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  • Celebrating 20 Years of Training Excellence 2004-2024

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The Human Mask

May 1, 2010 — by Paul Francois & Enrique Garcia — pdf

Each of us wears a role playing mask all year long–we have to.  We keep our hopes, needs, hang-ups, our fears, prides, prejudices, our irrationalities, and our weaknesses from hanging out for everyone to stare at–or step on.

We wear these masks to work, to lunch, to meetings, and to church.  We always keep them handy for when friends drop in.  We adjust them constantly. 

The secret to communicating is to crack the mask.  Simple it is; easy it is not.  It takes an uncommon understanding of people, great sensitivity and skill; and the discipline to use these traits in every communication.

It means the difference between a message that is simply heard and a message that is understood and believed. Whether interviewing a victim, witness or suspect, cracking the mask is key.

Paul & Enrique have been team teaching Interviewing & Interrogation together since 1997. They are the principals of Third Degree Communications, Inc.

  • I will continue to use and pass on this information because I really believe in the instructors and their approach.

    —Kimberly Meyer, Washoe County Sheriff's Department

  • I highly recommend this training for any Probation staff who have the necessity to interview/interrogate individuals for investigation purposes.

    —R. Bret Fidler, Santa Clara County Probation Department

  • This was, by far and away the best training I have received in 15 plus years of Law Enforcement. The instructors are experienced, engaging, articulate, and very entertaining. I will be recommending this training to multiple agencies.

    —Mark Paynter, Oregon DOC

  • Effective teaching teams! The presentation of the material was consistently interesting, and intelligent without being too intellectualized.

    —Michele Keller, Deputy Probation Officer, County of Alameda

  • The information presented was highly relevant to my job and was presented in a manner that was organized and very easy to digest.

    —Michael McGarvey, California State Prison, San Quentin

  • Instructional style is engaging and highly effective.

    —George Laing, Fire Prevention Captain, Investigator

  • It not often that you go to a training that you really, really want to pay attention to. Because of the high quality information and style of presentation, I knew that if I looked away I was going to miss out.

    —Quinten Graves, Oregon State Police

  • This training provided the useful tools necessary for assessing the veracity of a suspected child abuser, which goes a long way in helping to protect children.

    —Sunny Burgan, MSSW, LCSW, Social Work Supervisor, Santa Clara County DFCS

  • This training by far has been the most informative and most effective I've attended. The instructors engaged the students in a manner that made me want to speak my opinion, ask questions, and participate.

    —Julio Ibarra, Merced County Sheriff’s Office

  • Your training gave me the confidence and tools to interview the suspect for over 5 hours and to bring a closure to the case.

    —Daniel Phelan, San Jose Police Department

  • Incredible training with amazing real world instruction. I have been taking law enforcement classes for over 30 years and by far this is the best presented and most useful.

    —Det. Brian Dale, Portland Police Bureau

  • Your training has made the greatest and most direct impact on my assignment of any training class that I've taken.

    —Ken Gelskey, National City Police Department

  • This was, by far, one of the most useful training classes I've attended since becoming an investigator.

    —Steven Aiello, Antioch Police Department