Speaker 1: Hey everybody, it's me Josh and for this week's s
Speaker 1: Y s K Selex, I've chosen one on truth Serums,
Speaker 1: which originally came out in April of two thirteen. Turns out,
Speaker 1: well we always thought was a truth serum was actually
Speaker 1: just a handful of goofballs. Enjoy. Welcome to Stuff you
Speaker 1: Should Know from House Stuff Works dot com. Hey, and
Speaker 1: welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. And there's Charles W.
Speaker 1: Chuck Bryant back in the saddle again. Man, it's been
Speaker 1: a while. That was a goat boy being whipped. That's you.
Speaker 1: Here's the goat boy, right. Do you remember goat boy
Speaker 1: from Sarry Life? Yes? What was his name? I don't
Speaker 1: Jim Brewer, Yeah he was goat boy, wasn't I think so?
Speaker 1: Was it called goat boy? Great? Classic SNL character? Agreed? Yeah, uh, agreed,
Speaker 1: that's pretty good. Thanks. Um, how are you doing? Oh
Speaker 1: I'm great. Man. Inject me with truth sermon, asked me,
Speaker 1: and then you'll get the truth may or may not
Speaker 1: work though, And it's not even serum, you know. Um,
Speaker 1: We've got a a pretty cool case coming up where
Speaker 1: this is going to be used. Uh well cool, Well, no,
Speaker 1: but I'm saying, like, thank you for correcting me, because no,
Speaker 1: it's not cool, it's interesting, sensational. Yes, And uh, this
Speaker 1: is actually what made me think that we should do
Speaker 1: something on truth serum was the James Holmes case, the Aurora,
Speaker 1: Colorado batman shooter, Um, who has been saying that he's
Speaker 1: insane or acting insane ever since he was caught. But
Speaker 1: a lot of people think, maybe he's not so insane, right,
Speaker 1: And uh, a judge just recently in the middle of
Speaker 1: March approved um him to be tested under narco analysis,
Speaker 1: which is narco interrogation, really is what it is. It's
Speaker 1: unusual these days in the US for something like that
Speaker 1: to happen, and a lot of folks are saying, what's
Speaker 1: up with this judge, like are you for real? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And it turns out that there is a very long history,
Speaker 1: especially in the twentieth century, of people using what has
Speaker 1: been popularly dubbed truth serum, but incorrectly dubbed truth serum
Speaker 1: because it doesn't necessarily generate the truth or um cover
Speaker 1: the truth. And it's not a Siah. Yeah, watery part
Speaker 1: of coagul little blood is that right? Is that all
Speaker 1: it is? I believe so, and I think there's a
Speaker 1: plant based serra as well. But either way, none of
Speaker 1: that is none of the truth storm drugs that they
Speaker 1: use our serums. No, and we should probably get out
Speaker 1: of the way right now that um LSD not a
Speaker 1: truth serum or a truth drug. Uh okay, well, now
Speaker 1: that's what I think most people think about when when
Speaker 1: you think of being interrogated under the influence of drugs
Speaker 1: that they give you LSD and started shouting at you.
Speaker 1: I had no idea about this, but it reminds you.
Speaker 1: You know, you harken back to the days of the polygraph.
Speaker 1: When that first started, it was like, well, okay, society
Speaker 1: is saying, what we shouldn't beat people with rubber hoses
Speaker 1: to get the truth out of him anymore, and it's
Speaker 1: possible that this isn't even the truth. They're just saying
Speaker 1: what we want to hear because they want us to stop.
Speaker 1: So let's try some other techniques. And as a result
Speaker 1: you had the polygraph truth serums, which we're gonna call
Speaker 1: incorrect or no, that's what they're called, basically, UM because
Speaker 1: there isn't really a clinical name for him, is there UM?
Speaker 1: I don't know n narco analytic gold drugs. Well that's
Speaker 1: kind of like the Yeah, I just made that up,
Speaker 1: but that's really what it is. So basically there's two
Speaker 1: reasons why you would use truth serums, and they come
Speaker 1: down to narco analysis and narco interrogation. And the one
Speaker 1: I should say that James Holmes is going to undergo
Speaker 1: is I guess kind of a combination of both, because
Speaker 1: they're trying to get at the truth of a sanity
Speaker 1: um and but at the same time it will be
Speaker 1: interrogative because he's a suspect in a massive murder trial.
Speaker 1: Although I would say that's just the psychological because the other,
Speaker 1: the probative truth is they're trying to get a revelation
Speaker 1: of a crime. Oh yeah, I guess that's true and
Speaker 1: not necessarily their mental state. Yea. So those are those
Speaker 1: are the two differences. Is are you trying to say,
Speaker 1: you know, inject you and say did you steal the painting?
