SENDING CHARACTERS TO THERAPY, EX-COP AT A MURDER SCENE, AND PROVOKING A SUSPECT - 018
TRANSCRIPT:
This week on the Writer's Detective Bureau, sending your characters to therapy, ex-cop at a murder scene, and provoking a suspect in an interview. I'm Adam Richardson and this is the Writer's Detective Bureau.
Welcome to episode 18 of the Writer's Detective Bureau, the podcast dedicated to helping authors and screenwriters write professional quality crime-related fiction. Recently, Joanna Penn was talking about Patreon on the Creative Penn podcast. She said, "I think patronage is one of the most powerful things that you can do to support creators that you want to continue hearing from. It's one of those ways that you can support people and encourage them to do the things that are either useful to you or just putting good stuff in the world." Regardless of whether you support me on Patreon, I absolutely think you, as a creator of stories, should look into setting up your own Patreon account. You can learn more at Writersdetective.com/patreon.
This Thanksgiving I was definitely thankful for my patrons, Joan Raymond, Guy Alton, Natasha Bajema, Natalie Barelli, Joe Trent, Siobhan Pope, Leah Cutter, and Ryan Kinmil for helping me keep the lights on in the Bureau. You can find links to their author websites in the show notes by going to writersdetective.com/18.
Welcome to episode 18 of the Writer's Detective Bureau, the podcast dedicated to helping authors and screenwriters write professional quality crime-related fiction. Recently, Joanna Penn was talking about Patreon on the Creative Penn podcast. She said, "I think patronage is one of the most powerful things that you can do to support creators that you want to continue hearing from. It's one of those ways that you can support people and encourage them to do the things that are either useful to you or just putting good stuff in the world." Regardless of whether you support me on Patreon, I absolutely think you, as a creator of stories, should look into setting up your own Patreon account. You can learn more at Writersdetective.com/patreon.
This Thanksgiving I was definitely thankful for my patrons, Joan Raymond, Guy Alton, Natasha Bajema, Natalie Barelli, Joe Trent, Siobhan Pope, Leah Cutter, and Ryan Kinmil for helping me keep the lights on in the Bureau. You can find links to their author websites in the show notes by going to writersdetective.com/18.
I'm on the road this week and currently recording in my hotel room. While spending many hours alone driving, I was listening to Kick Ass with Mel Robbins on Audible. And I know this is the second time Mel Robbins' audiobooks have been mentioned, so I'm running the risk of sounding like a fanboy. But Kick Ass with Mel Robbins really got me thinking about character creation. So this audiobook has Mel essentially doing a therapy-type session with a few selected fans to identify what's holding each of them back in life.
And they try to figure out how to deal with that and how to develop a plan to move forward. But in that process, they also talk about the consequences of continuing to carry on without addressing those problems as well. So to step back, I think we can all agree, you know, regardless of whether you've studied psychology or not that the first twelve or so years of your life will affect your personality, your outlook on life, and your psychological makeup more than other period or accomplishments in your life. And how you respond to those events, whether those were big or small, good or bad, will determine your future and your character and even your daily habits.
I was recently helping a screenwriting team with making their cop characters more realistic, less of a cookie cutter cop stereotype that we see so often in TV and movies, what I like to call a Michael Mann's man. You know, Sonny Crockett, Miami Vice. Or Lt. Vincent Hannah in the movie Heat. Don't get me wrong. I love Michael Mann's stories and characters and they probably had way more influence on how I lived my life personally than they should have. But if you're going to get away from stereotypes which exist by the way, because there is truth to them. But if you're going to get away from those, you want to make your characters relatable to the reader or viewer.
So speaking as the reader or viewer, since I'm not the writer in this equation, I want to relate to them. And I'll relate to them when I see my life's struggles or those quirky moments reflected back at me. Now, I'm not saying you need to detour your story to create some kind of character development montage or anything, you know, that's stupid. But going back to the kind of quasi-therapy sessions that Mel Robbins had in that audiobook I was talking about a minute ago, I think we can create some really interesting, really relatable characters by crafting them with them their childhoods in mind.
