Writing Wrongs

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Linguistics, Life, and Death

* Warning: Today’s episode contains discussions of murder and racial profiling * Some time in the 2000s, somewhere in the USA. John Smith, an African American male defendant, has been accused of murder. While in jail awaiting trial, he makes a phone call to his cousin. It was believed John confessed to the murder. The defence disagreed, but needed linguistic assistance to help them. Elsewhere in the country, tragedy has struck. 7-year-old Leona Harris was attending a house party with her father, Robert. While standing in the front garden with some friends, they came under gunfire from a passing car. A number of the group were wounded – Leona and Robert fatally so. The police believed they had identified the gang responsible, and the individual who pulled the trigger, and brought him in to be interrogated. However, they needed more information to charge him with the murders. To obtain this, they approached a former member of the gang, Sidney Brown, to help them gather new evidence to arrest the prime suspect – Marcus Jeffreys. Sidney was provided with a mobile phone and instructed to call Marcus, the conversation being recorded and later transcribed. The prosecution’s case was that the transcript clearly showed Marcus agreeing to the proposition that he had committed the murders. Marcus’s defence disagreed. In today’s episode, our hosts Dr Nicci MacLeod and Professor Tim Grant are joined by Professor of Linguistics John Baugh. He’s come to talk to us about his type of linguistic profiling, which occurs when someone’s speech triggers discriminatory bias against them. Through a discussion of two cases John has worked on, he explains how his expertise tackled linguistic evidence in the US criminal justice system. For a list of our sources and more information about this case, please visit https://www.aston.ac.uk/writing-wrongs Have a question for Nicci or Tim? Email us at writingwrongs@aston.ac.uk and we may answer it during an upcoming episode! Check out the official AIFL blog for more forensic linguistic goodies here: https://medium.com/@AIFLblog If you have been affected by any of the themes in this week’s episode, please contact one of these free sources: https://www.samaritans.org/how-we-can-help/contact-samaritan/https://www.helpguide.org/find-help Production Team: Jordan Robertson, Neus Alberich Buera, Karolina Placzynta, James CresswellSound: James CresswellEditing: Angela WalkerVisual design: George GrantWith our thanks to Professor John Baugh   Professor Tim Grant’s home page: Tim Grant - Aston Research Explorer Dr Nicci MacLeod’s home page: Nicci MacLeod - Aston Research Explorer Professor John Baugh’s home page: John Baugh | Faculty | The People of Rice | Rice University Professor John Baugh’s book: Linguistics in Pursuit of Justice Center for African and African American Studies at Rice University  Academic resources Baugh, J. (2016). Linguistic profiling and discrimination. The Oxford handbook of language and society, 349-368. Cotterill, J. (2003). Language and power in court: A linguistic analysis of the OJ Simpson trial. Springer. Dixon, J. A., Mahoney, B., & Cocks, R. (2002). Accents of guilt? Effects of regional accent, race, and crime type on attributions of guilt. Journal of Language and Social Psychology, 21(2), 162-168. Fraser, H. (2020). Forensic transcription: The case for transcription as a dedicated branch of linguistic science. In The Routledge handbook of forensic linguistics (pp. 416-431). Routledge. OJ Simpson Trial Transcript http://simpson.walraven.org/jul12.html  Other resources BBC 2016, “Renting while black,” https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-trending-35464634. The Fair Housing ActResources

