All this case does is point out how stupid polygraph tests are. Nothing more.
If, as the government claims, Chad Dixon taught methods that allow subjects of polygraphs to effectively cheat them, then polygraphs can easily be cheated. If polygraphs can be easily cheated then why is anyone relying on polygraphs for anything.
Polygraphs are part operational security theatre and part invasive intrusion on someone's personal life. As this sad story proves they offer little more.
Now, getting a government job you’re unqualified for isn’t as bad as murdering someone, but it’s still a bad thing for society. Unqualified people in government jobs would presumably make the government run less efficiently with respect to taxpayer money, and less effectively, which could be especially bad if these government jobs help people.
Unless the students being taught told the instructors in advance that they were going to use the education to kill people and commit crimes, which is exactly what happened here.
That being said, I agree with everything else you said.
The lie detector is ineffective, and "catching" someone based on it is not justice, regardless of their guilt.
Consider a thought experiment (which is admittedly loaded, but instructive, I think): suppose that the government is institutionally anti-Irish. During their interrogations, they routinely ask for documentation of family history, and if they find that you have Irish ancestry, that weighs heavily against you.
As an objector to this unjust state of affairs, you specialize in falsification of documents to obscure Irish ancestry. Some of your clients admit to you that they have in fact committed crimes, but you help them anyway. Have you "committed a horrible deed" in ensuring that their fate is not decided by non-evidence?
>Perhaps we as a society rely to much on this "so called" technology
Perhaps?