NRA Women readers know by now that the criminal interview is the technique a would-be bad guy uses to get close to you while judging whether you’ll make a good, easy victim. He’s judging your awareness, your temperament and the general level of pain-the-butt he thinks you’re going to be. There are several different kinds of interviews, some of which you won’t even know you’re in, but it can be helpful to recognize the different techniques a criminal might use to approach you and start an interview or an interaction. And fortunately, there’s a simple way to remember them: The Four D’s.
Author Geoff Thompson explains the four D’s in his book, Dead or Alive: The Choice Is Yours. The book is almost 30 years old now and Thompson is a British martial artist, so some aspects of the book might be less relevant to women in the U.S. in 2025, but much of the information about human and criminal behavior is insightful and helpful to anyone interested in self-defense. Thompson calls the four D’s “the most important element of self-protection to be aware of” and notes that they’re particularly used by muggers and rapists preparing victims for attack.
Dialogue
This is what we often think of when we refer to a criminal interview: Someone approaching you casually and starting a conversation, often by asking an innocuous question. The criminal who uses the dialogue approach is trying to distract and disarm you with innocent-sounding chatter so that he or an accomplice can make a move—drawing a weapon, closing distance or something else—while you are thinking about whatever question he just asked you.
How to use it against him: Speak up and talk back, but not in a way he’s expecting. You don’t have to be harsh with every stranger who asks you for directions, but at the same time, don’t be afraid to be rude to people who ping your radar. Put on your command voice and clearly and loudly state that you don’t talk to strangers, that you’re not interested, or just a simple “no!” or “that’s close enough” or “stay away from me.”
Deception
“Do not expect dangerous people to stand out in a crowd,” Thompson writes. Sometimes bad guys don’t look like bad guys. A criminal who approaches you using deception might pretend to offer you assistance or otherwise present himself as a nice guy. He wants you to let down your guard and trust him—that way when he flips the switch, you’ll be so taken aback and scared of him that you’ll comply and he won’t have to fight at all. Always remind yourself: This is a stranger, and he approached me.
How to use it against him: Just leave if you can (the answer to any criminal interview, really), but if you’re somehow stuck, you can try deceiving him into letting his guard down. You might say, “I don’t want any trouble,” which lets him know that you see through him. This also makes you seem submissive, which brands you as an easy victim, so don’t try it if he’s in attack range or only use it if it gives you a chance to draw your firearm (if you’re already a victim and you’ve decided that’s your best option).
Distraction
Distraction is somewhat baked into the dialogue and deception approaches. If a bad guy can distract you from what he’s really doing, you’ll be less likely to recognize when he’s making moves and even less likely to be suspicious of his motives. This can happen in many forms. He might charm you through his dialogue and deception, or he might do something outrageous to scare you, like scream at you, to stun you into freezing for a split second—long enough for him to gain the upper hand. Similarly, he can distract you with an off-the-wall question that throws you for a loop. He might even distract you with a promise or a false reassurance: “I just want to help” or “Don’t worry, I’ve got kids, too, I know how it goes” or the very suspicious why-would-he-say-that “I won’t hurt you, I promise.” Again, he wants you to let your guard down and feel like you can trust him.
How to use it against him: Thompson suggests a novel approach—throwing the bad guy off his game by asking him a totally off-the-wall question like, Is your mom’s name Elsie? “The fact that this is peripheral to your circumstances only adds to the effect,” he writes. Such a distracting question engages his brain in something other than his criminal goal and gives you a second to act. “This engagement will buy you one free shot,” Thompson says.
Destruction
This is the hard one, because there’s almost nothing you can do about it. The destruction approach is the ambush, the sneak attack you don’t see coming. He comes right at you guns blazing, or he hits you from behind. There’s no pretext, no conversation and virtually no perceptible warning.
How to use it against him: You won’t be able to defend against an ambush or really even react to it, but you can use the destruction technique with any other type of criminal interview by launching a pre-emptive attack (that’s what your gun is for, after all) immediately after asking the engaging question mentioned above. Obviously, this is extremely situational-dependent and only an option when you’ve determined that yes, this definitely is a bad guy and yes, I am in reasonable fear for my life and am justified in using my firearm in self-defense.
How to Avoid the First Three D’s
As mentioned, you can’t do much about the come-from-behind Destruction attack. But you can avoid even having a criminal approach you with Dialogue, Deception or Distraction in the first place by giving off the I’m-not-a-victim vibe. “If the victim is in code white,” Thompson writes, “deception often becomes an unnecessary tool.” In other words, move through the world in condition yellow, paying casual attention to your surroundings. This will help you look like a difficult victim who criminals won’t want to risk approaching.
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