History Main / LyingToThePerp

** Another SVU example: Cragen tells a perpetrator that they used DNA analysis to prove that the cigarettes he smoked were used to burn an old woman. When he goes back behind the two-way mirror, one of the detectives reminds him that any DNA samples from the lit end of the cigarette were burned away. Cragen's response? "[[SarcasmMode Oops]]."

* One case in ''PhoenixWright'' was ended successfully by Phoenix's use of such a lie (confusing the color of a poison vial) to confess (by way of correcting the color, implying that he would have to have done it to know what the real color was).
---> '''Phoenix''': [[spoiler:This bottle has your fingerprints all over it! And contains...potassium cyanide!]]

** And another involved an extremely subtle lie. [[spoiler: 'Adrian Andrews' is a pretty masculine name, so Wright leads the Shelly De Killer on by letting Shelly lie about his meeting with Adrian. He uses male pronouns, so Shelly uses them too...and then Wright accuses him of lying about having ever met Adrian in the first place. Adrian is a woman.]]

* In ''[[Literature/Redwall Outcast of Redwall]]'', someone is poisoning people using wolfsbane, so the herbalist announces the fact that handling the plant stains the perpetrator's hands red, so they will soon be revealed, while also making note of the wash that can remove the stain. Naturally the poisoner tries to clean himself with the wash, and is caught ''literally'' red-handed in the act of doing so.

* Though not itself a CrimeDrama, the ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "The Drumhead" had an interrogator use this tactic on a young medical bay Lieutenant. A Klingon spying for the Romulans was discovered early in the program shortly after an explosion rocked the ''Enterprise'''s warp core, seemingly committed by sabotage. The explosion was later discovered to be caused by a faulty seal, but convinced of the Lieutenant's guilt by association to the spy, and the fact that his grandfather is Romulan, the interrogator attempts to force a confession out of him by claiming that evidence was found of a corrosive chemical causing the explosion, which the Lieutenant had access to. Subverted when the Lieutenant (rightfully) rebuffs the accusation, and Picard later chides the interrogator for using the tactic as unjustified and uncalled-for. In this case, the unethical interrogator had even opened up the previously private interviews to a public audience; presumably, so that the false accusation would apply even ''more'' pressure by destroying the young officer's reputation whether it was true or not. Picard is then hauled before the tribunal himself for questioning its methods, where he gives them a well-deserved TheReasonYouSuckSpeech, pointing out their similarities with [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything numerous other unfair legal processes in the past]].

* There is a scene from the short lived Denis Leary show ''The Job'' where the detectives in question lie to a suspect's mother, telling her that he is dead, to make her cry, while two other detectives tell the man that the others are beating his mother. It works, and he's only too happy to talk.

* Happens all the time on CriminalMinds. One particularly memorable episode involved Jason Gideon helpfully providing prayer time/rugs/etc for an imprisoned Muslim fellow, but really he was just manipulating the guy's sense of time.
** Another time, a character convinced a serial killer who was holding him at gunpoint not to kill him right away by claiming "I know why you stutter". Not only did the investigator not know why this particular man stuttered, but ''nobody knows'' why stuttering occurs (though there are theories).

** In "Profiler, Profiled", Morgan believes that the cops accusing him of murder are using this trick when they were interviewing him, even claim "We (FBI) invented this!"
** Also notable for using this to rule ''out'' [[FalseConfession False Confessors]].

--> (The victim had, in fact, been stabbed in the head)

** Having just finished a semester of Criminal Procedure at law school, one can say that lying to suspects is not just a trope but often TruthInTelevision; this, however, would be a violation of the suspect's Constitutional right to counsel, making this a case of [[YouFailLawForever failing Constitutional Law forever]] (and probably getting any evidence obtained from the discussion thrown out of court in RealLife.)
*** She apparently didn't ''say'' she was his public defender, she just implied it and let him jump to that conclusion. She does introduce herself as being from the Public Defender's office, but those watching ther interview also note that in this case the deception is only fine as long as the witness doesn't say anything they have to prosecute him for.
** Brenda not only lies to get the perp to confess, but pretty regularly lies to get them to waive their Fifth Amendment rights. ''Hopefully'' that wouldn't fly in the real world, Unfortunately, if you're talking, by definition, you've waived your Fifth Amendment rights.
** Pope sums this up pretty amusingly in one episode. Brenda's lawyer, who is watching her in an interview, ask if she is lying to the perp. Pope immediately replies, "how long have you known her? Of course she's lying."

