasures, by the way. Anytime someone deploys countermeasures, she told us how she did it. We now have a seat cushion you sit on. So if you see somebody flexing, we know that they're trying to deploy countermeasures. There's also a foot pad. So some people are known to squeeze their toes to make a fist. And so they'll have to take – their shoes off and put it on a pad, they're sitting on a pad. So now we can detect more readily those countermeasures that people are using in the past to try to defeat the polygraph. But she successfully defeated it because it was considered wartime against terrorism. It was in her best interest to tell us because otherwise she could have been executed for that.

No kidding. Espionage.

Espionage. So she, in fact, served—she was given a 25-year sentence in a federal pen. She just got out, and now she's living in Puerto Rico. No kidding. Yep. Who taught her? The Cubans. Did she tell you? Well, yeah, she shared. It's interesting. I teach at Amber Riddle. My counterpart that sits across the hall was actually a neighbor of hers down the hall at the Defense Intelligence Agency as well. He knew her. He didn't know what she was up to until long after it was done. But she has, and there's been others that successfully have been able to get through it. More than likely today, you won't get through it as much as you could cause what we call an inconclusive, whereas we're not going to be able to make a determination based on the results.

Okay. Is that why we hear about – is polygraph allowed in the courtroom as court testimony in some states and not others or nowhere? Yeah.

It's actually allowed in a lot of places, but it depends. So generally what has to happen, if you're going to use it in a criminal case, the prosecutor and defense attorney have to stipulate in advance before the polygraph is even given that we're going to admit the results no matter what the results are. Now, if you're a gambler, you might want to do that. I had a polygraph I ran once for a defense attorney. He wanted to know how to defend his client. That was a bad decision because she originally stated it was battered spouse syndrome is the reason she killed her husband. In reality, it was premeditated and she confessed after the polygraph. Remember, polygraph examiners are not just operators of a machine. They're also interrogators. You have to be able to get the truth. That was my next question.

How much is intuitive and then what you're seeing and hearing?

Yeah, if you see the deception on the chart, we've got to figure out what's behind it. I had one example where a kid was 18 years old applying for a job at a police department in a clerical position. He had a high response to one question, deception indicator we call that. What could an 18-year-old kid have done that's bad? Smoke marijuana, steal a car, whatever. End result, fast forward, is actually he was part of the mob family. He carried $3,000 to a cafe, paid Hitman to knock somebody off with the instructions of his family. Who would have expected this would come out? But when we have deception indicated on a chart, we have to find out what's behind it. And that's when it rolls into a structured, let's call it an interrogation, even though we don't like to use that term anymore. So that one, in that case, it took you higher up the ladder than you thought you were even going to go. Absolutely. This kid was applying for a job, and you never know what a person's done in their past. That's just one example, and I have hundreds of them.

Okay, well, I want to hear the other hundreds of them when they come back. This is fascinating to me, and I hope, I'm sure, to our listeners as well. Again, our guest today, from Emory Riddle University, Alan Zaquella, and we'll be back to Countywide right after this.

Life changes, then it changes again. Predicting the unexpected in life is impossible. That's why it's called unexpected. So when it comes to financial goals, our philosophy is don't predict, prepare. Hi, I'm Edward Jones Financial Advisor, Matthias Sandoval. A job loss, change in health, or a loss of a loved one can have a big impact on your family's financial security. Let's work together to help make sure you're equipped for life's unexpected events. Call our office to schedule a face-to-face appointment. Edward Jones, making sense of investing. Member SIPC.

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Thank you so very much for your generosity and kindness in helping others. I hope that you take advantage of the many Arizona state tax credits available when giving to qualified charities and schools. If you haven't taken advantage, I hope you'll ask your favorite charity if they qualify. You can go to Arizona Department of Revenue website, search for tax credits, and look at the list of qualifying charities. Then look at your latest Arizona income tax return and see how an Arizona tax credit can benefit many. This is Lewis saying thanks again.

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We welcome you back to the program. Again, countywide, I'm Brad Miller, Alan Sequella, our guest at Emory Riddle University, and talking today about his experience with polygraph. What do you call it, polygraph director, polygraph?

We're examiner, polygraph examiner.

Okay, simple enough. I love these examples. I think this is fun, and it kind of shows how it kind of works. A little bit more about the courts, when things are allowed and kind of when they're not. Does it depend on what? Or is it simple different state and jurisdictions?

Well, it's primarily actually whether the two sides in a criminal case want to admit it. Really? You have to agree. Yeah. And some states have also said, no, we're not going to use it. In addition, there is other regulation for polygraph. It's called the Polygraph Protection Act of 1989, in which private employers cannot use it anymore. So historically in the past, you could have used it. Today, you only see it used in government, law enforcement, intelligence agencies. Although, interestingly enough, it's being used in bass tournaments, and bodybuilders have to take them to make sure they're not drugging. Bass tournament, the winner has to take a polygraph to make sure he wasn't cheating, maybe kept the bass from the night before, put some weights in it, whatever. So you can still use it. Priorities. Even domestically, I've been called by a cheating spouse. My spouse said she'd stay with me if I passed the polygraph. Well, you know what? No one's going to win in that particular case. Did you take the assignment? Never. I would never take an assignment. There's no winners there.

