Darren Stanton

A keen interest in human behaviour enhanced by his time in the force is what inspired ex PC Darren Stanton to become the ‘human lie detector’.

Mr Stanton began his career as a Special Constable in Nottinghamshire before becoming a PC in 1992.

He retired 18 years later in 2010 and has gone on to be a regular media personality thanks to his unique skill of reading people's body language to determine if they are lying.

Following his retirement, a chance meeting with a public relations company helped Mr Stanton develop his media brand and reputation.

He also works for recruitment companies and has been asked to analyse high profile events such as the News International phone hacking scandal.

He said: “I left the job and got an opportunity to assess the general election in 2010, I was asked by a lot of the media to assess body language and truthfulness in the head to head debate, so I hit the ground running really.

“I studied psychology at university so I have always had a keen interest in people.

“We are all programmed to lie. For example as kids we might be given a terrible present from a relative at Christmas like a horrid jumper and your parents might say just wear it for the day – the whole consequence is to not hurt someone's feelings.

“Or when we are at school and you haven’t done your homework you might say I’ve lost it, or it got wet, or the dog ate it.

“These are things that are low impac - there is no consequence.

“With what I am involved in now it is all to do with minimising risk, a lot of my work is in recruitment because it is quite an expensive process for companies and statistically they say one in five people will commit blatant fraud on a CV, so I sit in on an interview as an observer.

“When people are speaking they have what is called a natural base line, which allows a certain degree of animation.

“The voice pitch will be a certain volume and speed, they will be using certain types of words and they will breathe at a certain rate, so when I am looking at someone in that context that is what I am gauging.

“When someone is asked a question about a portion of the CV, if we start to see a break in several of those patterns at the same time there is obviously a reason why and it just gives a red flag for the person who is interviewing to zero in on that part of their life a lot more.

“I have also moved into TV as a contributor about my work, I do a lot of radio interviews too.

“I have written for Marie Clare, Heat Magazine, The Daily Mail, Cosmo, the Daily Express, generally about signs to see if people are cheating on them.

“I have also written about body language for politicians and public figures.”

Mr Stanton said his skills are based on an understanding of human behaviour and instinct: “I had a passion and I went with it really, but I think most police officers would agree with the expression ‘a copper's nose’.

“You would do a stop and search and think on the face of it everything seems okay but there is something I am not happy about - most officers who follow their instinct generally are right.

“Obviously the police are quite rigid in how they train officers to interview. If you said to somebody ‘I will ask you outright did you burgle that property’ they say that statistically an innocent person will generally come out with a random saying like ‘no it wasn’t me I haven't got nothing to do with it’ whereas someone implicated in the matter, because they have no time to think, will mirror the accusers language so they’ll just say ‘no I didn’t burgle the property’.”

He talked about how his career in the force prepared him for a career in the spotlight: “Obviously I gained massive confidence in public speaking and dealing with an array of different emotions because over the years in the force you deal with so many different people.

“It has really enabled me from a communications point of view and also from the law aspect because I am quite well versed in matters of law.

“Retiring is all about recognising that although people have done it for so long there is a life after the force and you can transfer so many of the skills you have gained in the job, you don’t need to stay in that particular field.

“Just look at what you are interested in and then follow that path.”

Mr Stanton is currently developing two reality television concepts with producers in Los Angeles and here in the UK, based upon his work.