* Done in ''Series/JonathanCreek'', when Maddy tells the suspect she's been incriminated by skin cells left in Jonathan's shoulders when [[ItMakesSenseInContext she gave him a massage]], and once she gives a full confession:

* Non- CrimeDrama example: In ''ThreesCompany'', Janet exposes a crooked health inspector who demanded a bribe in order to keep Jacks' perfectly acceptable restaurant open:

* In one episode of ''{{Neighbours}}'', a man arrested for assaulting Chris names Jarrod as the man who paid him to. Jarrod effortlessly exposes him as a liar by showing up at interview with Superintendent Hayes and leading Walton to believe he is his Legal Aid lawyer. By the following scene he has changed his story.
* Played for laughs on ''{{The Golden Girls}}''. One of the ''EmptyNest'' characters, Barbara, had crossed over for the ep and had to help the girls when a guy came into the house with a gun.

** As your lawyer should tell you if present. If he's not, ''why are you talking at all?''. (At least in the US.)

* One very disturbing result of this tactic is that it can also convince innocent people to confess and/or plead guilty because they don't see any hope of winning in court. Even more disturbing in the case of 14yr old Michael Crowe. The police told him they had physical evidence that he had murdered his sister. Even though he was innocent, he not only confessed, for a while he actually came to believe that he must have done it.
* According to DavidSimon in ''Homicide'', this is basically a requirement of being a detective. A good detective must be able to read a suspect his Miranda rights, (and in Baltimore) sign a paper showing they've understood them, and then in the very next breath convince the suspect that those rights are meaningless. From there, it's half-truths and lies all the way. (For example: One common trick is to confiscate the suspect's shoes and tell the suspect that they're going to check that blood splatter on them to see if it's the victim's blood type. It serves a double-whammy: The suspect is convinced they have evidence, and their faith in themselves is shot; hell, they didn't even notice that any blood splatter had hit their shoes!)
** Simon also notes other things of even more dubious legality, such as using a ''Xerox copier'' as a lie detector. The detectives load three sheets of paper, reading "truth", "truth", "lie" into the machine. The questions are answered, and "copy" pressed. What is your name? "Alice" Truth. Where do you live? "Troperville". Truth. Did you kill Bob on the night of the 25th? "No". Lie. Well well well. You lying motherfucker. Confession. Another detective uses the sobriety test ("look at my finger, cross your eyes, stand on one leg"), telling a perp it is a kind of ninja truth technique. This works. Another extremely stupid suspect admits to beating a woman into unconsciousness, robbing her, and orally raping her, but is convinced by a detectives assurance that, because he didn't actually strike the mortal blow, he cannot be charged. As one detective notes: "Ignorant motherfucker."

* In Creator/CoryDoctorow's ''Literature/LittleBrother'', the [[PoliceState Department of Homeland Security]] [[NightmareFuelStationAttendant prison warden]] claims the [=DHS=] intercepted a package of bombs arriving at Marcus the suspected terrorist's house (combined other EnhancedInterrogationTechniques). Since none of his friends got that sort of treatment, he suspects [[DisproportionateRetribution she just wanted to get back at him for not decrypting his phone on request]].

** David Simon wrote the ol' photocopier-as-lie-detector trick into yet another series, when Bunk uses it in the opening scene of the fifth season of ''TheWire''.
** The first season of TheWire has a particularly egregious example, where the detectives claim that a picture of Bunk's kids are the kids of a murder victim in order to get D'Angelo Barksdale to write a letter saying he's sorry to them. His lawyer arrives in time to snatch it off him, and his the-morons-I-have-to-deal-with demeanour is hilarious.

