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3 Va. J. Soc. Pol'y & L. 3 (1995-1996)
Trust, Lies, and Interrogation

handle is hein.journals/vajsplw3 and id is 9 raw text is: TRUST, LIES, AND INTERROGATION Margaret L. Paris, INTRODUCTION You have probably heard the old joke about the three biggest lies in the world: In escalating size, the first is Of course I'll still respect you.... . Next comes The check is in the mail.... . Then the big- gest whopper of all: I'm from the government-I'm here to help you.9 The fact that this joke has been circulating for years highlights our anxieties about the trustworthiness of three special kinds of partners: romantic, financial, and civic.2 Cooperative relationships with these partners are particularly important to our well-being, but if we cannot trust their assurances, we may find ourselves avoiding such relation- ships. But on what grounds do we decide to trust these partners when we cannot possibly control completely their choices of future action? After all, they might live up to our worst fears and turn us into suck- ers. Assistant Professor, University of Oregon School of Law. B.A., 1981; J.D., 1985, Northwestern University. Many colleagues deserve thanks for the help they provided me in writing this article. First and foremost are my husband, Sheldon Rubin, and my friend Lisa Kloppenberg. I am also especially grateful to Leslie Harris for talking me through this arti- cle at several stages, and to others who gave me helpful comments on drafts: Garrett Epps, Laird Kirkpatrick, David Schuman, and Andrew Taslitz. I received valuable research assis- tance from Mike Reeder, and the University of Oregon and its School of Law assisted me through generous research grants. Finally, I owe much to the clients with whom I worked during six years of criminal defense practice in Chicago. Almost all of them were guilty of having committed crimes, and many, though by no means all, of them impressed me with their remorse, humanity, and overwhelming desire to reenter relationships of trust. The shame I felt at the deceitful treatment that many of them received from law enforcement officials (who, I believe, were simply following their training) was the genesis of this arti- cle. 2 Psychologists have long observed that jokes tend to reflect powerful human anxieties. See Sigmund Freud, Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious (J. Strachey trans., 1960).

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