“Why would I do that?”: Discursive and Interactional Manifestations of Suspect Resistance in Police Investigative Interviews

Abstract

Police investigative interviews are typically described in terms of their asymmetrical distribution of power, with authority and control often concentrated in the hands of the investigator. Yet this asymmetry is not absolute. Drawing on discourse analysis, this article examines how suspects of online sexual offenses used language to actively negotiate and, at times, resist the institutional roles assigned to them—namely, those of respondent and informant. Our analysis shows that at the interactional level, resistance to the respondent role manifests in violations of turn-taking, thematic progression, and authorized speech acts. At the discursive level, suspects employ elliptical, evasive, or non-agentive responses to resist their informant role, often minimizing their responsibility. These strategies, observed across cases, highlight that resistance is not confined to silence or refusal to speak but can also take subtle, linguistically embedded forms. The findings illustrate the complexity of power dynamics in investigative interviewing and emphasize the interplay of linguistic, discursive, and interactional strategies through which suspects attempt to influence and redirect the interview process.