The Consequences and Constitutionality of Training Police to Blame Victims

Abstract

A common technique in American interrogations is “moral minimization,” in which investigators excuse or justify the suspect’s criminal behavior on moral grounds. A surprising type of moral minimization is explicit victim-blaming, which includes blaming the victim by endorsing negative stereotypes on the basis of gender, race, religion, or sexual orientation, what we call victim-blaming-by-stereotype. No one has previously considered the policy wisdom or constitutionality of this technique. We explore the unintended consequences. One cost is the secondary victimization of those who suffer from crime, especially when they discover how detectives have disparaged them. The second is the effect on the interrogators. Using the economic concept of self-selection and psychological theories of persuasion, we explain why the training and practice in the pretense of victim-blaming produces a detective cadre that is more likely to actually blame victims. Victim-blaming detectives are less likely to effectively investigate crime. Finally, we consider constitutional objections to victim-blaming-by-stereotype. The practice does not plausibly violate the suspect’s Due Process or Miranda rights—the constitutional challenges that commonly garner the most attention among scholars of interrogation—but it plausibly violates the equal protection rights of the victim.

Keywords: Interrogation, police, victim-blaming, equal protection