Now, those childhoods aren't for the story, they're for you, the creator of their world, to know and to extrapolate from. So start asking questions of each character that you're trying to formulate for your story. What was each character's life like from birth until about twelve? What happened to them? What did those events do to their character? And I'm talking about good things and bad things. It could be, you know, what were the ramifications of growing up with both loving parents in the home? That will certainly affect the way that that person, that character, communicates or loves. Or did having both parents in the home create this need to walk on eggshells around people? Or are they repeating those kind of love cycles that they witnessed as a kid?
So how are those events affecting the way your character now lives? How do those events inform the way this character interacts with other people? What about people in a position of authority? Or with people subordinate or people that they perceive as subordinate to them? How about members of the opposite sex or of the same sex? Ask yourself what does your character fear most? Now, if your first reaction is to say that he or she doesn't fear anything, you know, because they're some sort Navy SEAL, Rambo, Ninja Turtle with a better, I don't know, chakra alignment than the Dalai Lama, then your characters is most definitely compensating for something. What is it? What drove them to be all of these amazing things?
Better than what your character fears most, what is your character's most irrational fear? Do they love themselves? Do they think they're unworthy of something specific? How does that translate into the way that they communicate? Do they have a chip on their shoulder or are they a people pleaser when they should be making a stand? What would it sound like if you sent your characters into therapy? Write that down. Of course, I'm not the character creation expert here. I'm just throwing some questions out.
I would love to know your favorite character creation hacks. And you can send them to me at writersdetective.com/podcast because I would love to hear what works for you.
And they try to figure out how to deal with that and how to develop a plan to move forward. But in that process, they also talk about the consequences of continuing to carry on without addressing those problems as well. So to step back, I think we can all agree, you know, regardless of whether you've studied psychology or not that the first twelve or so years of your life will affect your personality, your outlook on life, and your psychological makeup more than other period or accomplishments in your life. And how you respond to those events, whether those were big or small, good or bad, will determine your future and your character and even your daily habits.
I was recently helping a screenwriting team with making their cop characters more realistic, less of a cookie cutter cop stereotype that we see so often in TV and movies, what I like to call a Michael Mann's man. You know, Sonny Crockett, Miami Vice. Or Lt. Vincent Hannah in the movie Heat. Don't get me wrong. I love Michael Mann's stories and characters and they probably had way more influence on how I lived my life personally than they should have. But if you're going to get away from stereotypes which exist by the way, because there is truth to them. But if you're going to get away from those, you want to make your characters relatable to the reader or viewer.
So speaking as the reader or viewer, since I'm not the writer in this equation, I want to relate to them. And I'll relate to them when I see my life's struggles or those quirky moments reflected back at me. Now, I'm not saying you need to detour your story to create some kind of character development montage or anything, you know, that's stupid. But going back to the kind of quasi-therapy sessions that Mel Robbins had in that audiobook I was talking about a minute ago, I think we can create some really interesting, really relatable characters by crafting them with them their childhoods in mind.
Now, those childhoods aren't for the story, they're for you, the creator of their world, to know and to extrapolate from. So start asking questions of each character that you're trying to formulate for your story. What was each character's life like from birth until about twelve? What happened to them? What did those events do to their character? And I'm talking about good things and bad things. It could be, you know, what were the ramifications of growing up with both loving parents in the home? That will certainly affect the way that that person, that character, communicates or loves. Or did having both parents in the home create this need to walk on eggshells around people? Or are they repeating those kind of love cycles that they witnessed as a kid?
So how are those events affecting the way your character now lives? How do those events inform the way this character interacts with other people? What about people in a position of authority? Or with people subordinate or people that they perceive as subordinate to them? How about members of the opposite sex or of the same sex? Ask yourself what does your character fear most? Now, if your first reaction is to say that he or she doesn't fear anything, you know, because they're some sort Navy SEAL, Rambo, Ninja Turtle with a better, I don't know, chakra alignment than the Dalai Lama, then your characters is most definitely compensating for something. What is it? What drove them to be all of these amazing things?
