Response to Tighar's "unintentional manipulation" in eyewitness reporting

Tighar has finally responded to our research...

By saying it's not really research.  

Please consider this article in today's Mariana's Variety:

Archaeologist, researchers caution reliance on Earhart eyewitness accounts

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Published on Friday, March 01, 2013 00:00

Written by By Alexie Villegas Zotomayor - avz@mvariety.com - Variety News Staff

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MOST of the eyewitness accounts and those of U.S. military personnel are subject to unintentional manipulation, memory reconstruction, and faulty interpretation.

In the wake of the persistent interest to probe the mystery surrounding the disappearance of famous aviatrix Amelia Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan, Dr. Thomas F. King, Thomas A. Roberts and Joseph A. Cerniglia, in a paper titled “Amelia Earhart, Saipan, and the Reliability of eyewitnesses” examine the hypothesis claiming that Earhart and Noonan were on Saipan based on accounts given by residents and some U.S. military personnel and also how these so-called “eyewitness accounts” could be tainted.

“We want to offer some cautions about uncritical reliance on eyewitness accounts — particularly when these accounts have been gathered by untrained personnel and have been frequently retold,” wrote King, Roberts and Cerniglia.

The three are affiliated with The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery or TIGHAR that has been exploring the Nikumaroro hypothesis — that Amelia Earhart and Noonan managed to land on Nikumaroro, formerly Gardner Island, in the Phoenix Islands in the Republic of Kiribati.

King et al. said that there was a flurry of interest in 2012 in stories about Earhart and Noonan on Saipan in the Northern Marianas 75 years after their disappearance while en route to Howland Island from New Guinea in 1937.

They said two new books were published that featured these stories and more are yet to come.

King, a senior archaeologist with TIGHAR, along with Roberts and Cerniglia also submitted a paper last year to the first Marianas History Conference and their paper delved into the eight stories that point to Earhart and Noonan in the Marianas.

In their new paper discussing the reliability of eyewitness accounts, the authors divided these stories into two groups: (1) Micronesian stories, recollections of Chamorro, Carolinian or Marshallese delivered orally and recorded by non-Micronesians; and (2) U.S. military stories, related by U.S. military personnel about what they experienced or by others to whom they spoke.

They said that a few stories come from non-military American sources. They also noted one story from a Japanese informant reported by Mike Campbell in his book.

“The reports that are most impressive to most readers are those of eyewitnesses: people recounting what they say they actually saw, usually in 1937 on the part of the Micronesian informants and 1944 on the part of U.S. military personnel. If these people are not lying — and how could they all be? — then an unbiased reader may reasonably conclude that what they say is true,” said King et al.

The authors cited contradictions in the accounts however.

King et al. said, “A problem that confronts some of the authors who have published material on the Earhart-on-Saipan hypotheses is that eyewitnesses have sometimes provided contradictory testimony.”

They said this problem is often addressed by rejecting some stories and accepting others.

“Acceptance and rejection are often couched in very unambiguous terms,” King et al. said.

They said that informants whose stories are rejected are taken to be Japanese collaborators, participants in a U.S. government cover-up or simply not to be trusted.

“It may well be that all informants were telling what they believed to be the truth, though perhaps shaded in some cases to meet what they understood to be social expectations. However, this does not necessarily mean that any informant described ‘objective’ reality — that is, reality as it might be perceived by another party. There are good reasons to view all the eyewitness and other informant stories with skepticism, even while accepting the honesty and good will of those who have told them,” they said.

As to the reliability of eyewitness accounts, King et al. shared scientific studies that explored reliability of memory, including memories of eyewitnesses.

They cited, among other studies, research undertaken by Elizabeth Loftus of the Univ. of Washington whose 1979 book “Eyewitness Testimony” as the most widely available.

Referencing Loftus, King et al. said, “A growing body of research shows that new, postevent information becomes incorporated into memory, supplementing and altering a person’s recollection. New information can invade us, like a Trojan horse, precisely because we do not detect its influence.”

For the TIGHAR researchers, the studies including Loftus’ tend to show that memory is a highly malleable phenomenon. “Our memories can be significantly transformed by influences from outside our heads— notably by the suggestions of interviewers.”

