Is someone guilty if they wont take a lie detector test?

Answer 1

Disclaimer: I am not an attorney and I have no training in law.

I am, however, a citizen of the World, and a veteran of military service.

And now to answer your question: when a person refuses to submit to a lie detector test, it does NOT mean he or she is guilty.

Citizens of a fair number of nations around the world cannot be compelled, by law, to submit to a lie detector test. It is fair to mention now that these tests can be cheated by those well-trained, and also that innocent people who are nervous and afraid can score a false positive (false guilty.)

What I am saying is that lie-detector testing is less than solid from a scientific standing. Guilty persons almost always fail the test. Innocent people also fail sometimes. When an innocent person fails the test, he becomes guilty to the law, contrary to justice.

Personally, if I knew I was guilty, I would submit to the test. But if I was falsely accused, and sure of my innocence, I would proudly refuse any and all truth/lie tests.

Innocent people have been known to fail polygraph tests. In Wichita, Kansas, in 1986, after failing two polygraph tests (one police administered, the other given by an expert that he had hired), Bill Wegerle had to live under a cloud of suspicion of murdering his wife Vicki Wegerle, even though he was neither arrested nor convicted of her death. In March 2004, a letter was sent to The Wichita Eagle reporter Hurst Laviana that contained Vicki's drivers license and what first appeared to be crime scene photographs of her body.

The photos had actually been taken by her true murderer, the BTK killer (Bind, Torture, Kill); the serial killer that had plagued the people of Wichita since 1974 and had recently resurfaced in February 2004 after an apparent 25 year period of dormancy (he had actually killed three women between 1985 and 1991, including Wegerle). That effectively cleared Bill Wegerle of the murder of his wife. In 2005 conclusive DNA evidence, including DNA retrieved from under the fingernails of Vicki Wegerle, demonstrated that the BTK Killer was Dennis Rader.

Information taken from Wikipedia and other sources.