Better than what your character fears most, what is your character's most irrational fear? Do they love themselves? Do they think they're unworthy of something specific? How does that translate into the way that they communicate? Do they have a chip on their shoulder or are they a people pleaser when they should be making a stand? What would it sound like if you sent your characters into therapy? Write that down. Of course, I'm not the character creation expert here. I'm just throwing some questions out.
I would love to know your favorite character creation hacks. And you can send them to me at writersdetective.com/podcast because I would love to hear what works for you.
This week's first question comes from K.A Lugo at jackslaughterthrillers.com. K.A asks, "If a troubled ex-cop is discovered over a dead body with blood on him and his prints found on the weapon, would he be taken into custody and questioned downtown? Or would he just be questioned on site and released pending the results of a full investigation? Love your podcasts, K.A Lugo."
Well, thank you, K.A. I really appreciate it. And I know exactly who we're talking about here because I read the book. So definitely check out her website at jackslaughterthrillers.com. The simple answer here is oh, he is most definitely going downtown. We wouldn't necessarily know that his prints were found on the weapon as we roll up to the scene, but anybody standing over a dead body with blood and a weapon in hand is definitely going to be questioned. There's not, you know, your badge is not going to get you out of having to take a trip and go sit in an interview room for a few hours to give some answers.
And the reason I wanted to touch on this topic is because being present at a murder scene, or a dead body scene is certainly something worthy of investigation. And having a badge in your pocket or a former, you know, a retirement badge or an ex-cop's badge, whatever it is, that position does not alleviate you from the responsibilities of being in that position. And so I guess what I'm trying to say is even when ... Let's say this cop is actually on duty and he kills somebody. Or it is perceived, you know? Somebody else kills somebody but there's part of an investigation where you have to determine what happened and whether or not this officer or now, an ex-officer, in this scenario is involved.
There is definitely a homicide investigation that's going to occur. When we're talking about an officer-involved shooting where there's the typical uniformed police officer gets in a shooting with a bad guy, there are two investigations that happen. There's obviously the investigation to find out what happened and whether this was within policy. And you know, whether it was a good shooting or not. But there is a criminal investigation, no different than if anybody else shot somebody. So if the officer shoots and kills somebody, there's the administrative investigation, like I just mentioned. But there is a literal murder or homicide investigation where the shooter is the cop and the bad guy is the victim.
They may not word it that way, but that is the exact same intent. And in California, there is a penal code section for justifiable homicide and it's right in there along with manslaughter or second degree murder or first degree murder. So the ruling of what happened comes from that investigation. And then essentially, the exoneration comes or the lack of a prosecution comes because the circumstances reveal that the shooting was a justifiable homicide.
So in this scenario, the troubled ex-cop ... I mean, first of all, he's troubled so that should be a flag anyway. But even if the officers knew Jack, you know, Jack Slaughter rolling up on the scene, they would be in the same situation as officers that arrived at a scene with a uniformed officer. And so everything is going to go through the normal procedures of taking witness statements, interviewing the shooter, or interviewing the suspect or in this case, interviewing you know. They don't know if he's a witness or not, but it's going to be a long night for Jack. I'll put it that way. He's going to be in that room for quite a few hours answering all sorts of questions.
He's not going to be in a position to be able to hold things back. I know Jack as a character is a former cop who's now turned private investigator but he's going to have a hard time keeping anything in his P.I case private from that point because it's going to have everything that he ... Everything that he did that brought him to that scene is going to have to be laid out just for the simple fact of finding the truth of what happened and then also to keep him out of jail from looking as if he is the murderer. Thank you so much for your question, K.A. And you can find her website at jackslaugherthrillers.com.
