Now this is spooky. Researchers at Northwestern University were able to confirm suspected details of mock terrorism plans by reading the brain waves of volunteers. The accuracy in this part of the study was 100%. NWU press release is here. Another part of the study involved finding plans without prior knowledge.

The most intriguing part of the study in terms of real-word implications, Rosenfeld said, is that even when the researchers had no advance details about mock terrorism plans, the technology was still accurate in identifying critical concealed information.

"Without any prior knowledge of the planned crime in our mock terrorism scenarios, we were able to identify 10 out of 12 terrorists and, among them, 20 out of 30 crime- related details," Rosenfeld said. "The test was 83 percent accurate in predicting concealed knowledge, suggesting that our complex protocol could identify future terrorist activity."

Development of a lie detector that actually works would have profound implications for criminal justice. While we could not force a person to take the test without repealing the Self-Incrimination Clause, the fact that any innocent person who is wrongly accused would be able to simply and immediately clear himself would virtually eliminate the possibility of wrongful convictions. It might well be time to reconsider the rule of Griffin v. California, 380 U.S. 609 (1965). If you can clear yourself by taking the test and choose not to take it, shouldn't the fact-finder be able to draw the obvious inference?  Even if we can't instruct the juries to that effect, don't we all know they will anyway once the availability of the test is common knowledge?