Speaker 1: But yeah, that's a good art art theft podcast on
Speaker 1: that or um like some sort of psychological truth that
Speaker 1: they're trying to uncover about themselves, right uh. And that one,
Speaker 1: as far as truth serums go, is probably the one
Speaker 1: where it's the drugs will be most effective. Yeah, because
Speaker 1: it's kind of unlocking like an unconscious um revelation a person,
Speaker 1: like uncovering a neurosis that maybe they didn't understand that
Speaker 1: they had and now it's there's some sort of catharsis
Speaker 1: that these drugs have allowed to just kind of let
Speaker 1: their guard down. Now they're they're flowing out with a
Speaker 1: catharsis and they're feeling better afterward. Yeah. And most of
Speaker 1: those studies to have been uh not been on like prisoners,
Speaker 1: but maybe volunteers and things, so it's a more friendly environment.
Speaker 1: So maybe they get further that way. But we'll get
Speaker 1: to all that, all right, So let's let's talk about
Speaker 1: the the history of this chuck um, they're not so old,
Speaker 1: the idea of using drugs to get the truth out
Speaker 1: of somebody. And actually there was a Texas doctor doctor
Speaker 1: house for real, Yeah, the real doctor house house. He
Speaker 1: uh he was a Dallas, Texas doctor um and obstetrician
Speaker 1: and uh back when he was delivering babies. They were
Speaker 1: using a combination of chloroform, morphine and a scope al amine,
Speaker 1: which you may have heard of before if you've ever
Speaker 1: taken um uh motion sickness drugs that patches opolamin Yeah. Uh,
Speaker 1: and he noticed that when women were on this combination
Speaker 1: of drugs, they tended to be very candid and forthright
Speaker 1: u with stuff. Sometimes they didn't have anything to do
Speaker 1: with the child birthring process. And doctor House said, hey,
Speaker 1: I wonder if you could use this on criminals. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and truthful that's the most important part. Well, yeah, they
Speaker 1: found out that they were accurate, and so yeah, he said,
Speaker 1: you know what, who's who's not forthcoming and who doesn't
Speaker 1: tell the truth are lying lying criminals, right, so maybe
Speaker 1: we should and get them pregnant and then give them
Speaker 1: scopeful a mean, actually not to get them pregnant. And uh,
Speaker 1: he sort of resisted the whole truth storm thing. Uh.
Speaker 1: Supposedly that came about in the Los Angeles record was
Speaker 1: when it was first used. But yeah, he eventually would
Speaker 1: come around and embrace that term and use it himself,
Speaker 1: because you know, once things take hold in the public consciousness,
Speaker 1: you just sort of have to give in. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: he he in that way kind of resembles though that
Speaker 1: the inventor of the polygraph, for the guy who brought
Speaker 1: all these disparate parts of the polygraph together. William Molton Marston,
Speaker 1: the guy invented Wonder Woman, just kind of became a
Speaker 1: promoter of his law enforcement tool. Yeah, but he found
Speaker 1: out that it worked the first time, not by getting
Speaker 1: a bunch of guilty guys found guilty, but of a
Speaker 1: study with three men who said they were innocent. Uh,
Speaker 1: he gave them the scope l amine Um, I guess,
Speaker 1: interrogated them, found that they still said no, I'm innocent,
Speaker 1: all three of them, and then they later got off
Speaker 1: even though like all the evidence was it was against them.
Speaker 1: They didn't get off because of the truth serum. That
Speaker 1: was a separate study. He just kind of compared the
Speaker 1: two and said, Hey, this is gonna work like Gangbusters. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and despite that, I guess sort of success. Um. I
Speaker 1: guess he certainly touted it as such. But um, there
Speaker 1: haven't been a whole lot of studies on scope amin um.
Speaker 1: Just a few different cases as they've actually had, like
Speaker 1: police interrogations using scope amine. And interestingly, and I totally
Speaker 1: by this because it kind of harkens back to old movies.
Speaker 1: Just the threat of it was sometimes enough to induce
Speaker 1: like a confession, and that reminds me the movies of
Speaker 1: the guy approaching like with a needle in his hand,
Speaker 1: scorting it in the air and saying you, you know,
Speaker 1: if you have as of making a talk, and also
Speaker 1: they go, well screw it, I'm just I don't want
Speaker 1: that junk. And I wonder if it's if it's because
Speaker 1: they had committed so many crimes that they hadn't been
Speaker 1: caught for they didn't want to implicate themselves in a
Speaker 1: bunch of other ones, and they were just being utilitarian
Speaker 1: saying I'll give you this one. I bet it was
Speaker 1: more they were just like you know, it became a
Speaker 1: big thing in the public consciousness, like true storm, and
Speaker 1: so they didn't know what was going on right. Well, also,
Speaker 1: if they were using it um enough that it had
Speaker 1: gotten out how unpleasant the whole experience was, maybe that
Speaker 1: was what they were protecting themselves against because um, there
Speaker 1: were a lot of psychological um effects, including falling asleep, UM,
Speaker 1: strong with that, babbling what's wrong with that? Becoming delusional
Speaker 1: and having hallucinations um. And then the physiological effects far
Speaker 1: outlasted the psychological effects, and you would have probably dry socket.