Well, thank you, K.A. I really appreciate it. And I know exactly who we're talking about here because I read the book. So definitely check out her website at jackslaughterthrillers.com. The simple answer here is oh, he is most definitely going downtown. We wouldn't necessarily know that his prints were found on the weapon as we roll up to the scene, but anybody standing over a dead body with blood and a weapon in hand is definitely going to be questioned. There's not, you know, your badge is not going to get you out of having to take a trip and go sit in an interview room for a few hours to give some answers.
And the reason I wanted to touch on this topic is because being present at a murder scene, or a dead body scene is certainly something worthy of investigation. And having a badge in your pocket or a former, you know, a retirement badge or an ex-cop's badge, whatever it is, that position does not alleviate you from the responsibilities of being in that position. And so I guess what I'm trying to say is even when ... Let's say this cop is actually on duty and he kills somebody. Or it is perceived, you know? Somebody else kills somebody but there's part of an investigation where you have to determine what happened and whether or not this officer or now, an ex-officer, in this scenario is involved.
There is definitely a homicide investigation that's going to occur. When we're talking about an officer-involved shooting where there's the typical uniformed police officer gets in a shooting with a bad guy, there are two investigations that happen. There's obviously the investigation to find out what happened and whether this was within policy. And you know, whether it was a good shooting or not. But there is a criminal investigation, no different than if anybody else shot somebody. So if the officer shoots and kills somebody, there's the administrative investigation, like I just mentioned. But there is a literal murder or homicide investigation where the shooter is the cop and the bad guy is the victim.
They may not word it that way, but that is the exact same intent. And in California, there is a penal code section for justifiable homicide and it's right in there along with manslaughter or second degree murder or first degree murder. So the ruling of what happened comes from that investigation. And then essentially, the exoneration comes or the lack of a prosecution comes because the circumstances reveal that the shooting was a justifiable homicide.
So in this scenario, the troubled ex-cop ... I mean, first of all, he's troubled so that should be a flag anyway. But even if the officers knew Jack, you know, Jack Slaughter rolling up on the scene, they would be in the same situation as officers that arrived at a scene with a uniformed officer. And so everything is going to go through the normal procedures of taking witness statements, interviewing the shooter, or interviewing the suspect or in this case, interviewing you know. They don't know if he's a witness or not, but it's going to be a long night for Jack. I'll put it that way. He's going to be in that room for quite a few hours answering all sorts of questions.
He's not going to be in a position to be able to hold things back. I know Jack as a character is a former cop who's now turned private investigator but he's going to have a hard time keeping anything in his P.I case private from that point because it's going to have everything that he ... Everything that he did that brought him to that scene is going to have to be laid out just for the simple fact of finding the truth of what happened and then also to keep him out of jail from looking as if he is the murderer. Thank you so much for your question, K.A. And you can find her website at jackslaugherthrillers.com.
This week's next question comes from our familiar friend, Guy Alton. Guy writes, "I love reading detectives like Harry Bosch and Lucas Davenport. And one of their investigative go-tos seems to be goading their suspect into acting foolishly. For example, their gut feeling is that man they're interviewing is their perpetrator, so they intentionally offend them so as to draw an attack on them to justify further investigation. Does this interview technique work often in the real world?"
The simple answer is no. In this scenario, it sounds as if they're conducting this interview not sure if this is their suspect and hoping this provocation will cause an outburst. More often than not, I actually, I mean as far as a trope goes, I tend to see the provocation stuff happening more in scenes where the suspect is actually a defendant that has decided to take the witness stand. The provocation comes from an attorney trying to provoke that reaction, so that way, the jury gets to see that this person has this other side to their personality.
There are a lot of different methods when we're talking about an interview or an interrogation to try to get a suspect to be forthright with the, either making an admission or making a statement. But we're not really looking for a reaction. We're looking for facts going back, I know I've talked about this before, but we're looking for information that we can use to essentially stick to a timeline and then have it be a fact that we can either prove or disprove. So the emotions aren't going to prove that somebody is guilty of a crime. And in fact, the emotional outburst or that provocation may actually indicate that they're innocent.
