Blood test??
would have cleared things up quite quickly i would think?
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MovieChat Forums > The Imposter (2012) Discussion > Blood test??
SPOILER ALERT!
I found myself thinking the same thing right at the time in the movie where they "tested" Frederic with the 5 family photos and he got 4 out of 5. I don't know how the traditional law enforcement game in an instance like that plays out when a legitimate family member "believes" the person to be who he says he is.
I found it interesting that the mother passed the polygraph test twice and then failed it big time after that to give credence to thoughts toward Charlie Parker's possibility hypothesis that the Nicholas' half brother may have killed Nicholaas with the knowledge and/or help of the mom. But I can also understand if the mom was innocent, of her easily passing the test twice and then getting freaked out that they're still grilling her resulting in FALSE indicators from the polygraph.
I found it interesting that the mother passed the polygraph test twice and then failed it big time after that to give credence to thoughts toward Charlie Parker's possibility hypothesis that the Nicholas' half brother may have killed Nicholaas with the knowledge and/or help of the mom. But I can also understand if the mom was innocent, of her easily passing the test twice and then getting freaked out that they're still grilling her resulting in FALSE indicators from the polygraph.
Don't rely on just this documentary to form your conclusions about that episode. There is a very specific piece of information that the documentary left out concerning *why* the FBI agent felt the need to repeat the test another two times. share
Can you enlighten us to what it was?
shareHere is how the episode was described in the New Yorker article on the case:
One day, Fisher asked Beverly to take a polygraph. Carey recalls, “I said, ‘Mom, do whatever they ask you to do. Go take the lie-detector test. You didn’t kill Nicholas.’ So she did.”
While Beverly was taking the polygraph, Fisher watched the proceedings on a video monitor in a nearby room. The most important question was whether Beverly currently knew the whereabouts of Nicholas. She said no, twice. The polygraph examiner told Fisher that Beverly had seemingly answered truthfully. When Fisher expressed disbelief, the examiner said that if Beverly was lying, she had to be on drugs. After a while, the examiner administered the test again, at which point the effects of any possible narcotics, including methadone, might have worn off. This time, when the examiner asked if Beverly knew Nicholas’s whereabouts, Fisher says, the machine went wild, indicating a lie. “She blew the instruments practically off the table,” Fisher says. (False positives are not uncommon in polygraphs, and scientists dispute their basic reliability.)
According to Fisher, when the examiner told Beverly that she had failed the exam, and began pressing her with more questions, Beverly yelled, “I don’t have to put up with this,” then got up and ran out the door. “I catch her,” Fisher recalls. “I say, ‘Why are you running?’ She is furious. She says, ‘This is so typical of Nicholas. Look at the hell he’s putting me through.’ ”
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/08/11/the-chameleon-2 share
Oh wow. Yes that is pretty interesting information. Thanks for sharing.
shareBlood tests were probably quite expensive in 1997...in Linares, Spain. I suppose they would only resort to that if there was substantial doubt...the photo test and their "judgement" left them with no doubt. I guess they wanted the happy ending of reuniting a family with their son.
shareDNA tests weren't prohibitively expensive in 1997 for a case like this, and were a common forensic tool.
shareBut only utilized when required...the Spanish judge had no question he was the boy...and towards the end the mother refused only just before Frederic admitted everything...so there was no need really.
shareFrom the point he arrived in the Unites States up until the point he was arrested was only four months, that's actually pretty quick when it comes to something like this. Keep in mind this sort of thing was really quite unprecedented. On top of that getting a blood test done requires a court order (when the subjects of the test are unwilling such as in this case).
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