Is that a case of I've seen too much TV, perhaps? Or would that perhaps have unveiled some of the Issues in their marriage. You leave that one unsettled.

Well, you know, I'm never going to know because I've never done it. You know, today I only run demonstrations. So, you know, I've done it for Boy Scouts. I do it at the university every semester. I have one this Thursday. And I've actually gone to probably the most fun polygraph, I would say, that I've ever run was at a bachelorette party. This was a very wealthy family, and they brought in entertainers. So they brought in a magician, they brought in a card dealer, a palm reader, and a polygraph examiner. So the girls would come in, I'd hook them up and let them ask the questions. And I gave, I used the old analog system where they could go home with the chart.

Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. Great.

It started getting a little hairy when I started spilling beer. I was afraid they were going to short out my polygraph instrument. That would not have been very fun. So this was just for fun. Strictly fun.

Yeah. All right. Well, it's fascinating. I meant to ask you a little bit, given your experience and what you've gathered, ability, When you're interrogating someone, when you're just sitting and talking, forget the polygraph machine. You've got to have a sense developed over time with experience and your knowledge about someone lying or not, even without the polygraph and all the... That's a very good question.

I bring this up in the class I teach at Embry-Riddle. I teach a class called Interview and Interrogation. And we teach the students how to interpret verbal and nonverbal signs of deception. I let them watch a video of five suspects being interviewed. I say, go ahead and use this checklist and tell me who did it. Of course, there's a 20% chance of getting it right because there's five. Nobody gets it right. And if they do, they don't know why. Six weeks later, they get to see the video again, not knowing who it was. And now they can pick that person out. So the answer is yes. Usually within the first three minutes of interviewing someone, I know whether I got the right person or not. Now it's a matter of getting them to tell me they did it. So any trained interrogator knows by looking at the verbal signs, nonverbal signs, vocalizations, your pitch changes, some of those microexpressions. Remember I mentioned on the polygraph you have the autonomic nervous system that controls. When you go into a the fight or flight, you can physically see some of that. Your pupils dilate, you stop producing saliva, you may have a heart rate that you can see on the person's shirt, or you can see the jugular about to jump out of their neck. So you're looking at a lot of that, plus, again, how they're responding. So yes, once I gave up polygraph and went into the private sector, I had to now rely on my ability to know when a person's not truthful and whether to push forward or not. And of course, that's when I got to be even better at doing interrogations without the polygraph. Once I put that aside, now I don't have that crutch. Now I have to do it without. So yes, over time, interrogators and investigators, whether it be in government or law enforcement, they get very good at their craft because they've done so many of these. Did you ever get one really wrong? Yes. I mean, a polygraph or an interrogation?

Either way. Just what pops into your head when I ask it.

I had a polygraph where I actually should have called the person inconclusive. In other words, there wasn't a significant difference in irrelevant and controlled questions. I should have called him inconclusive. But I passed him because it was a pre-employment. He actually won a blade or steel, an 18-wheeler, and driving across the country, got arrested somewhere else. And then when I was called out from my supervisor, he said, Sequoia, you shouldn't have passed this guy. It was an inconclusive at best. Last polygraph of the day, I was tired. Human. Yeah. That stuck with me. So, you know, when you're tired, you really should take a break and maybe have another examiner look at it. And that's pretty much quality control. Right. As far as interrogations, yeah, sometimes you get the wrong person. And one of the things you don't ever want to do is get a forced or coerced confession. There's been times people have confessed to crimes they did not commit. The last thing we want to do is send someone to prison for a crime they did not commit. And so I've never had one of those, but I have had the polygraph. I mean, you don't want to, again, make a mistake with someone's life.

Right. Can you pick up on that? It sounds like it's quite rare that that kind of thing happens where somebody says that it shouldn't even be in the room.

Yeah. Well, generally what happens with an innocent person, for the most part, they get stronger in their denials as the interrogation persists. Okay. Because they didn't do it. They're going to get stronger than now. They're going to interrupt the interrogator more. And really, a trained interrogator should see that. And I've seen that where I've gotten into an interrogation and the suspect, who turns out to not be the suspect, who's an innocent person at the wrong place at the wrong time. Yes, so I know something's up here. Okay, something's not jiving. Then you have to back out of it and go back to your investigator and say, hey, we need to dig and look in another direction. So, yes.

Have you ever had, say, law enforcement or the lead agency come to you and say, maybe you clear someone, and they're like, whoa, we were leaning on this guy to put this case together. You're telling us he didn't do it or she didn't do exactly what we said? Have you ever kind of broken that up?