I've very often said that it's really easy to spot, especially as a cop, it's really easy to spot when somebody's lying. But it is really tough to spot when somebody's telling the truth. So one of those basic ways of doing that is when you confront somebody on it, if they're getting louder and louder and more defiant, and saying, you know, shut the hell up. You can't talk to me this way. And you know, let's say it's something really egregious like you killed your spouse or you sexually assaulted your own child. If a cop was saying that to me and I truthfully was innocent, I would want to be throwing that cop through the window. And I would be getting louder and louder, and louder and more aggressive, and more provoked.
So provoking a suspect is not going to one, indicate to me that this person is guilty. And two, is not doing anything to help me prove my case. So what we're really doing is trying to come up with psychological ways of getting this person to talk to us. So the strategy you use is based off of how you perceive the suspect, or your perception of how the suspect sees you. So if they're going to underestimate me, if that suspect thinks he's smarter than me, thinks he can talk his way out of this because I'm an idiot compared to him, I'm going to walk in there okey-dokey, just like, you know, Columbo and treat him like he's Hannibal Lecter. Like he's the smartest guy, the most mastermind criminal. And I'm going to, you know, flatter him and teach me your ways because I need to be better at my job and stroke his ego to get him to talk.
Now, that's a very different type of personality that will react to that than somebody who will react to the, you know, what they call the good cop/bad cop routine where one officer is building the rapport and being the friend. You know, I may not have sympathy but I'll have empathy. I can pretend to have sympathy, but I can be empathetic and I can get somebody to really believe that I'm not passing judgment on them. And my partner can be the asshole. Now, that doesn't mean that there's a threat of violence there, but it's that psychological fear of there's this bad guy that really wants to just throw me in jail and not hear my side of the story. But this other cop is not passing judgment on me.
I mean, I can't tell you how many years in prison people are spending because I have the ability to sit across from a child molester and not strangle him or not appear liked I want to strangle him. And be the one person in their life that understands. That understands that this little boy turned you on and that you think that it's this little boy's fault that all of this happened because he knew what he was doing. Now this is some really sick kind of thinking. But a lot of times that is the way that these child molester suspects are thinking.
And when you're sitting across from a detective who is not passing judgment on you, who is saying that they understand, it's all of a sudden here's the one person that I can confess all of these things that have happened to. Now, unfortunately, that one person is recording it and is going to play it for a jury. But in that moment, it's a relief. To play that, you know, to use that kind of psychological rapport-building with a person is again, another completely different strategy.
And as you go through the different kind of strategies that we can use, none of them really revolve around provoking somebody into anger, because all that's really going to do is get them to shut up. And then when they've stopped talking, we've lost that resource of being able to plug the things that that person says into our timeline. When we plug them into the timeline, whether they're the truth or not, it's something we can go back and prove, say, you know, this person was at this place or he wasn't at this place at this date and time. Or that he had these interactions, or that these thing were said. Or they were interactions with these people.
So it's really important to understand that the emotion of a situation is not going to prove a case. Thank you so much for the question, Guy. I really appreciate it and I appreciate you for being a patron.
So that's a wrap for episode 18 while I'm on the road. If you have questions for me to answer, send them in the forum that you'll find at writersdetective.com/podcast and I'll do my best to get them answered for you on an upcoming episode. Thanks again for listening. Write well.
The simple answer is no. In this scenario, it sounds as if they're conducting this interview not sure if this is their suspect and hoping this provocation will cause an outburst. More often than not, I actually, I mean as far as a trope goes, I tend to see the provocation stuff happening more in scenes where the suspect is actually a defendant that has decided to take the witness stand. The provocation comes from an attorney trying to provoke that reaction, so that way, the jury gets to see that this person has this other side to their personality.
There are a lot of different methods when we're talking about an interview or an interrogation to try to get a suspect to be forthright with the, either making an admission or making a statement. But we're not really looking for a reaction. We're looking for facts going back, I know I've talked about this before, but we're looking for information that we can use to essentially stick to a timeline and then have it be a fact that we can either prove or disprove. So the emotions aren't going to prove that somebody is guilty of a crime. And in fact, the emotional outburst or that provocation may actually indicate that they're innocent.