** This one is from ''[[LawAndOrderCriminalIntent Criminal Intent]]'' (the first episode, even): Goren convinces the girlfriend of a narcissist perp to help them by convincing her that he gave her AIDS. At the end, when he finds out she betrayed him, she shouted "You killed us both anyway!" to which Eames reveals that neither of them had AIDS after all, to which Goren half-heartedly admits "I lied. Sorry."

** Original flavor had a similar plot, when [=McCoy=] put a comatose girl on the witness list for the trial of her attacker. He also told the doctor that when the perp's lawyer called, he was to say she was awake and talking to police. The doctor agreed to, under protest, and the defense pleads out without checking in person.
** Goren once got a confession by telling the suspect that he hadn't actually committed any crime (of course, by the time his admission was done, he was guilty of some criminal negligence for allowing a patient under his care to die). [[YouFailLawForever Police are in fact not allowed]] to tell a suspect they're not guilty of a crime.
** Subverted in mothership episode "Ritual." Detectives suspect a man of committing murder in a parking garage and then driving out of it, using his magnetic key-card to exit the garage. However, the garage's gate system doesn't record card usages, and with no witnesses they have no way of knowing whether he did actually use his key-card that evening. They decide to bluff and tell him in interrogation, "We checked the readout at the garage. Your card was used just after Uncle Josef got his head bashed in." As they say this, the suspect lights up with a smile and faint glimmer in his eyes. "The magnetic card system?" he calmly replies; "You can't get a readout from that thing." D'oh!

* An early ''CSINewYork'' episode has a victim whose head was slammed into a restaurant oven; the victim staggered out of the restaurant and collapsed down the street. During the interrogation, the suspect is told "then you followed him out and shot him dead." The suspect immediately admits to the head-slam but not the gunshot, only to discover the victim died of the head trauma and was never shot.

* In ''TheShield'' episode "Blood and Water", Det. Vic Mackey (who is a blue-eyed skinhead) pretends to be a neo-Nazi to get a suspect to open up.
** It doesn't work.

* Though not itself a CrimeDrama, the ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "The Drumhead" had an interrogator use this tactic on a young medical Lieutenant; a Romulan spy was discovered early in the program shortly after an explosion rocked the ''Enterprise'''s warp core, seemingly committed by sabotage. The explosion was later discovered to be caused by a faulty seal, but convinced of the Lieutenant's guilt by association to the spy, the interrogator attempts to force a confession out of him by claiming that evidence was found of a corrosive chemical causing the explosion, which the Lieutenant had access to. Subverted when the Lieutenant (rightfully) rebuffs the accusation, and Picard later chides the interrogator for using the tactic as unjustified and uncalled-for. In this case, the unethical interrogator had even opened up the previously private interviews to a public audience; presumably, so that the false accusation would apply even ''more'' pressure by destroying the young officer's reputation whether it was true or not.

* Also [[strike:happens all the time]] OnceAnEpisode (if not more) on ''TheCloser''. Perhaps the ultimate example was when Deputy Chief Brenda Johnson told the perp that [[RefugeInAudacity she was the public defender assigned to him]].

** The first season of TheWire has a particularly egregious example, where the detectives claim that a picture of Bunk's kids are the kids of a murder victim in order to get D'Angelo Barksdale to write a letter saying he's sorry to them.

* In one Bones episode, they told the killer that they'd charged someone else with the murder. He was so vain that he confessed just to get the credit.

** Simon also notes other things of even more dubious legality, such as using a ''Xerox copier'' as a lie detector. The detectives load three sheets of paper, reading "truth", "trith", "lie" into the machine. The questions are answered, and "copy" pressed. What is your name? "Alice" Truth. Where do you live? "Troperville". Truth. Did you kill Bob on the night of the 25th? "No". Lie. Well well well. You lying motherfucker. Confession. Another detective uses the sobriety test ("look at my finger, cross your eyes, stand on one leg"), telling a perp it is a kind of ninja truth technique. This works. Another extremely stupid suspect admits to beating a woman into unconsciousness, robbing her, and orally raping her, but is convinced by a detectives assurance that, because he didn't actually strike the mortal blow, he cannot be charged. As one detective notes: "Ignorant motherfucker."