The Case of Don Juan de Marin

*Warning: this episode contains descriptions of emotional abuse and manipulation* --- November 12, 2018, Madrid, Spain. 47-year-old Galician man Rodrigo Nogueira Iglesias is arrested near the Puerta de Atocha railway station. His crimes stretched back more than twenty years. Rodrigo frequented social media platforms and dating websites where he used fake profiles, pretending to be different people with different names and professions, all with the initial goal of attracting the attention of women who could be potential victims. We are joined by Dr Sheila Queralt – a friend of the Institute and Spain’s top forensic linguistics expert, having consulted on some 300 cases over the past 15 years and testified as a linguistics expert witness in criminal and civil trials across 10 countries, with cases reaching courts including the ECHR. Her work in forensic linguistics at ForensicLab continues through her Laboratory based in Barcelona, which provides linguisticanalysis of recorded conversations and voice messages, as well as written documents.---In the episode, we make references to episodes 1.4 Romance Fraud, featuring a conversation with Dr Lis Carter, and 3.2 The Multiple Personas of an Online Child Abuser, featuring DrEmily Chiang. Have a question for Nicci or Tim? Email us at writingwrongs@aston.ac.uk and we may answer it during an upcoming episode!  Check out the official AIFL blog for more forensic linguistic goodies here: https://medium.com/@AIFLblog   If you have been affected by any of the themes in this week’s episode, please contact one of these free sources: https://www.samaritans.org/how-we-can-help/contact-samaritan/  https://www.helpguide.org/find-help  ---Production Team:  Angela Walker, Jordan Robertson, Neus Alberich Buera, Karolina Placzynta Sound: James Cresswell Visual design: George Grant Editing: Angela Walker Additional voices: Salvador Alberich Castelló ---Illustration by Víctor Gomollón García. Reproduced with the illustrator's kind permission. The illustration was originally created for the book Estafas amorosas by Sheila Queralt Estévez (Larousse Editorial, 2022).More information about the book:https://www.larousse.es/libro/libros-ilustrados-practicos/estafas-amorosas-sheila-queralt-estevez-9788419250179/ EspañolIlustración de Víctor Gomollón García. Reproducida con la amable autorización del ilustrador. La ilustración fue creada originalmente para el libro Estafas amorosas, de Sheila Queralt Estévez (Larousse Editorial, 2022).Más información sobre el libro:https://www.larousse.es/libro/libros-ilustrados-practicos/estafas-amorosas-sheila-queralt-estevez-9788419250179/---Professor Tim Grant’s home page: Tim Grant- Aston Research Explorer  Dr Nicci MacLeod’s home page: NicciMacLeod - Aston Research Explorer  Dr Sheila Queralt’s home page: SQ-Lingüistas Forenses Decalogue for requesting a linguistics expert report by Sheila Queralt    News of the Nogueira Iglesias case in the Spanish press A guide to spotting romance fraudsters  ---Academic sources Carter, E.(2024). The Language of Romance crimes: Interactions of love, money, and threat. Cambridge University Press. Chatten, A., Baxter, K., Mas, E., Pena, J., Tabachnick, G., Duncan, D., & MacKenzie, L. (2024). “I’ve Always Spoke Like This, You See”: Preterite-to-Participle Leveling in American and British Englishes. American Speech: A Quarterly of Linguistic Usage, 99(1), 3-46. Queralt, S. (2022). Linguistic Profiling: A Spanish Case Study. Methodologies and Challenges in Forensic Linguistic Casework, 44–62.

The multiple personas of an online child abuser

* Warning: Today’s episode contains descriptions of child sexual abuse material. * In today’s episode, Dr Nicci MacLeod and Prof. Tim Grant are joined by Dr Emily Chiang, one of our Research Fellows at AIFL, about her research into identity performance in online child sexual abuse conversations. By tracing 17 different personas from a single perpetrator, Dr Chiang explored linguistic differences in identity performance and online grooming strategies. Together, Dr Chiang and our hosts go over how her research may help future grooming and child sex abuse cases. Have a question for Nicci or Tim? Email us at writingwrongs@aston.ac.uk and we may answer it during an upcoming episode! Check out the official AIFL blog for more forensic linguistic goodies here: https://medium.com/@AIFLblog  If you have been affected by any of the themes in this week’s episode, please contact one of these free resources: https://www.samaritans.org/how-we-can-help/contact-samaritan/ https://www.helpguide.org/find-help  Production Team: Mark Round, Jordan Robertson, Neus Alberich Buera, Karolina PlaczyntaSound: Mark RoundEditing: Nicci MacLeodVisual design: George GrantAdditional Voices: Karolina PlaczyntaWith our thanks to Dr Emily Chiang and Dr Zoe Adams Professor Tim Grant’s home page: Tim Grant - Aston Research Explorer Dr Nicci MacLeod’s home page: Nicci MacLeod - Aston Research Explorer Dr Emily Chiang’s home page: Emily Chiang - Aston Research Explorer Both Tim and Emily are part of the Europewide Horizon SALVUS project looking at the investigation of online child abuse and exploitation across Europe. You can find out more about the SALVUS project here: https://salvusproject.eu  Research Papers:Deceptive identity performance: Offender moves and multiple identities in online child abuse conversations Online grooming: moves and strategies  Do Perverted Justice chat logs contain examples of Overt Persuasio⁠n and Sexual Extortion? A research note respondingto Chiang and Grant 2017 and 2018.