Speaker 1: I get the impression of the mouth. Your mouth was
Speaker 1: so dry that like your your saliva glance dried up
Speaker 1: to which is extraordinarily painful. Yeah, and that they would
Speaker 1: actually use that in surgery too, because they wanted you
Speaker 1: to have dry mouth form surgery. But also like headaches,
Speaker 1: rapid heartbeat, board vision. It didn't last long as a
Speaker 1: truth storm because of these reasons. It didn't despite doctor
Speaker 1: House's efforts that did kind of follow the wayside. But
Speaker 1: if you are um interested in scopeal, I mean, there's uh,
Speaker 1: basically a legend that Colombian drug gangs use this. If
Speaker 1: you go down, yeah and you order a coke, you
Speaker 1: better watch them pour it because they will dose you
Speaker 1: with scope. They being Colombian drug gangs, they're living in
Speaker 1: the nineteen twenties. Yeah, and they I guess one of
Speaker 1: the effects that it has is um amnesia. And but
Speaker 1: you're still conscious and moving around and hanging out and
Speaker 1: using your A T M card to get the money
Speaker 1: for them because you're very forthcoming with whatever is asked
Speaker 1: of you. It sounds like one of those things like
Speaker 1: the old White Traveling wives tales, like it definitely does
Speaker 1: sound like that, and I'm sure it is largely but
Speaker 1: I read a Vice magazine article on it and supposedly
Speaker 1: the author went down to Colombian found all this stuff
Speaker 1: out firsthand. It was pretty opening. Have you ever seen
Speaker 1: Flirting with disaster? Yeah? Remember that Mary Tyler Moore had
Speaker 1: the story about on the highways, they'll bump you in
Speaker 1: the car and then get you to pull over and
Speaker 1: rob you. And then they get bumped on the highway
Speaker 1: and they think it's there being rob but they're not.
Speaker 1: I don't remember her in that. Yeah, she was the
Speaker 1: adoptive mother of the Ben Stellar character. Yeah, she's great.
Speaker 1: Um so scope mean ex scope means out. Up. Next,
Speaker 1: we have everyone's favorite truth surum barbite wits. And they
Speaker 1: were discovered not barbiturous, but they to use them like.
Speaker 1: This was discovered by accident by Arthur Lovenhart and uh
Speaker 1: he was at the University of Wisconsin, Go Badgers, and
Speaker 1: he was doing some experimenting with respiratory stimulants and injected
Speaker 1: a dude who was catatonic, mute, and rigid, and all
Speaker 1: of a sudden he loosens up, opens up his eyes
Speaker 1: and talks a little bit, and they think, wow, you know,
Speaker 1: this could be a big deal. This seems like this
Speaker 1: drug woke this guy up, and we are getting information
Speaker 1: out of him about his life. Maybe we can use
Speaker 1: that as a truth term. So they started to UM.
Speaker 1: A guy named Clarence W. Muhlberger ahead of the Michigan
Speaker 1: Crime Detective Detection Laboratory and East Lansing started using barbiturates.
Speaker 1: And these are UM. If you hear of truth serum
Speaker 1: being used in any narco interrogation, including James Holmes, is
Speaker 1: UM you you're you're there talking about the use of barbiturates.
Speaker 1: These are the only ones who have been proven to
Speaker 1: even possibly uncover some sort of truth in an interrogation. UM.
Speaker 1: So you've got uh amma barbital, thiopental and sicco barbaital
Speaker 1: and UM. Any of these three a k. Yellow jackets,
Speaker 1: pink ladies, goofballs, red devils, all those guys, any of
Speaker 1: them should be in the hands of an expert capable
Speaker 1: of um producing some sort of truth or at least
Speaker 1: get somebody talking. And they aren't quite sure how, but
Speaker 1: they think possibly that the cerebrum UH is detached. The cerebrum,
Speaker 1: which monitors the higher functioning of the cerebellum, is detached,
Speaker 1: and so doesn't say things like you don't want to
Speaker 1: say that you should probably stop talking now. That's what
Speaker 1: they think is happening. So they have used those with
Speaker 1: some success, uh, anecdotally or I guess not anecdotally, but
Speaker 1: in experiments. But they still have the battle of actually
Speaker 1: using them in an investigation because courts aren't prone to allow,
Speaker 1: you know, a confession if you were doped up. It depends.
