I had a friend who was accused of attacking someone with no reason. My friend was a woman who was less than five feet tall and weighed less than 90 pounds. The man who accused her of attacking him was well over six feet tall, over 200 pounds and had a history of domestic violence (one conviction and three restraining orders); no history of violence towards strangers, though.
No witnesses, so it was a "he said, she said" situation. The police asked both to take polygraphs.
The man had an inconclusive result.
My friend? Failed.
The police declined to file charges against her anyway. The examiner explained that if she had a strong emotional reaction to the charges, she might fail the test even though she was innocent because the test measures emotional reactions, not absolute truth.
I have absolutely no doubt that she was telling the truth. She had no prior relationship to this man, she had never shown any violent tendencies at all, in fact, I can't even recall her raising her voice ever. He did have a motive to want to discredit her whereas I don't think she had any motive at all (work situation).
Another friend, who has quite a lot of experience with recreational substances, passed three work polygraphs that included asking if he has ever taken illegal drugs. He's a white collar worker and this was back in the 80s when anti-drug paranoia was high.
I would really love to know whether TH's computer shows if she has ever done internet research on passing polygraphs.
