A while back www.lobbyistsofficesofgrw.com reported that the parents of baby lisa irwin had agreed, then disagreed, then agreed to allow baby lisa irwin’s brothers to be questioned by a forensic expert.
Forensic Child Interview
This is a non-pressure interview that will be video-taped by the police. It may be that the boys will have a Guardian Ad Litem by this time; a court appointed attorney who takes no position in the case, other than the best interest of the boys. 1. What is a forensic interview? 2. Who conducts it? 3. How long is it? 4. Who can be present for it? 5. What information are police looking for? 6. Child responsibilities (parentification) 1. What is a child forensic interview? A child forensic interview is one in which a child is permitted to communicate (and being communicated to) via other means than only speaking. The interview can now include picture drawings, letters, toys, and other means of not only communicating, but drawing out responses of children in a low key environment. 2. Who will conduct the interview? A forensic interview would likely be conducting by either a trained social worker, or an officer trained (and gifted) in child interviews. In this case, reports are that it is a LSW (licensed social worker) experienced in child interviews.
Child protective service workers end up with a great deal of interviewing experience as each report of abuse received will have anywhere from 6 to 15 interviews; including child, siblings, mother, father, grandparents, teachers, pediatrician, and anyone else in the home or connected to the child in question. The average child protective worker will get a minimum of 2 reports to investigate or “assess” in a week; week after week, month after month. Overworked CPS workers often see 10-14 reports a month. There is a high burn out rate due to secondary trauma and work load, with many lasting less than 2 years on the job before moving to another position in child welfare. Whoever this social worker is, he or she will be under heavy scrutiny as the video recording will be dissected for the slightest hint of a leading question. 3. How long will the interview take? The interview length is dictated by the child and his interest.
Much time is spent rapport building, talking about favorite TV shows, sports, music, and so on.
The interviewer is especially trained in avoiding introducing new language to the child (which is a skill for adult interviews as well) and asks open ended questions so that the child is not led to anything.
With leading questions a child will admit to just about anything, as they are highly susceptible to suggestion.
The interview will be video taped and scrutinized by the lawyers and experts. The lawyers, particularly, will look to pick apart anything they can in order to ‘reinterpret’ answers most favorable to their clients.
Some children will go on for 2 hours; enjoying talking, while other children will fade away in just a few minutes; the children dictate, for the most part, the length of the interview. 4.
Regarding who can be present, no matter who it is, they must be seated in a way of which they do not make eye contact with the child, to coach or lead a child via face expressions or cues.
In this case, a Guardian Ad Litem may be present, or a counselor, therapist, or someone of whom the child feels comfortable with. It is possible, depending upon the child, that no person will sit in on the interview. Whoever does sit in (if they have someone sit in) will be the target of a defense attorney unafraid to falsely accuse. 5.
What information are police looking for? The interviewer (either for police or police) will be seeking to learn what the boys heard and what they may have seen.
There may a distinct change in scope since the initial contacts with the boys, as the investigation has narrowed greatly with the failed polygraph, alcohol, and change of time line.
Deborah has already told us that they heard something, and police will be using new information to ask questions to learn: a. Where did they sleep b. Did they get up at night c. What did the parents say to them d. What was mother drinking. e. How mother and father get along f. Who was in the house Police will be on the alert for force-fed information from the parents; that is parental coaching. Children who are coached will often use language that is not age appropriate. They will also have an absence of sensory language descriptions as it is not associated with memory. Children are notorious for tattling on parents. When a child is pressured by the parent, it does not take long to get to the truth: see the Balloon boy vomiting on television. The more that parents tell their children that it is a “family secret” or “don’t tell anyone!”, the more children will tell. Alcohol is a part of this case and children often say, for wine, ‘blue soda’ or “mommy’s special drink” and can give incredible details of what an intoxicated parent looks like. Children will often count how many drinks a parent has; completely unknown to the parent. Children of alcoholics are often parentified; caring for mommy, cleaning up vomit, putting mommy to bed, making breakfast for the younger child, and so on. Police know much more now than they did a month ago.
Children have often described “Mommy’s special pills” or “Mommy’s nice pills” and describe how nice their mother becomes after taking pills. Children will mimic IV drug users with pencils.
Children will show workers where mommy or daddy hides drugs, including food cabinets, beneath rice containers, and so on. Whatever a parent does, the child repeats.
Just about every abhorrent behavior by a parent will be described by a child. If there was another man in the home, a child will talk about him and if there was any romantic contact, the child could take two dolls and demonstrate what ‘mommy and special man’ were doing, if this is the case.
The interview will focus on mother’s demeanor, how she disciplines. This begins with questions about house rules and what happens when the rules are broken, and often, once a child begins to talk, the child will tell every detail he was told not to tell, and will emotionally feel much better having done. Abusive parents poison their children with family “secrets” and cause low level, chronic anxiety by pressing them not to tell or “Mommy will get in trouble”, or the more common and disturbing, “that State lady will take you away from Mommy”. When a substance abusing mother receives welfare benefits for the child, she will go to ungodly levels of putting fear within a child to keep the child quiet, including terrible stories of abusive foster homes but especially “they will take you away from me and put me in jail.”
We now know much more about the damaged relationship between Jeremy Irwin and Deborah Bradley, including substance abuse, history of drama, triangulations, Lisa being the ‘glue’ to hold them together, Deborah’s use of sexual inappropriate behaviors with neighbors. They will focus upon domestic violence, and upon mother’s temper issues, as I believe that police think that Deborah Bradley violently shook or threw Lisa to the floor and invented a foolish kidnapping story to cover her crime. I think the alcohol “confession” was the brainchild of the attorneys and private investigator, as they are covering all their bases.
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This interview will likely show up in the Grand Jury and help police to continue to make the case that Deborah Bradley killed her child, and Jeremy Irwin is lying for her.
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