Speaker 1: I mean, this judge in the James Holmes Aurora, Colorado
Speaker 1: trial said, go to it. I signed off on it,
Speaker 1: which means that it should be it should be admissible
Speaker 1: in that judge's courtroom. You know, well, that's not a
Speaker 1: confession though, that's they're looking for his psychological wellness. Again,
Speaker 1: it depends, and I kind of have I've been thinking
Speaker 1: about what you're saying. I don't. I don't know, because
Speaker 1: they right, But is he faking? Is he malingering? And
Speaker 1: this is how how barbiturates have been used as truth
Speaker 1: rooms in the past. Um one of the first cases,
Speaker 1: one of the first studies, was carried out by a
Speaker 1: couple of people named Gerson and Victor Off and they
Speaker 1: use sodium amatol to interview seventeen suspective malingers at Fort Dix,
Speaker 1: New Jersey, basically some uh, some army guys who were
Speaker 1: thought to just be lazy and shiftless and faking an
Speaker 1: injury so they didn't have to do army stuff anymore. Right,
Speaker 1: So they gave these guys sodium amatal and they found that, Um,
Speaker 1: they were a forthcoming, seemingly against their will about their
Speaker 1: conditions about faking it or not right, that is true. Uh.
Speaker 1: They did not tell them they were going to be
Speaker 1: taken as they sprung it on him. Yeah, like a
Speaker 1: minute before. Yeah. And they interviewed them before they took
Speaker 1: the amatal at all by psychiatrists, So I think they
Speaker 1: wanted to get just a comparison. I guess. I don't
Speaker 1: know if you call it the control because it was
Speaker 1: the same people, but at least a control interview. Then
Speaker 1: they dosed them up and they said they had no
Speaker 1: no saying this. They had to do it. That's right, Um,
Speaker 1: and it different. The difference between that and the therapeutic
Speaker 1: is who wrote this? Do we have an author's name?
Speaker 1: His name he works for the CIA, is George Memorrell.
Speaker 1: So Mr Memorrell points out that the setting and the
Speaker 1: type of patients and the kind of truth is going
Speaker 1: to make all the difference. So it depends on what
Speaker 1: you're looking for and what kind of setting, because, like
Speaker 1: I pointed out earlier, when it was like student volunteers,
Speaker 1: it's way more friendly. And a lot of them reported like, oh,
Speaker 1: I feel you fork, and this is great, I'll tell
Speaker 1: you whatever you want, not criminals who are hiding a crime. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So um Bemor points out that the rapport between the
Speaker 1: interviewer and the interviewee is extremely important and important anyway,
Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, and that one of the flaws, or
Speaker 1: one of the significant points about that Fort Dick's interview
Speaker 1: um Or experiment was that these people still fessed up
Speaker 1: to being the lingers, even though there was a hostile
Speaker 1: attitude towards the interviewer, because they didn't have any choice
Speaker 1: in the matter and the guy sprung it on them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and they also manipulated them. And I think this is
Speaker 1: one of the reasons that I didn't find any cases
Speaker 1: where the court had actually admitted a confession drug induced confession. No.
Speaker 1: I mean I saw sorts of uses, but never one
Speaker 1: said all right, we put the scot on drugs and
Speaker 1: he confessed and we can use that. Did you find
Speaker 1: the Yeah, there's a in in the eighties of New
Speaker 1: jerseyman shot his ex girlfriend at point blank range. Um
Speaker 1: and he uh said that he had seen the devil
Speaker 1: when he did it. Uh, And he used a NARCO
Speaker 1: interview to basically have his sentence cut in half and
Speaker 1: it worked. But again, that was psychological wellness. That wasn't
Speaker 1: confessing to a crime even right, No, that they he
Speaker 1: was guilty. There was psychological wellness or what I'm saying
Speaker 1: a single case where the confession under a drug was allowed,
Speaker 1: So I see what you're saying. And yeah, it also
Speaker 1: said that the judge is um judge didn't allow any
Speaker 1: use of the words truth, serum, or um or barbiturate
Speaker 1: or anything like that. But the psychologists and psychiatrists who
Speaker 1: gave their opinion of this guy were allowed to use
Speaker 1: that NARCO interview to help form their opinions exactly. But yeah, yes,
Speaker 1: so I guess it is just kind of um a
Speaker 1: tool that you can't use in court, but you could
Speaker 1: use to kind of further explore other evidence, right well.
Speaker 1: And one of the reasons, which is what I was
Speaker 1: getting to, was that the they would manipulate people like
Speaker 1: when these soldiers were coming out of the state to
Speaker 1: a more fully conscious state. They would lie to them
Speaker 1: sometimes and say, hey, you already confessed like all this
Speaker 1: stuff like in zero dark thirty. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, because
Speaker 1: you have amnesia, you don't form any memories. You're physically
Speaker 1: incapable of forming memories when you're under the influence of
Speaker 1: barbiturous at a certain point. Yeah. They think they've used
Speaker 1: this before on terror suspects, like in the eighties. And uh,
Speaker 1: of course it was a big part of mk Ultra,
Speaker 1: our favorite sure government program of all time. H Um, So,
Speaker 1: I guess we should say, what what? There's different stages
Speaker 1: to being under the influence of barbiturates, right, there's the
Speaker 1: sedative stage. There's unconsciousness where you are hyperactive but you're unconscious,
Speaker 1: but you're you got the Jimmy legs. Uh, there's unconsciousness
Speaker 1: without reflex even anxious stimuli. And then the last one
Speaker 1: is death. So uh, I can't help out at that point, right.