Yes, and I will tell you, that's one of the things that when I went to polygraph school, day one they said, how many of you have high blood pressure or ulcers? And a couple rose their hand. They said, if you stay in this field, you're going to have both high blood pressure and ulcers because there is that pressure. So, yes, I've had that pressure come down. I'm going to give you the suspect. You need to tell me he's dirty before I even put him on a polygraph. I go, no, I'll tell you what the results are. I can't tell you anything else. So, yes, there's been discussions where I have to clear somebody. This is not our guy. You need to look in another direction.

Wow. Fascinating stuff. All right. Again, we need to take a short break. We'll come back and again wrap it up. Alan Sequela, Assistant Professor Embry-Riddle. Fascinating. Talking about his experience as a polygraph examiner this morning. Countywide, we're back after this.

Life changes, then it changes again. Predicting the unexpected in life is impossible. That's why it's called unexpected. So when it comes to financial goals, our philosophy is don't predict, prepare. Hi, I'm Edward Jones Financial Advisor, Matthias Sandoval. A job loss, change in health, or a loss of a loved one can have a big impact on your family's financial security. Let's work together to help make sure you're equipped for life's unexpected events. Call our office to schedule a face-to-face appointment. Edward Jones, making sense of investing. Member SIPC.

Verdi-Solaire, your hometown heating, air conditioning, and plumbing company in the Verdi Valley, and your trusted north-central Arizona Goodman dealer. Goodman is a name you can trust with the revolutionary ComfortBridge technology factory installed into select Goodman gas furnaces and air handlers to ensure the entire system operates at peak energy-efficient performance. Verdi-Solaire offers free in-home estimates, locally owned and operated since 1983. Visit them at VerdiSolaire.com. Better. Cleaner. Faster.

Thank you so very much for your generosity and kindness in helping others. I hope that you take advantage of the many Arizona state tax credits available when giving to qualified charities and schools. If you haven't taken advantage, I hope you'll ask your favorite charity if they qualify. You can go to Arizona Department of Revenue website, search for tax credits, and look at the list of qualifying charities. Then look at your latest Arizona income tax return and see how an Arizona tax credit can benefit many. This is Lewis saying thanks again.

As the days get shorter and the nights cooler, make sure your future is wrapped in the right protection. Jonna Randall Murdoch, your local Farm Bureau agent, is ready to help you simplify and protect what matters most. Your home, your car, your life, and your future. Jonna offers competitive pricing with a relationship-first approach that puts you at the center of every decision. Call Jonna Randall Murdoch today at 928-649-8686, located on Villa Drive in Cottonwood. Farm Bureau Financial Services. It's your future. Let's protect it.

And we welcome you back to Countywide. I'm Brad Miller. Alan Sequella is our guest today, and I want to thank you.

This has been just absolutely fascinating. I could sit here and talk to you all day.

Final kind of thing, you mentioned your family, man. You ever have teenagers growing up in your house? Boy, would I hate it to have been one of them. Yeah, yeah, a daughter. Oh, that poor thing. Absolutely.

Did she ever try to get one past that? Well, she brought home a boyfriend. Oh, God. She brought home the boyfriend. You know, like most law enforcement would be out there cleaning the gun. Instead, I actually pulled out the polygraph. Yeah. Pulled it out, opened it up on the table.

Did he know what you did before he got there? He showed up.

He said, come on in. Meet Dad. I opened it up. My daughter turned as red as an American flag. My wife didn't talk to me for a week. And I said to the son, I said, hey, son, you know what this is? His eyes got real big and he said, it looks like a lie detector. I said, it is. Don't let me put you on it. And I closed it and I walked away. That's all I had to say. It worked because they broke up a couple weeks later.

There you go. There you go. Did you have a bad vibe about this guy or just a joke? No, it was a joke.

He's a high school boyfriend. They're not going to stick it out. That's funny.

That's real funny. All right. Well, that aside, the other good work you do, we do appreciate, I know, on behalf of folks trying to keep their security together, whether they're Fortune 500 or just somebody at home or whomever it is. That's good stuff. And working with probably a lot of young people at Embry-Riddle, getting them prepared to go out and continue in this world that's only going to get more complicated and probably more susceptible to cybercrime, high-tech crime, and those kinds of things. And you're one of those that's teaching them to fight that.

Yeah, you know, Brad, it's exciting because they're coming into a time when AI and other technologies are advancing. They're going to have great tools. While others are afraid of AI, I think the intelligence and law enforcement fields are very excited about it because they're going to be using a lot of the cool tools that are coming from it. And these students that are graduating from Embry-Riddle are taking on really cool jobs. And if it's not the government, they're going to Raytheon or some of these other aerospace or defense industries, and they're doing some pretty neat things. Excellent.

All right. Well, sounds great, Alan. Thank you again so much. It is Countywide. I'm Brad Miller, and we'll see you next time.

This has been Countywide. Listen in each Tuesday and Thursday at this time. If you have a topic or guest idea that you'd like to suggest, email us, news at myradioplace.com.

Bye.