->'''Simone Bryce''': They do it all the time; that's why I told you to stop.

--> - A [[SelfMadeOrphan girl who killed her mother]] learns about this trope the hard way on LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit

* ''{{Castle}}'' does the "divide and conquer" ploy in "The Double Down" to break the beta of the StrangersOnATrainPlotMurder pair.

* In CoryDoctorow's ''Literature/LittleBrother'', the [[PoliceState Department of Homeland Security]] [[NightmareFuelStationAttendant prison warden]] claims the [=DHS=] intercepted a package of bombs arriving at Marcus the suspected terrorist's house (combined other EnhancedInterrogationTechniques). Since none of his friends got that sort of treatment, he suspects [[DisproportionateRetribution she just wanted to get back at him for not decrypting his phone on request]].

** In one case the detectives convince a suspect to take part in a lineup by telling him that he'll be a ringer and that the lineup is for an unrelated crime.

** In another episode, Goren convinces a man that his wife (whom he put into a permanent vegetative state and is now trying to take off life support to collect her life insurance) is able to communicate by looking at "yes" and "no" cards.

** Except that the police aren't the ones who cut deals, prosecutors are, and any "deal" made with the police is null and void. [[ShmuckBait Oops.]]

** The film ''Film/{{Bernie}}'' (which was based on a true story) has the DA do something like this. He organizes a fake contest in which the person who kept their hand on a car would win the car, using this to lure out men who owed child support so they could be arrested.

* Subverted in ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'' when Warrant Officer Falman interrogates [[AxeCrazy Barry the Chopper]] by checking his memory of his crimes to see if he really is what he claims to be: [[spoiler:the infamous criminal's soul bound to a suit of armor]]. Among the crime examples he uses, Falman changes the date of one of them, and Barry calls him on it.

One common ploy is to have detectives telling suspects that they have been identified by victims or collaborators. Another is, when two perps are involved, separating them and telling each the other one caved.

* ''Film/TheGeneralsDaughter'': When questioning a suspect in the gangrape, Sunhill pulls out a pair of women's underwear in an evidence bag and leads him to believe that they're Captain Campbell's DNA-evidence-filled underwear from the night of the gangrape. He promptly starts talking about how he tried to stop the rape, and reveals the identities of the other men involved.

* Another example is in "The Tablecloth", in which two women each claim that an embroidered tablecloth which has blown off a clothesline belongs to her. The man who found it announces that there is a wine stain on it. One woman tells an elaborate story explaining how the stain happened. The other woman says, "It must not be mine. Mine had no such stain." Of course, the tablecloth wasn't stained, proving the truthful woman was the owner.

** Brenda not only lies to get the perp to confess, but pretty regularly lies to get them to waive their Fifth Amendment rights. I sure ''hope'' that wouldn't fly in the real world.
*** It does. If you're talking, by definition, you've waived your Fifth Amendment rights.

*** If this troper recalls correctly, she didn't ''say'' she was his public defender, she just implied it and let him jump to that conclusion. She does introduce herself as being from the Public Defender's office, but those watching ther interview also note that in this case the deception is only fine as long as the witness doesn't say anything they have to prosecute him for.

** In "Profiler, Profiled", Morgan believes that the cops accusing him of murder is using this trick when they were interviewing him, even claim "We (FBI) invented this!"

** Having just finished a semester of Criminal Procedure at her law school, this troper can say that lying to suspects is not just a trope but often TruthInTelevision; this, however, would be a violation of the suspect's Constitutional right to counsel, making this a case of [[YouFailLawForever failing Constitutional Law forever]] (and probably getting any evidence obtained from the discussion thrown out of court in RealLife.)

** In the move adaption of ''DeathOnTheNile'', he tells the murderer that he can prove he fired the murder weapon by applying heated wax to his fingertips to reveal the presence of gunpowder on his fingers. No such test exists, but the killer confesses anyway.

*** If this troper recalls correctly, she didn't ''say'' she was his public defender, she just implied it and let him jump to that conclusion.