The Complex Trial Protocol, an innovative way to get to the truth

The Canterbury Centre for Policing Research at Canterbury Christ Church University and the Centre for Global City Policing at UCL present:

The Complex Trial Protocol, an innovative way to get to the truth

Dr Michel Funicelli, Senior Lecturer in Policing, Canterbury Christ Church University

The Complex Trial Protocol is a reliable and sound methodology in analysing P300 brainwaves. This relatively inexpensive and non-invasive technique is most likely to benefit law enforcement agencies throughout the world in reducing erroneous suspect identification. In forensic circles it can be used to determine if a person involved in a crime, as a witness or a suspect, recognizes or not, crucial pieces of information in relation to that crime and only known to the perpetrator or witness, and the authorities.

A major problem faced by law enforcement agencies worldwide is the unreliability of eyewitness identification and scarcity of physical clues at crime scenes. The body of evidence in mistaken eyewitness identification as a major contributing factor to wrongful convictions is considerable. Police agencies only collect physical evidence in approx. 15% or less of crime scenes.

The P300 is a well-studied electrical brainwave which appears as a positive (P) deflection on an electroencephalogram (EEG) and occurs about 300 to 600 ms (300) – ergo the label P300 - after a person is presented with a meaningful and novel stimulus. It is detectable by placing electrodes on the scalp of a person and it is considered as a reliable index of memory recognition, underpinned by robust scientific evidence. The leading theory of this brainwave is the orienting reflex, an involuntary psychophysiological reaction to a stimulus that is new to an organism’s environment, and which carries special significance.