Speaker 1: And you can also see why you would want to
Speaker 1: have a skilled physician president at this interrogation because this
Speaker 1: is a possibility which killing somebody. Um with using it.
Speaker 1: Sure you can't just like the Joe cop can't administer
Speaker 1: this stuff, right, And Joe cop even if he could,
Speaker 1: couldn't just give you pills. This has to be done
Speaker 1: through an injection. And what they do is they take
Speaker 1: you into the sedative stage, which can be um divided
Speaker 1: into three planes. Uh, well, bemoral does at least. Plane
Speaker 1: one is there's no really obvious effect. Plane two is cloudiness, calmness,
Speaker 1: you're kind of a little high. You forget everything, yes,
Speaker 1: but you still kind of have your wits about you,
Speaker 1: is from what I can tell. Plane three slurge, slurred
Speaker 1: speech like that, you're right, I'm on the third plane
Speaker 1: man um old thought patterns are disrupted. You have an
Speaker 1: inability to integrate or learn new patterns. Also four memories,
Speaker 1: poor coordination, and you're unaware of painful stimuli. And this
Speaker 1: is what they call the psychiatric work stage. They get
Speaker 1: you to this stage, which only lasts for like five
Speaker 1: or ten minutes, and then well, I'm sorry, they get
Speaker 1: you to unconsciousness, that first stage of unconsciousness, and then
Speaker 1: as you come back out of it, you pass through
Speaker 1: that third stage and they started asking you questions. Then
Speaker 1: as you start to become more and more conscious, they
Speaker 1: inject you again and make you unconscious, and then you
Speaker 1: come back out of it, and they may do this,
Speaker 1: like several times there was one psychotic prisoner who was
Speaker 1: given a graham and a half of barbiturous and um
Speaker 1: over the course of this interview. So I mean, that's
Speaker 1: that's that's probably a pretty long interview that the guy underwent,
Speaker 1: and that's a lot of barbituous you know, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: but that and that's one of the problems. These are
Speaker 1: heavy drugs and like the back to the Fort Dick soldiers,
Speaker 1: some of them experienced delirium and fantasies and delusions and
Speaker 1: said that they have kids that they didn't have and
Speaker 1: that I'm gonna kill my stepfather who was already dead.
Speaker 1: So it's kind of like sort of just throw it
Speaker 1: all out the window if at that point, you know, well,
Speaker 1: they don't know what's the truth and what's not exactly,
Speaker 1: So I guess what they'll do is they'll put you
Speaker 1: into sleep, bring you out, and ask you questions, and
Speaker 1: they probably write down everything you said, and then you
Speaker 1: they'll go back in fact check that kind of stuff
Speaker 1: and see what they can use against you or or
Speaker 1: in addition to probably as you're coming out. Finally at
Speaker 1: the end of the interview, yeah, there there may be
Speaker 1: some things that they know. Like if they suspect you
Speaker 1: of something and you say something that implicates you, they
Speaker 1: they'll they'll probably work that up pretty hard when you
Speaker 1: have no memory of it, or they'll just lie and say, yeah,
Speaker 1: you were you admitted to a lot of stuff. Do
Speaker 1: you want to talk a little more about it exactly?
Speaker 1: And you think you have you ever? Have you ever
Speaker 1: been with you me when she's coming out of like
Speaker 1: twilight sleep for a procedure or anything. No, she's she's
Speaker 1: been there for me. That's good stuff. Yeah, that's where
Speaker 1: you get the good stuff. Yeah, if if you ever
Speaker 1: do have some questions ready, um or your tape recorder,
Speaker 1: Like Emily had to go under not too long ago,
Speaker 1: and uh, I went in and I was I was
Speaker 1: like typing everything she was saying to me because I
Speaker 1: wanted to read it to her later. At funny, she
Speaker 1: thought they were throwing her a party and um, because
Speaker 1: they had like the curtain that they pulled around the
Speaker 1: hospital bed, you know, and she thought that they were
Speaker 1: decorating for her party. And I wish I remembered everything
Speaker 1: she said as real funny and then you know, when
Speaker 1: I have my tooth done. I said all kinds of
Speaker 1: crazy stuff to the doctors. Yeah, I'm sure that's the
Speaker 1: best part of their day. Are the recordings of that? No,
Speaker 1: I don't think so. You may records me when I'm
Speaker 1: talking in my sleep. Yeah, it's really intrusive, man, And
Speaker 1: then she'll play it for me the next morning and
Speaker 1: laugh and laugh, and you'll delete it. No, she's got
Speaker 1: it all on tape still. Really, yeah, I would get
Speaker 1: rid of that stuff. I'm trying to. I don't know
Speaker 1: where she keeps it. Um. All right, So you pointed
Speaker 1: out one thing that they actually did mention in the
Speaker 1: article too, is that persistent and careful questioning is the
Speaker 1: only way that you're going to reduce these ambiguities that
Speaker 1: are going flying around like. It's not just like a
Speaker 1: regular interrogation. You have to understand that this person is
