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Shocking the Conscience: Public Responses to Police Use of the “Mr. Big” Technique

ABSTRACT The Mr. Big technique is an elaborate Canadian undercover approach used to elicit confessions from suspects. The process involves befriending the suspect, involving him or her in a (fake) criminal gang, and through enticement, bribes, promises of future employment, threats of abandonment and (often) violence, eliciting a confession to the crime of interest. At Canadian law, evidence procured through police tactics that “shock the conscience” of the community must be ruled inadmissible. Our research explored the extent to which Mr. Big tactics are perceived as shocking. A sample of 120 participants rated vignettes of seven real Mr. Big cases as to how shocking the procedures were. Results indicated that the degree to which participants viewed the police procedures as atypical, or involving a potential breach of suspect rights, were related to increased shock.