The Last Frontier: Alaska Murder Seeks Admission of Results of Two Polygraph Exams

According to an article in the New Miner (Alaska),

The attorney for a woman accused of killing her 18-month-old son in November hopes the court will admit evidence from a polygraph test the defense believes will help absolve her of guilt.

Bill Satterberg, the attorney representing Fairbanks resident Amberlynn Swanson, filed a request that the court admit two pieces of evidence in the case: a polygraph test of Swanson conducted by an expert in the field, David Raskin, and expert testimony from Raskin claiming law enforcement failed to properly conduct a test of their own….

On Sept. 17, Satterberg filed a motion requesting the judge allow the consideration of the two polygraphs, one by Raskin and one by Alaska State Troopers. 

So, what’s the likelihood that Swanson will be successful?

The article notes that

For the polygraphs or the testimony to be admitted in court, the judge must approve. Judges in the Ninth Circuit Court have been reluctant to admit polygraphs, but in his filing Satterberg argues the United States Supreme Court and Alaska State Supreme Court have each set precedent to allow polygraphs in certain circumstances.

After doing some digging, I’m guessing the article is referencing Pulakis v. State, 476 P.2d 474 (Alaska 1970). But Pulakis didn’t deem polygraph evidence admissible; it merely found that the defendant waived his ability to object to the admission of polygraph test results.

The only other case I could find that was partially on point was Diorec III v. State, 295 P.3d 409 (Alaska App. 2013). In Diorec III, one of the conditions of the defendant’s probation was that he submit to periodic polygraph testing. The defendant objected to this condition, and the Court of Appeals of Alaska cited Pulakis for the proposition that “[u]nder current Alaska law, the results of polygraph examinations are normally not admissible in court proceedings, even when the parties are willing to stipulate to the admission of the results.”

The court did, however, 

note that courts from other states are currently split on the issue of whether a probationer’s polygraph results are admissible in a probation revocation proceeding. But Diorec has not yet been required to take a polygraph examination, and the State has never asked that the polygraph results be admitted into evidence. Consequently, this issue is not squarely in front of us in the present case, and we express no opinion on the proper resolution of this issue. 

Diorec III thus did not deem polygraph evidence admissible, and, at most, it hinted that polygraph evidence might be admissible at probation revocation proceedings. I thus don’t see any Alaska precedent that would allow for the admission of polygraph evidence in Swanson’s case.

-CM