JUST HOW DO THOSE "POLICE PSYCHICS" DO IT?
My friend Alec Jason, a
forensics expert who was instrumental in my exposure of the tricks
used by Reverend Peter Popoff in his faith-healing swindle, once
shared with me his dismay at the naivety shown by one of the
major authorities in forensics, Vernon J. Geberth. A book
by Geberth titled, "Practical Homicide investigation --
Tactics, Procedures, and
Forensic Techniques, -- begins
a section on "Identification of Suspects" with a definition:
"A psychic is a person who is especially sensitive to nonphysical
forces of life energy."
Geberth depended upon the
fatuous claims of Noreen Renier, an Orlando, Florida, "police
psychic" who was featured on an episode of the short-lived
TV series, "Put to the Test," featuring naive "investigators"
who would be unlikely to find a bowling ball in a bathtub in
full sunlight. The show did, however, provide an excellent
example of just how bad the "readings" of the operators
actually are, and how much wishful thinking, enhancement of vague
statements, and sheer invention, enter into making the data appear
to work.
As Dr. Gary Posner of the
Tampa Bay Skeptics pointed out in his review of this program,
Renier provided a description of a murderer that was so far off
the mark -- except for the gender -- that it would require an
incredible amount of imagination to make it fit the perpetrator.
As for providing a psychic impression of the crime scene, which
was in a small California community, Renier trotted out the usual
can't-miss statements. In a stroke of divine inspiration,
Renier said about the house, "It seems that there's a lot
of white in it." Wow. What more can I say?
But there's more: "And there's some strong slant . . . with
the roof. . . ." Double wow. How does the woman
DO it? Then she offered, "A house, or church, or a
house near a church . . ."
The mind boggles at the
perception and sensitivity of this inspired psychic. These are
facts obviously unknown to her, except by divine insight.
The three hosts of "Put to the Test," along with the
attending investigator -- who knew all the details of the crime
and was dutifully prompting Renier -- were appropriately bowled
over. Only on one detail did they express some reservation.
Renier ventured: "Screen door creaks."
Oops. The screen door scraped the porch, but did not creak.
Well, maybe it used to creak. Or it will creak someday.
We'll wait and see.
Renier's reading was full
of the usual "I feel," "it seems like," "I
see," "there would have been," "maybe,"
"could have been," "I think," and other such
expressions. She asked numerous questions. "Is
that right?" and "I don't know" shared the same
breath. All the way through, the questioners lead her along
in her rambling guesses, as well as nodding approvingly when
she was right, and looking puzzled when she wasn't.
But there's a good reason
for all that feedback, according to Geberth's book. He
specifies that ". . . the police have a responsibility to
assure that the psychic is properly handled." Apparently
that "proper handling" consists of following rules
that allow the psychic to operate in an ideal "cold reading"
atmosphere, and supplying all the details.
The psychic, he wrote,
must be questioned "in a casual, gentle manner," and
". . . there should be no series of ‘Yes' and ‘No'
questions. . . . If an answer doesn't sound right, instead of
a negative, 'No, no, you're all wrong," [the psychic prefers]
'Let's go back to that later.'" And, the expert adds,
"Psychics respond better and are more accurate when the
individuals working with them have a positive attitude."
Geberth suggests that to
ascertain the authenticity of a psychic, a good method is to
depend upon word-of-mouth. "This report [about how
good the psychic is] may appear in a local newspaper . . ."
he tells us. Sounds dependable enough for me!
On the rational side of
his description on how to handle psychics, the author goes on
to actually suggest several rather good methods of avoiding giving
data to the psychic, and yet misses the importance of taping
the session. To his mind, taping should be done only in
order that none of the details offered will be lost; in my opinion,
the astute investigator might
wish to tape a session in
order to record the entire gamut of details, the real precision
of the statements, and the wild range and number of guesses,
right and wrong. From taped records, such facts are invariably
evident.
Geberth warns his reader
that an unusually accurate performance by a psychic should be
regarded with suspicion:
The phonies like conditions they can control. They
do a lot of key bending and blindfold tricks that are
impressive. Their clarity and accuracy are usually
overwhelming. . . . Real psychics are human, and
therefore are subject to error.
But fakes are not human.....?
Are they divine, then?
And this man is an expert
in "practical homicide investigation." Did he
have anything to do with the O.J. case?
In closing his naive reference
to police psychics, Geberth writes:
. . . there is a definite need for the evaluation of the
successes and failures of psychic phenomena as
they relate to law enforcement before they can be
recognized as a "legitimate" investigative tool.
Grammar aside, I believe
he meant to write "psychics" rather than "psychic
phenomena," and he seems unaware of Dr. Martin Reiser's
rather definitive and damning evaluations, in 1979 and 1982,
of whether law enforcement agencies could benefit from employing
psychics, and the in-depth examination by Piet Hein Hoebens in
1981 of Dutch psychics Gerald Croiset and Peter Hurkos, inarguably
two of the best-known practitioners of this flummery. Reiser
concluded, after a comprehensive test he performed on a dozen
police psychics:
Overall, little, if any, information was elicited from
the twelve psychic participants that would provide
material helpful in the investigation of the major
crimes in question. . . . We are forced to conclude,
based upon our results, that the usefulness of
psychics as an aid in criminal investigation has not
been validated.
