Detector Story

The lie detector won. In Brooklyn last week Mrs. Edna Hancock, who had pitted her word against that of a lie detector in a recent rape case (TIME, Jan. 10), was indicted for perjury. Her alleged rapist, Murray Goldman, was saved from a ten-year prison sentence.

The case could not alter the fact that lie detectors may sometimes lie,* but that was all right with Mr. Goldman. Mrs. Hancock, an employe of Brooklyn State Hospital, had charged that he broke into her room and tried to rape her. A jury convicted him. But when the lie detector supported his story that he was no stranger to Mrs. Hancock's favors, Judge Samuel Leibowitz went hunting for corroborative evidence. Result: several other men friends of Mrs. Hancock (besides her husband) turned up. She finally admitted that she had met Goldman before. Last week the District Attorney waved Murray Goldman out of jail, clapped Mrs. Hancock in.

*Unless there is evidence supporting the detector, there can obviously be no proof that it is telling the truth.

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