Speaker 1: heavily drugged and you gotta weed through a bunch of
Speaker 1: stuff to get to what may or may not be
Speaker 1: the truth. And here's the big thing about using NARCO interviews,
Speaker 1: narco analytical interviews. If you're a skilled interrogator, you should
Speaker 1: be able to get all this from the same person
Speaker 1: without the use of drugs. Well, that's what they say
Speaker 1: to right. Yes, to the experts said, I would have
Speaker 1: eventually gotten to this point had I just done it clean, Yeah,
Speaker 1: had I had enough time, or had had we had
Speaker 1: somebody in there who knew what they were doing more
Speaker 1: to interrogate the person, we would have gotten the same thing.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I have the same impression that barbiturates are
Speaker 1: shortcut as far as getting like probitive truth. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: if you using like a narco interview or interrogation, Um,
Speaker 1: it's it's a little bit of a shortcut, but it
Speaker 1: also makes it much harder, like you were saying, for
Speaker 1: even the most seasoned interrogator, because there's so much baffling
Speaker 1: stuff that they include that may or may not be true,
Speaker 1: that may or may not be related to anything that
Speaker 1: that can actually kind of cloud the truth more than
Speaker 1: if they were just sitting there line. Yeah, while and
Speaker 1: if you're just Joe cop, you may not be some
Speaker 1: trained psychologists and a lot of times it helps we
Speaker 1: threw that stuff. I think Joe cops just say away
Speaker 1: from the barbaituits in the suspects. At the same time,
Speaker 1: you know, um Ben's adrine has actually been used as well.
Speaker 1: You wouldn't think stimulants would be effective if you were
Speaker 1: trying to question someone. But ben zadene and methodrene they
Speaker 1: found potts. Oh yeah, yeah, I mean it's hardcore speed,
Speaker 1: pharmaceutical speed. It was what Neil Cassidy like died doing
Speaker 1: ben bead and scopel amine. Is that right? How weird
Speaker 1: at this wedding? I just saw that On the Road movie.
Speaker 1: This made me think of that, remember him dying in
Speaker 1: on the Road. Especially, he didn't die in on the Road,
Speaker 1: but he died. You know. Neil Cassie was the real
Speaker 1: dude that the character was, but in real life he
Speaker 1: died at some wedding in Mexico. And it's sort of
Speaker 1: but it's not necessarily in the movie. You'll just have
Speaker 1: to see it. So, uh is it movie again? Um?
Speaker 1: I mean, are you on the Road fan? Yeah? I
Speaker 1: mean it's very faithful and it's very beautiful and the
Speaker 1: casting was great. Okay, that was what I was worried
Speaker 1: about the most. They do a good job with it,
Speaker 1: and but you know how tough it is to make
Speaker 1: a coherent, like traditional movie out of that book. So
Speaker 1: I think he did a good job. I enjoyed it.
Speaker 1: So anyway, hardcore speed was used for a while because
Speaker 1: they thought that there was so little time for them
Speaker 1: to consider formulating a lie, that people when they're on
Speaker 1: the speed would just barf out everything as quick as
Speaker 1: they can and just talk talk talk talk talk. Right,
Speaker 1: So if you're gonna do that, you could still maybe
Speaker 1: formulate a lie even though you're talking really fast. Let's
Speaker 1: put the barbituates and the methamphetam means together and see
Speaker 1: what happens. And I think he mentions at least one
Speaker 1: study that found like, yeah, it kind of works a
Speaker 1: little bit at the very least wild r if you're
Speaker 1: a mild um. I just finished their auto biography, by
Speaker 1: the way, really, yeah, that's what made me think of it.
Speaker 1: Oh it's amazing, is it really? Yeah? That's cool. I'm
Speaker 1: surprised those dudes are alive. Let's just put it that way.
Speaker 1: I'm sure. Um so. J. M. McDonald he's a psychiatrist
Speaker 1: in Denver and he's had a lot of experience with this,
Speaker 1: and he is one of the people that that is
Speaker 1: pretty hardcore against the confession aspect of it, Like, we
Speaker 1: can use it for a lot of things, but we
Speaker 1: can't use it too as the truth of a confession
Speaker 1: of a crime. That's just sort of his stance. Here's
Speaker 1: why he do you remember the psychopath? I said that
Speaker 1: got a graham and a half of barbiturous. This guy
Speaker 1: was um, totally in control. He was completely self possessed,
Speaker 1: as I think they put it um throughout this interview,
Speaker 1: and actually was asking more than once like hey, can
Speaker 1: I have another injection? I have a feeling he was
Speaker 1: a serious drug user. Yeah, or at the very least
Speaker 1: he was after that, sound like he had experience. So
Speaker 1: he he and he that he didn't give up anything.
Speaker 1: And what what McDonald thinks, and what I think a
Speaker 1: lot of psychiatrists believe, is that if you are a
Speaker 1: very self possessed person with the strong mind and I
Speaker 1: guess the strong will you might put it, you're not
Speaker 1: going to give up anything all the way until unconsciousness.