Dhiren Barot Part 2: Al Qaeda's al-Britani

VOTE FOR US IN THE TRUE CRIME AWARDS 2026!*Warning: this episode contains descriptions of terrorist mass-casualty events, and torture * NOTE: This is Part 2 of a double episode. Please make sure you have listened to Part 1 before proceeding. ---These two episodes are dedicated to the memory of Dr Janet Cotterill (1968-2022) who contributed significantly to this case and to forensic linguistics more generally.  Her obituary can be found here https://iafll.org/2022/11/11/remembering-dr-janet-cotterill-1968-2022/--- August 2004. Dhiren Barot, a high-value terrorist, has been arrested in London, and police need to charge or release him within four days. To charge Barot, the police needed to prove to a criminal standard that he had indeed written the Gas Limos project, a document that contained the plot to attack underground carparks of landmark tourist destinations across London with multiple limousines filled with gas cylinders containing explosive gases. In this second part we are joined by Professor Jessica Woodhams from the University of Birmingham who, alongside Tim Grant, Janet Cotterill, and Janet’s PhD student, was rushed to New Scotland Yard in the summer of 2004 to carry out an analysis of The Gas Limos project. For a list of our sources and more information about this case, please visit https://www.aston.ac.uk/writing-wrongs Have a question for Nicci or Tim? Email us at writingwrongs@aston.ac.uk and we may answer it during an upcoming episode! Check out the official AIFL blog for more forensic linguistic goodies here: https://medium.com/@AIFLblog If you have been affected by any of the themes in this week’s episode, please contact one of these free sources: https://www.samaritans.org/how-we-can-help/contact-samaritan/ https://www.helpguide.org/find-help ProductionProduction Team: Mark Round, Jordan Robertson, Neus Alberich Buera, Karolina PlaczyntaSound: Mark RoundVisual design: George GrantEditing: Nicci MacLeodAdditional voices: Professor Siddhartha Bandyopadhyay, George Grant, Stephany Grant, Dr Graeme Hayes,  Greg Fraser McLarenResourcesProfessor Tim Grant’s home page: Tim Grant - Aston Research Explorer Dr Nicci MacLeod’s home page: Nicci MacLeod - Aston Research Explorer Professor Jessica Woodham’s home page: Professor Jessica Woodhams - School of Psychology - University of Birmingham Research ResourcesAcademic Sources-              Andrew, C. (2012). The defence of the realm: The authorized history of MI5. Penguin UK.-              Carlisle, D. (2007)  Dhiren Barot: Was He an Al Qaeda Mastermind or Merely a Hapless Plotter? Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 30:1057–1071 DOI: 10.1080/10576100701670979  -              Grant, T.D. (2022) The Idea of Progress in Forensic Authorship Analysis CUP-              Sean O’Neill and  Daniel McGrory, The Suicide Factory: Abu Hamza and  the Finsbury Park Mosque(London: Harper Perennial, 2006)  News sources -              Guardian 2006 https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2006/nov/07/usa.terrorism-              Times of India 2006 - https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/articleshow/2168783.cms Other Web sources-              US Government 9/11 Commission Report https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-911REPORT/pdf/GPO-911REPORT.pdf-              House of Commons library on pretrial detention of terrorists - https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn05634/