The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation mentions in a report dated 23 September 2010 that anticipated polygraph testing is among the causes of an armored car drivers’ strike in the provinces of New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island:

Armoured car drivers have set up picket lines across New Brunswick and P.E.I.

Members of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters who work for G4S Secure Solutions Canada went on strike at midnight Wednesday.

Union member Dan McPhee said wages, benefits and the expectation of mandatory polygraph tests are at issue.

“As it stands now, they can force us to take [a polygraph] and use it against us even though no one else follows that formula,” McPhee said. “If they suspect us of stealing they can bring us in, take one, and if it comes up inconclusive they say you must be stealing and ‘We’re letting you go.’”

The armoured car drivers stock ATMs for several banks including Royal Bank, CIBC and TD Bank branches. They also deliver money to several stores, including Costco, Wal-Mart and Canadian Tire.

The approximately 80 drivers are picketing busy areas, McPhee said, but their intention isn’t to hurt business.

“If they don’t wish to go into the bank because we are here on strike, that’s up to them,” McPhee said. “But we don’t want anyone to feel we are preventing them from doing their daily business.”

The union said company managers are filling in for the workers.

The company’s president couldn’t be reached for comment.

Clayton County, Georgia Sheriff Kem Kimbrough

Kevin Rowson of WXIA television news in Atlanta reports on Clayton County sheriff Kemuel “Kem” Kimbrough’s plans to subject 40-50 employees to polygraph screening in an attempt to determine who anonymously e-mailed reporters a complaint about work conditions in the department:

CLAYTON COUNTY, GA — Clayton County Sheriff deputies are being asked to take a polygraph test because the Sheriff wants to find out who is talking to the media.

Sheriff Kem Kimbrough said he’s trying to get to the bottom of a problem at his jail. It stems from an email sent to the media that claims a number of problems at the county’s jail.

The email contends that the jail has a number of problems, including a water outage, and officer safety “after recent riots at the jail.”

The email quoted a source who said that morale is at an all time low and employees are frustrated that no one will air their concerns.

Sheriff Kimbrough said “Morale for bad employees is at an all time low because I’m rooting them out one by one.”

Forcing 40-50 employees to submit to the indignity of polygraph “testing”–a thoroughly discredited procedure that has no scientific basis–is unlikely to improve morale.

The email referred to recent riots at the jail. Sheriff Kimbrough said there have been no riots. “I told them I don’t mind you calling the media, I don’t mind you talking to people so long as you tell the truth,” he said.

The Sheriff is going to give polygraph tests to about forty or fifty employees who worked the shift when, what he called “the lies”, were leaked to the media. “Since I know that I’ve got some liars in the midst we’re going to investigate to see whose telling those lies,” Sheriff Kimbrough said. “If we catch you telling the lie then that’s something that always has been punishable by termination.”

But if someone “fails” a polygraph “test,” it doesn’t mean that they have been “caught” telling a lie. Polygraphy is sheer pseudoscience, and it is inherently biased against the truthful, yet easily passed by liars using simple countermeasures, as explained in AntiPolygraph.org’s free book, The Lie Behind the Lie Detector (1 mb PDF). Clayton County Sheriff’s Office personnel ordered to submit to polygraphic interrogation may wish to read it.

The email, sent from an anonymous account, said “Deputies of the Clayton County Sheriff’s Office are expressing concern over threats of termination.”

The Sheriff said he believes it’s only about six employees behind the email who were holdovers from the past administration of former Sheriff Victor Hill. “They had it good,” Sheriff Kimbrough said. “They weren’t doing any work, they were living the high life off the county dime and now I put them to work.”

The Sheriff said time and money are not an issue with his investigation because he has an internal affairs section that will handle it. He said he also has a polygraph expert on staff.

It looks as if Sheriff Kimbrough already has suspects in mind. No doubt his polygraph expert will know which employees the sheriff suspects. It would not be surprising if the very employees Kimbrough suspects happen to “fail” the polygraph. In a famous experiment set up by CBS 60 Minutes, four different polygraph operators found four different employees of Popular Photography magazine guilty of having stolen camera equipment. Each polygrapher had been told in advance that a different employee was the likely culprit. And in each case, it was the employee who had been fingered as a suspect who “failed.” In fact, no camera had been stolen.