Speaker 1: They can knock you out and you're not going to
Speaker 1: say it. He even faked amnesia as part of the
Speaker 1: whole ruse. Right, have you seen um side effects? Not yet?
Speaker 1: That's good. You don't even say anything else, no, no,
Speaker 1: no spoilers, Yeah all right, uh yeah, well you're exactly right, though,
Speaker 1: he uh, he faked all this stuff, and if you're
Speaker 1: neurotic on the other hand, or the kind of person
Speaker 1: who is prone to confess, like a guilty conscience type anyway, right,
Speaker 1: exactly like you. You You you feel relief by by by
Speaker 1: telling people things, and you're more likely So it depends
Speaker 1: on who's asking what they're asking, who the who the
Speaker 1: person under the drugs is uh, A lot of different
Speaker 1: factors on whether or not it's legitimate at all. So Chuck,
Speaker 1: like we said, this is a CIA white paper from
Speaker 1: that we're working off of. It's a white paper, yeah, um,
Speaker 1: and it was recently declassified. Pretty cool paper if you
Speaker 1: ask me. Um, although there it is really kind of
Speaker 1: all over the place. Um the structure. Sure, I've become
Speaker 1: an admirer of it. I know you're not, but I
Speaker 1: like the guys in the CIA. He's not a professional writer.
Speaker 1: He did a fine job. So he uh he he
Speaker 1: points out that, Okay, I'm in the CIA. How do
Speaker 1: we use this for the CIA? And he says that
Speaker 1: it has been used before for example, um, to find
Speaker 1: out if a foreign subject knows a language that you
Speaker 1: say they're not, like, maybe they're actually a foreigner, a
Speaker 1: double agent or something like that. You get like, I
Speaker 1: don't know speaking English, and then all of a sudden
Speaker 1: you get them under the thanks for the drugs exactly
Speaker 1: so they can sniff out someone who says they don't
Speaker 1: speak your tongue. Um. And he says that the one
Speaker 1: of the problems is you're gonna have a hostile interrogation
Speaker 1: and rapport like the the some of the guys in
Speaker 1: this field of psychiatry've done studies on this show. It's
Speaker 1: really important. But he kind of comes to the conclusion
Speaker 1: that if you use a doctor, you have automatically somebody
Speaker 1: that's universally trusted to some extent. And if you use
Speaker 1: a doctor to conduct these inner views, you're probably gonna
Speaker 1: have a little more poor And if it's a doctor
Speaker 1: who knows what they're doing with interrogations, then yeah, this
Speaker 1: could be kind of useful. The problem is is in
Speaker 1: the West, as he puts it, the use of truth
Speaker 1: serums is not it's not it's frowned on. It seems
Speaker 1: unfair the Iron Curtain though, right, They wasn't Russia big
Speaker 1: into it. No, he found the CIA writer found that
Speaker 1: there was two mentions of Russia uh and truth serums,
Speaker 1: and in one of them they said Russia doesn't use
Speaker 1: these I don't buy that that's what he says. He's
Speaker 1: the CIA author, so you'd think he would know, you know,
Speaker 1: was that from the Comrade files didn't down there right?
Speaker 1: Or was it like real information he was doing it.
Speaker 1: I guess he was doing a survey of publicly available stuff.
Speaker 1: So I'm sure that Russians wouldn't be like, yeah, we
Speaker 1: use this stuff all the time. Chief Um, he did
Speaker 1: say that, Okay, if we're not going to use it,
Speaker 1: our guys should be aware of what the of possibly
Speaker 1: having to experience this. And there's only one way to
Speaker 1: train somebody, and that's to do it to them. So
Speaker 1: I'm wondering, as a result of this paper, how many
Speaker 1: CIA agents have been you know, dosed up with barbiturous
Speaker 1: and given the third degree, because that's what this recommendation was.