“Even word choice by a questioner can influence memory,” they said.

These studies, they said, show that people’s memories can change over time in response to external and internal stimuli, and that people can come quite seriously to believe that they recall things that are different from what they originally saw and stored in memory.

“Altered memories can be as vivid, and as firmly and honestly believed in, as ‘pristine’ memories,” they said.

Senior archaeologist King and his fellow researchers said that there is a possibility of false memory creation with respect to both major populations of Earhart-on-Saipan eyewitnesses, referring to veterans of the U.S. military and Micronesian residents.

Explaining further, they found it striking that most memories related to Earhart and Noonan and the Lockheed Electra surfaced a dozen or more years after the 1944 invasion of Saipan.

“Many were not reported until the 1990s, in response to inquiries by Henry Duda, Thomas Devine and others.”

“It is not difficult to imagine a veteran of the invasion, looking back on a very exciting, frightening, confusing, perhaps heroic, perhaps traumatic period in his life, and finding gaps in his memory, things to wonder about,” they said.

They said that reading an appeal like Duda’s, or a book like Fred Goerner’s, Paul Briand’s, Vincent Loomis’, Buddy Brennan’s or Thomas Devine’s, “he may begin sifting and re-sifting his memories.”

They cited a notice published in Leatherneck magazine issued by Henry Duda that stated: “C’mon, Marines. Let’s bring out the truth. During the invasion of Saipan, I, and other Marines, as well as Army and Navy personnel, became aware of considerable material and information that Amelia Earhart, her navigator, Fred Noonan, and their airplane had actually landed on Saipan during her 1937 around-the-world flight, rather than the generally accepted assumption that they had gone down at sea. I wish to contact any additional Marines who may have information, especially those who were on guard duty where her plane was found in a Japanese hangar at Aslito Field.”

For King et al. they didn’t want to criticize Duda’s notice; however, they noted that it was a leading question.

“This sort of questioning pervades the record of eyewitness testimony elicitation on which the Earhart-on-Saipan stories are largely based. To judge from the psychological literature, it would seem almost made to order for the inadvertent creation of false memories,” they said.

They also said that there could be complications with Micronesian people recovering memories of 1937.

They said that there is some evidence that some American servicemen actively sought Earhart as they advanced through the islands.

They said that these servicemen may have asked very leading questions in 1943-1944.

The U.S. servicemen, they said, were encountering Micronesians going through “intense emotional upset.”

They said, “There would surely have been a strong motivation to tell the frightening newcomers what they seemed to want to hear and show them what they seemed to want to use.”

They also did not discount the opportunity for the creation of false memories.

As to the creation of false memories, the researchers also cited an interview made by Fr. Arnold Bendowske with Matilde Fausto Arriola in 1977, which they said was a “textbook case of leading the witness.”

Fr. Bendowske, in interviewing Arriola, said, “I mentioned to the Admiral at that time your name because you saw Amelia Earhart yourself.”

According to the transcript of that interview, Arriola replied, “I did not know her name when I first saw her. She did not mention her name or who she was.

Asked of the year, Arriola was trying to remember and Fr. Bendowske asked her, “Was it 1937 or 1938? Do you recall?”

The Earhart researchers said that Arriola regarded the priest as an authority figure being a Catholic and the priest’s mentioning that the U.S. military wanted her testimony enhanced the seriousness of the investigation.

“Asking leading questions is not the only interviewer practice that may have skewed the testimony of interviewees; the opportunity to profit from the ‘right’ kind of testimony also seems to have existed in some cases,” King, Roberts and Cerniglia noted in their research paper.

The TIGHAR researchers also looked into interrogation across cultural boundaries, implications of group opinion, and intercultural misunderstandings.

For King, Roberts and Cerniglia, “Although there may be kernels of truth in some or many of the stories, there are ways of accounting for them that do not involve the presence of Earhart and/or Noonan in the Marianas.”