I've very often said that it's really easy to spot, especially as a cop, it's really easy to spot when somebody's lying. But it is really tough to spot when somebody's telling the truth. So one of those basic ways of doing that is when you confront somebody on it, if they're getting louder and louder and more defiant, and saying, you know, shut the hell up. You can't talk to me this way. And you know, let's say it's something really egregious like you killed your spouse or you sexually assaulted your own child. If a cop was saying that to me and I truthfully was innocent, I would want to be throwing that cop through the window. And I would be getting louder and louder, and louder and more aggressive, and more provoked.
So provoking a suspect is not going to one, indicate to me that this person is guilty. And two, is not doing anything to help me prove my case. So what we're really doing is trying to come up with psychological ways of getting this person to talk to us. So the strategy you use is based off of how you perceive the suspect, or your perception of how the suspect sees you. So if they're going to underestimate me, if that suspect thinks he's smarter than me, thinks he can talk his way out of this because I'm an idiot compared to him, I'm going to walk in there okey-dokey, just like, you know, Columbo and treat him like he's Hannibal Lecter. Like he's the smartest guy, the most mastermind criminal. And I'm going to, you know, flatter him and teach me your ways because I need to be better at my job and stroke his ego to get him to talk.
Now, that's a very different type of personality that will react to that than somebody who will react to the, you know, what they call the good cop/bad cop routine where one officer is building the rapport and being the friend. You know, I may not have sympathy but I'll have empathy. I can pretend to have sympathy, but I can be empathetic and I can get somebody to really believe that I'm not passing judgment on them. And my partner can be the asshole. Now, that doesn't mean that there's a threat of violence there, but it's that psychological fear of there's this bad guy that really wants to just throw me in jail and not hear my side of the story. But this other cop is not passing judgment on me.
I mean, I can't tell you how many years in prison people are spending because I have the ability to sit across from a child molester and not strangle him or not appear liked I want to strangle him. And be the one person in their life that understands. That understands that this little boy turned you on and that you think that it's this little boy's fault that all of this happened because he knew what he was doing. Now this is some really sick kind of thinking. But a lot of times that is the way that these child molester suspects are thinking.
And when you're sitting across from a detective who is not passing judgment on you, who is saying that they understand, it's all of a sudden here's the one person that I can confess all of these things that have happened to. Now, unfortunately, that one person is recording it and is going to play it for a jury. But in that moment, it's a relief. To play that, you know, to use that kind of psychological rapport-building with a person is again, another completely different strategy.
And as you go through the different kind of strategies that we can use, none of them really revolve around provoking somebody into anger, because all that's really going to do is get them to shut up. And then when they've stopped talking, we've lost that resource of being able to plug the things that that person says into our timeline. When we plug them into the timeline, whether they're the truth or not, it's something we can go back and prove, say, you know, this person was at this place or he wasn't at this place at this date and time. Or that he had these interactions, or that these thing were said. Or they were interactions with these people.
So it's really important to understand that the emotion of a situation is not going to prove a case. Thank you so much for the question, Guy. I really appreciate it and I appreciate you for being a patron.
So that's a wrap for episode 18 while I'm on the road. If you have questions for me to answer, send them in the forum that you'll find at writersdetective.com/podcast and I'll do my best to get them answered for you on an upcoming episode. Thanks again for listening. Write well.
EPISODE LINKS:
- Author: K.A. Lugo - jackslaughterthrillers.com
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PATREON PATRONS THAT MADE THIS EPISODE POSSIBLE
- Joan Raymond Writing and Design - joanraymondwriting.com
- Guy Alton
- Anonymous (you may not want your name shown, but I truly appreciate your support!)
- Natasha Bajema - natashabajema.com
- Natalie Barelli - nataliebarelli.com
- Joe Trent
- Siobhan Pope
- Leah Cutter - leahcutter.com
- Ryan Kinmil - @RKinmil
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