Speaker 1: Just like, if you're an agent, you should be tested
Speaker 1: on this, and not only will you know it, give
Speaker 1: the agent the the firsthand experience, and you should videotape
Speaker 1: it so they can see they didn't actually talk about this,
Speaker 1: so they can't be manipulated into saying, oh, you said
Speaker 1: a bunch of stuff. Still no, right, But also it
Speaker 1: gives the agency, the awareness of like how much this
Speaker 1: person is going to give up under under interrogation when
Speaker 1: they're drugged, And maybe they shouldn't be sent to Latvia,
Speaker 1: maybe they should just be sent to Brazil instead. That's
Speaker 1: a good point. So like testing the dudes to see
Speaker 1: how they would react in the field in case they're
Speaker 1: in some back room somewhere, right and um femoral yeah
Speaker 1: he uh. He also suggests re member, we said LSD
Speaker 1: doesn't work as a truth serum. He suggested that agents
Speaker 1: possibly be given LSD, so if they're about to be
Speaker 1: dosed with truth serum, they can take some LST and
Speaker 1: just start going crazy, is how he puts it. In essence,
Speaker 1: all of this stuff they say will be bizarre and unreliable. Wow. Yeah,
Speaker 1: pretty cool stuff. Huh you got anything else? I think
Speaker 1: that's about it, man. Yeah, I'm curious to see how
Speaker 1: this Holmes trial what happens with that, because there's so
Speaker 1: little like I think it was. Uh, well you said
Speaker 1: you got the idea from seeing that. Yeah. I was
Speaker 1: gonna say it was coincidence, but I guess not. There's
Speaker 1: very few cases to even draw upon these days, so
Speaker 1: well done. Well done to YouTube can't wait to see
Speaker 1: what happens Holmes, So Truth Serum. We'll keep an eye
Speaker 1: out for the James Holmes thing. Uh. If you want
Speaker 1: to learn more about Truth Serum, you can try the
Speaker 1: search bar how stuff works dot com. But you may
Speaker 1: also want to read this CIA white paper, Truth, Drugs
Speaker 1: and Interrogation by George Bimmerell. Uh. And it's from September
Speaker 1: published by the CIA. Uh. And now it's time for listeners. Yes, Josh,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call this one. Uh. I can't remember what
Speaker 1: this is. That's what you gonna call it. Wait, wait,
Speaker 1: let me stop your for a second. Before we get
Speaker 1: to listener mail. Um, we need to give a shout out.
Speaker 1: Remember how we said, remember our horror fiction contest, could
Speaker 1: I forget? And we said that any of the people
Speaker 1: who entered as thanks, if they went on to publish anything,
Speaker 1: let us know, and we would tell everybody. Well. One
Speaker 1: of our horror writers, Melissa Maninny, has a sort of
Speaker 1: a short story called The Hangar that's included in an
Speaker 1: anthology of women horror writers called Mistresses of the macam.
Speaker 1: It's available on Amazon dot com and on Dark Moon
Speaker 1: Books dot com. So go check that out. Um, yeah, excellent, Melissa, congratulations. Okay,
Speaker 1: now it's time for listening email. Sorry, that's right, Um,
Speaker 1: we are going. I was able to title it in
Speaker 1: that brief break this is uh Aaron's grandpa is we
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call it hey guys. Today at work, I
Speaker 1: was re listening to older podcasts when I heard how
Speaker 1: tickling works and I was delightfully surprised to hear you
Speaker 1: call out for stories about Disney, in particular fascinating ones
Speaker 1: about the dark side. Um. This isn't one of those emails, however,
Speaker 1: but my grandpa Ron Brown worked as an actor for
Speaker 1: Disney in the late sixties to the late seventies, making
Speaker 1: movies and TV shows with animals, and also behind the
Speaker 1: scenes doing animal taming to a point and training. He
Speaker 1: was well known for being able to train bears, but
Speaker 1: most love for his strange assortment of critters he would
Speaker 1: bring home from work to entertain my mom and her
Speaker 1: siblings during her childhood. She had a pet squirrel, skunk,
Speaker 1: and multiple pigs that would make their home in her bed. Uh.
Speaker 1: He was the lead in two movies which I I
Speaker 1: am almost positive you have not heard of. Charlie the
Speaker 1: Lonesome cougar and left he the dingling links and I
Speaker 1: haven't heard of either one of those Disney was pumping
Speaker 1: about though. You know, even though he never made it
Speaker 1: big in Hollywood in his older years, he would always
Speaker 1: tell interesting stories hanging out with John Wayne or how
Speaker 1: he was One time in an elevator with Walt Disney himself,
Speaker 1: he chickened out telling him how much he loved all
Speaker 1: the time spent working for him. When he moved to
Speaker 1: a Sequim, Washington, he helped move retired show bears up
Speaker 1: to the Olympic Game Farm, where he would continue to
Speaker 1: train them an impressed tourist while making bears do fun tricks.
Speaker 1: And anyways, I love my grandpa very much and I
Speaker 1: mostly just wanted to share these memories of him that
Speaker 1: have been passed down to my favorite podcasters. So that
Speaker 1: is from Aaron, and she a cinephoto two of Grandpa
Speaker 1: Ron with John Wayne. So he wasn't making that up. Wow,
Speaker 1: it's pretty cool. So Aaron, we love stories about cool
Speaker 1: grandpa's and thanks sure, thanks, and thanks to your grandpa
Speaker 1: for being a cool grandpa. Um, if you want to
Speaker 1: tell us about your cool grandpa or any cool relative
Speaker 1: that hasn't a pretty interesting story, whether it relates to
Speaker 1: the podcast or not, we want to hear. You can
Speaker 1: tweet to us at s y s K podcast. You
Speaker 1: can join us on Facebook, dot com slash stuff you
Speaker 1: Should Know, and our home on the web is our website,
Speaker 1: appropriately titled stuff you Should Know dot com. For more
Speaker 1: on this and thousands of other topics, is it how
Speaker 1: stuff Works dot com