• Home
  • Lecture Series

Lecture Series

ALL EVENTS ARE FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC.

Who can spot a liar? Are police officers expert lie catchers?
Professor David Walsh, School of Law and Criminology, University of Derby [United Kingdom]
Saturday, March 2 at 3:30 pm
Husted Hall 106A, University at Albany Downtown Campus
Being candid, the reliance on emotion based deception detection methods, when combined with certain interrogation techniques and investigator bias, can undermine the notion of criminal justice, where the guilty are convicted and the innocent go free. Accusatorial methods of questioning of suspects may well increase stress. As such, this approach might lead to suspects showing fear and anxiety that may lead to them exhibiting behaviours and responses that reinforce the investigator belief in their guilt. In turn this may prompt investigators to strive more for confessions from those firmly believed to be guilty. Some of these elicited confessions are made by suspects quite probably guilty of the crime for which they are being investigated. On the other hand, confessions have been made by those who are later found to be completely innocent of the crime. This talk will examine the challenges of trying to discriminate between one group and the other. The talk will also examine the human cost of getting it wrong.

 

 

 

** More information coming soon! ** 

Past Lectures:
Nicole Rafter, Ph.D.  Justice, Genocide, and Multicultural Issues
    - View the photo album
    - Visit the related resources page

Victor Streib, J.D.  Death to the Women and Children
    - View the photo album
    - Visit the related resources page

Environmental Reproductive Justice in American Indian Communities
Dr. Elizabeth Hoover, Ethnic Studies and American Studies, Brown University
Friday, February 22 at 4:30 pm
Husted Hall 106A, University at Albany Downtown Campus
Indigenous communities face disproportionate health burdens and environmental health risk compared with the average population. This talk brings together the concepts of environmental justice, in which communities have been fighting for the protection of their environmental resources, and reproductive justice, in which women have been fighting for control of their reproductive abilities, to discuss the actions being taken in Native communities where the ability to reproduce culturally informed tribal members is being impacted by environmental contamination.

 

CANCELLED (An alternate event date is being selected. Please check back.)
Jeff Manza, Ph.D.
Counterterrorism and the Dark Side of American Public Opinion
Thursday, November 1
Location is Husted Hall, Room 214, UAlbany Downtown Campus, 135 Western Avenue
Lecture at 12:00 pm