They said, “This is not to say that Earhart and Noonan definitely were not captured by the Japanese, imprisoned on Saipan, and/or executed and buried there. Some version of the Earhart-on-Saipan story may be true. The evidence is tainted by the methods (or lack of method) involved in its collection, making it difficult if not impossible to judge its veracity.”

They said the association with Noonan or Earhart should be set aside in considering the stories about an American woman held captive on Saipan; that an effort to identify her and reconstruct her story could result in a valuable contribution to the history of Micronesia during the Japanese period and World War II.  

- See more at: http://www.mvariety.com/cnmi/cnmi-news/local/54002-archaeologist-researchers-caution-reliance-on-earhart-eyewitness-accounts#sthash.JHQxsFSM.dpuf

And now, if you will, consider my (our) response to the writer of this article, so it's clear what Tighar is really implying about Chomorro and US Marine testimony:



Dear Marianas Variety,

Sorry we didn't get back to you earlier.  We went to Japan to continue research on the Earhart saga. Yes, we do plan to create a documentary and a book.  In Rich's case, he's already completed a documentary on the topic called "Earhart's Electra" which is available at Amazon.com, it was the genesis of this search of Saipan.  It was posted at Kickstarter, and Mike Harris happened to catch it, and pointed out that it was he who had shot the footage of the islanders who saw Amelia Earhart on Saipan back in 1983.  This footage has always been incorrectly attributed to T.C. "Buddy" Brennan, who came up to Mike at a lecture and asked if he could accompany him to Saipan. Mike suggested he and Rich team up - he saw Rich had been interviewing US Marines about finding the airplane on Aslito airfield - the same GI's that he'd read about.  Rich interviewed Robert Wallack who found her briefcase, Thomas Devine, Douglas Bryce, Andrew Bryce, Erskine Nabers who was a wire operator on Saipan and decoded the message that they had found her plane on Aslito on June 19th, 1944.  Rich has four other US Marines who either saw the plane or saw it destroyed by US Forces.  On top of that there's the extensive list of islanders that CBS newsman Fred Goerner interviewed in the 1960's, the people Oliver Knaggs interviewed on Mili and Majuro, the islanders Mike Harris interviewed on Jaluit and Saipan in the 1980's - some of the dozens of whom are referenced in many books including Don Wilson's.  Then of course, there's the "Stars and Stripes" which printed the first Earhart allegation in 1944, where two GI's claimed they were asked to dig up her grave. Which brings us to the article ("Archaeologist, researchers caution reliance") about researchers warning that eyewitness reports are "subject to unintentional manipulation."  This comment borders on "unintentional racism" as it implies islanders aren't capable of remembering their own memories.  How can that be?   Are these researchers saying that these islanders we've interviewed are lying? Or that they are being manipulated?  Are they stating that the US Marines are lying? Or that they are being manipulated?   There's no such thing as "unintentional manipulation" - a clever catch phrase to make it seem that "oh, they must be making this up because the camera is convincing them to lie about what they heard or saw."  The article claims that “Even word choice by a questioner can influence memory."  Which of course is possible, unless you're someone who's been doing this for some time, and knows how to ask a person to recollect whatever it is they want to recollect. Either a person is manipulated or they are not.  "Manipulation" as a word is a pejorative, no two ways around it. It may be "Unintentionally racist" because it's been the history of Saipan, the history of the Chomorro people, that if an American can't understand them, or take the time to ask them questions about their lives, about their personal experience during the war, they couldn't possibly be telling the truth about what they heard or saw from their parents. The Chomorro were first told by the Spanish what to say or believe, then told by the Germans what they should or shouldn't learn, and then by the Japanese on what they could or couldn't say.  And then when the CIA was based in Saipan until 1962, another group of people would tell them how to speak or what they could or could not say.  Our exprience on Saipan is that everyone has secrets to tell, but in general, has chosen to not say them. This kind of paternalistic, chauvinistic so called expertise masquerading as science - which has little or nothing to do with science, or the pursuit of the truth, is typical of people who have a vested interest in their own version of the truth.  For example, one man we interviewed, 82 years old, said he was 12 years old when he saw a female fitting Earhart's description sitting with her arms bound behind her in the back of a army truck parked prior to the War in Chalan Kanoa.  