Susan Powell disappeared 20 months ago on a cold night in Utah. Her husband Josh has been the main focus of investigation and this is his first in depth interview. Can you spot the microexpression that occurs in this video? Any hot spots?
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIyfp0u2R-Y[/youtube]
Well…i’m still developing my skills here of course but I see Subtle Sadness at 0:34, Disgust on the Interviewer at 2:01, and Slight Enjoyment around 3:25-3:32 when he is recalling his wife walking out in her underwear. There were definitely some masking smiles here and there as well.
Throughout the interview, his mouth stays pretty even, however he tends to blink more rapidly when he is asked about his wife. Also, in the opening question, when asked if he killed his wife, he looks down and to his right while blinking. He doesn’t strike me as a “spontaneous” person either; because he just seems too calm, too quiet. Also, when he is asked if he still loves his wife, his response is “…I still love her… I guess…”
The micro-expressions I see vary from guilt to pain and sadness. It may have been manslaughter? He killed her in a fit of anger or by accident? The details surrounding the event just seem sketchy at best.
His father could be possibly lying about his relationship with Susan…? He keeps shaking his head contradictory to what he is saying… And also, right at the end of the interview, Josh shows some signs of anger perhaps? When he says she has two children that loves her? Sorry if I’m being completely wrong, I’m just starting to develop my skills as well~
Also, when asked about the disapearence of his wife, he kind of bites slightly his mouth. And he denies when he says that he is a good dad.
What I saw in Steven at time marker 4:20 is when he says “Susan enjoys doing that” was disgust . So what he says contradicts his emotion – he’s disgusted by the fact he’s fabricating! And then his upper eyelids raised like in a slight fear I think, even though I didn’t see his lip corners stretch out horizontally. And eyeballs rolled to the left like in “Oops”.
Besides Microexpressions, look at the title of the video of what Josh had said …”I would never hurt her”….why not in past tense?? The way Josh answers indicates there’s a heavy cognitive load…lacks conviction in his answers. And at 1:24, when he attempted to cry, I don’t believe those tears – I see no stress on his forehead or oblique eyebrows. I wonder how long he practiced that at home. Look at Steven trying to convince the reporter saying “She did it, I did it”….and keep shaking his head NO. And why would a son (Josh) be ok with his dad’s (Steven) sexual advances to ward his wife???
Thanks to everyone for their comments. We saw a nice “disgust” micro on the interviewer at 2:01. She clearly doesn’t think highly of Josh and his statements either. There is definitely something odd about Josh’s behavior. Its suspicious and raises several red flags.
I agree with Jeff, I saw the hidden enjoyment smiles when he was talking about her in underwear in marker 3:25-3:32. I saw controlled sadness in the mouth and eyes at 0:34 as well. At 1:08 i noticed he inhaled deeply, almost as if ventilating anger at his sons or something like that. At 2:46 he opened his mouth before hearing the last couple of words in the sentence, my conjecture is he was already looking forward to this interview question and prepared for it. At 2:50 there was a jaw thrust, which signifies anger, but i think it might have been a slip of the tongue in this case because he sounded like he repeated the first letter twice in “emotionally” as if he were unsure about it.
1:18 ”’do you still love her?”’ (gets surprised 1:19 – 1:20 by the answer and thinks about what should he say for 4 seconds.. THEN realizes his silence could be suspictious and forces his face make look like normal, trying to compensate with a neutral ”Yeah” to make the situation look like it normal again. The bullshit he told after that is another compensation. I think this is enough for me to think he is guilty