Lucy Studey Stood Up By FBI For Polygraph In Suspected Iowa Killings Probe

The FBI stood up Lucy Studey on Friday, delaying a polygraph until at least next week to determine her credibility about claims her father killed and buried perhaps dozens of women and some men in the Green Hollow area of Iowa.

It is these claims against Donald Dean Studey that investigators have been working for months to verify, with sources telling Newsweek that federal investigators from across the country are working the case and planning to descend on Thurman, Iowa, near Green Hollow as early as next week.

Investigators have even paved part of the hard-to-reach property to allow easy access to investigators in case remains are found by core-drilling a deep dry well and testing shallow graves on the land. If remains are discovered, the well could be dug out for more testing of samples for remains.

Studey said she showed up on time at the FBI office in Lakeland, Florida, Friday at 10 a.m. EST, as scheduled by the FBI there. Once she buzzed to be let in, she was told that the agent she spoke with to arrange the lie-detector test was off for the day. Studey said she was then told that the FBI does not administer polygraphs at that site.

Then, in a turnaround, the Lakeland office told her they simply forgot to call her to reschedule, and that the testing would happen at a later time at that office. Later in the day, Studey was told they may reschedule for sometime next week.

The FBI Omaha Office, which oversees the county where the land is located, declined to comment on the polygraph episode. The office has previously said it has offered assistance to the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, which is working the case along with the FBI and the Fremont County Sheriff's Department. DCI also would not comment.

"I'm kind of aghast that they would make an appointment and not be there," said Scott Olson, former Assistant Special Agent in charge of intelligence and counterintelligence in New York. "It's the height of unprofessionalism."

Asked about the statement to Studey that the FBI does not do polygraphs at the Lakeland office, another former FBI supervisor said that was simply untrue.

"For the FBI to say the office doesn't do the exams doesn't make sense," said Mark J. Becker, a former FBI Supervisory Senior Resident Agent overseeing violent crime Northwest Indiana. "A polygrapher carries around a piece of luggage, which is the machine. They just set it up where they are. It's like me carrying a laptop around the airport."

While testing can vary from agency to agency, a polygraph exam generally consists of two parts – the actual exam and a pre-test interview. The pre-test interview allows the tester and subject to refine the line of questioning.

After that, the actual exam is administered, starting with asking subjects an obvious lie. Each question is limited to a "yes" or a "no". While an exam result will be known at the conclusion of the test, many agencies will send the results for review before they are formally certified.

No matter if Lucy Studey passes or fails, critics of the tests say they're not absolute. Studies on the accuracy of lie-detector tests, which show deception as well as cue in on behaviors to ascertain the truthfulness of witnesses or suspects, have shown their reliability ranges from 75 percent to 87 percent. That leaves a huge gap for error. The tests are not admissible in most courts.

And the timing of the testing came as a surprise to some former FBI officials, who said it made little sense to give the test so late in the game unless authorities were looking to make sure all bases were covered before footing a large bill to excavate the land.

Typically, a polygraph is administered early in the process before more investigation gets underway, they said.

"If you're going to give her a polygraph, get one right in the beginning," Becker said. "It doesn't cost anything. I mean, the FBI agent is already getting paid that day whether he does a polygraph or doesn't do a polygraph."

Olson agreed.

"I don't see a reason for a polygraph at all," he said. "Polygraphs don't determine truth, they only determine whether somebody is having the physiological responses to telling a lie. You're not figuring out what happened...You're trying to tell if she thinks she's telling a lie."

Olson said the effect on Studey's memory because of the lapse in time since the alleged killings – dating to at least the 1970s, when Lucy Studey was just a young girl – makes a polygraph more irrelevant.

From the beginning of the case – dating back to early 2021 since investigators started taking Studey seriously – police and agents have said her story is credible. It's a story Studey says she repeated to teachers, school principals and police over and over since she was a kid.

That alone adds to her weight as a witness, Becker said.

"Why would you come out of the closet, risking providing false information to the police who are now starting to invest time and money – and then possibly get charged with providing false information, possibly face a felony and possibly face prison time?" Becker said. "The fact she's come forward, and they know who she is...lends a great deal to the validity of the information."

Michael Tabman, a retired Special Agent in Charge of the Minneapolis FBI office, said "it could be that something happened to make them question the testimony that they previously thought was honest."

"But even when that happens, and you think you've got this hot lead," he said, "you don't just take a day off."