He said "I clearly remember it, as the truck was parked for 30 minutes, and I had never seen a white person before." We asked him questions about other details about the war, about his family hiding in caves.  These and other details we were able to corroborate.  Why would he slip one lie into an hour of truth? In all the interviews, we found that the Chomorro people go out of their way to state exactly what they saw or didn't see, and can't be cajoled or manipulated in any fashion to say something they didn't actually witness.  A Chomorro will say "I did not see this personally, and I repeat that it was my mother or father who saw it, so I can't say that it happened, but this is what they said."  He didn't say it was Amelia Earhart. He said it was a "tall, thin woman wearing a khaki shirt with light colored hair with her arms bound behind her back and a black bandana across her face."  If he was being manipulated - or trying to obfuscate - why not just say "I saw Amelia Earhart?"  He did not know who she was, but he did see her as a prisoner prior to the war. We have taken the time to corroborate what their parents or relatives have said with other people who saw or said the same thing.  Or take the US Marine who said "I remember it as if it was yesterday. I was the wire operator in Col. Clarence Wallace's tent.  I decoded the message that came in on June 19, 1944 that said "We have found Amelia Earhart's airplane on Aslito airfield."  I took the message to my commanding officer and he signed it.  And I thought it was odd that he made no comment about it.  And then he ordered me to the hangar to guard the plane for 24 hours."  We were able to corroborate his story because we interviewed other soldiers who saw this man guarding the plane. What part of his story was made up?  What part was "manipulated?" To call a US Marine a liar is, in our humble opinion, beyond the pale.  Oh sorry - he was "unintentionally manipulated" into repeating what he saw. Well, we have news for these researchers; the camera, in this case, doesn't lie. This Marine spoke the truth and we have 5 other corroborating witnesses. And we'd like to see them tell a Marine to his face that he was "unintentionally manipulated."  To imply that as a filmmaker, or a journalist, we have somehow manipulated people into saying what they think they saw, as opposed to what they saw, or what their parents told them they saw, is to imply we've been unintentionally (or intentionally) manipulating eyewitnesses.  We've been at this research for over 30 years. Rich was hired to share his research for the feature film "Amelia,"  has done documentaries for the US State dept among others and knows the protocol of investigative journalism. Mike came to interview people who saw Amelia Earhart here back in 1983.  As a team, we've been at this for enough time to understand the difference between conjecture and reporting.   Our premise is simple; let people speak for themselves about they saw or heard.  We suspect those who choose to ignore the overwhelming accounts do so because of an inherent disregard of native islanders, or US Marines, or both - and in either case, ignore whatever "science" they cite as evidence of their own search, considering the source. The truth is, Tighar has had a bite at this apple for 30 years, developing and testing their theory that Amelia Earhart wound up on Nikumaroro.  Isn't it time to step back for a moment and consider that there might be some logic to what all of these eyewitnesses have said?  After all, if the premise was true that people can spontaneously make up memories based on wishful thinking, where are all the witnesses who saw her on some other island?  If it's true that the US Marines might have been deluded by the fog of war, why didn't they say she was on Iwo Jima, Okinawa or Guam?   The fact remains; over a dozen soldiers claim they found her plane, saw her plane, or watched it burn at Aslito airfield.  This was only 7 years after it has disappeared - it's not like they'd had a chance to come up with some other scenario.  And nearly 200 islanders claim they saw or heard or experienced her presence on Saipan, we've got 15 new eyewitnesses in just three weeks alone.  Logic tells us that these accounts bear further scrutiny - not that they may be incorrect, or manipulated, which is faulty reasoning - any cop can tell you that when eyewitnesses agree upon something, then its worth pursuing.  That is, unless they're being "unintentionally manipulated" of course. Scrapbook of AE pix on Saipan Oh, and we interviewed the fellow who was with the Marines when they found this scrapbook on Saipan this week.  His name is Richard "Rick" Spooner.  We encourage everyone to check into his bonafides.  He's known as "the Marine's Marine."  And he joins a chorus of Marines who want to speak the truth about what they saw on Saipan; after all "the truth will set you free."