The evaluation Geberth
called for has already been done.
He also wrote that:
The police have much to learn about the relative
value of psychic phenomena in criminal
investigations.
He might have better written
that:
The police have much to learn about how their own
evaluation of psychics can be colored by wishful
thinking and their willingness to believe that these
abilities have been established as genuine.
..................................................
In the '60s, while I was
involved in my all-night radio show out of New York city, I was
invited by an ardent believer to witness a performance of "psychometry"
by Florence Sternfels, another "police psychic" from
Edgewater, New Jersey. Psychometry is the claimed ability
to handle an object and to then describe by psychic means the
history of the object and its owners. And I was invited
to bring along with me a test object with some sort of history.
Florence had made a bit
of news when she tricked the phone company into giving her a
listing that they were unwilling to allow. She had a private
phone, but wanted to be listed as "Florence the Psychic,"
and the company insisted that she take a (more expensive) business
listing. She simply took a private line and listed her
name as "Psychic Florence," which got her listed in
the white pages as, "Florence Psychic." And that satisfied
her needs.
I showed up at a huge home
in Croton-on-Hudson with an envelope containing an object about
which I actually knew nothing, in fact I'd not even opened the
well-padded envelope. It was an object that had been loaned
to me by Walter B. Gibson, creator of the fictional Shadow character
that was at one time so popular, and a man who had known most
of the major figures in the magic profession. I knew nothing
about the object, so that the test would be appropriately "blinded."
Walter was standing by at his telephone awaiting a call from
me so that he could reveal the history of his test item.
After Florence had given
several "readings" on offered objects, pumping the
owners for information as expected and thus scoring strongly
to the delight of the faithful fans present, it came my turn.
I gave her my test object, and I told her that I knew nothing
about it, but that I could make a phone call -- after her reading
-- to learn everything I needed to know about it.
However, as soon as she
shook from the envelope a man's well-worn and very old-fashioned
silver belt buckle engraved with the initials "H.H.,"
I rather guessed who the owner had been, and I had to work hard
to avoid her reading my reactions to anything she said.
It did not appear that
the psychic looked at the object at all, but I'd noticed that
she always gave each item a quick look and turned it over while
making a few disconnected comments, then held it tightly in her
hand, out of sight. "This belonged to a man,"
Florence began. That was very obviously true, but I said
nothing. "Did it?" she asked me. "I don't
know," I answered. "Oh.
I get the initials H.H." she said, staring off into space,
then she held the buckle close to her face and squinted at it,
as if she had a hard time focusing in on it. "Ah!"
she exclaimed, "Look at this! Those are the initials
right here on it!" She showed it around to a few seated
near her, and received appropriate awed verification of her
insight. She turned
to me. "I get that this man is in spirit."
That style of belt-buckle was clearly from half-a-century back,
but I did not react. "Is he in spirit?" she asked.
"I don't know," I replied. Florence looked unhappy.
Much fingering and turning
of the belt buckle ensued. "Politics?" she ventured.
I was silent. "Or maybe the military, in some way?"
No reaction from me. "Was he in politics, or in the
military, at any time?" she asked. "Florence,"
I replied, "I know nothing about this object. It's
a test object."
"You don't know anything
about this buckle?" she said as she angrily rose from her
chair. "That's right," I told her. "Well-how-the-hell-am-I-supposed-to-know,
then?" she screeched, and threw the silver buckle down on
the thick rug at my feet.
There it was, from her
own lips, a succinct statement of just how she operated.
I left the room, with Florence mumbling and complaining to the
crowd, phoned Walter and verified my suspicion that the belt
buckle had belonged to Harry Houdini, and I discovered that it
had been worn by him in October of 1926 when he entered Grace
Hospital in Chicago to be treated for the ailment that did him
in ten days later. When I returned to the waiting audience
and informed them of these facts, Florence immediately came up
with, "You see, I knew there was serious sickness involved
with this object, and that always dulls my sensitivity, because
I feel the pain." I quickly asked her where the pain
was, and while transfixing me with a hard look, she pointed to
her chest. "Really?" I remarked, "It was appendicitis
that killed Houdini." "He also had a heart condition!"
she snapped, and my reading was most definitely over.
Perhaps Houdini -- or Florence
Sternfels -- had a misplaced vermiform appendix . . . ?
Postscript: At JREF,
we've just received a comprehensive report from The
Rationalists of East Tennessee
(RET), who at our request recently performed
the required preliminary examination
of an applicant for the million dollar
prize that we offer.
As you may know, no person has yet passed the
preliminary test and gone
on to be formally tested. That situation has not
altered as a result of the
RET report. Following a strict protocol, and
adjusting all of the terms
to satisfy the dowser who had made the
application, the Tennessee
group carried out an exemplary series of tests
that will be discussed shortly
here on this page.
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