PRAGMATIC ACTS AND STRATEGIES IN THE CRIME NARRATIVES OF ACCUSED RAPISTS IN AGODI CUSTODIAL CENTRE, IBADAN, NIGERIA

Abstract

Crime narratives of Accused Rapists (ARs) in correctional facilities, like Agodi Custodial Centre, Ibadan, offers insights into confessional cues that could aid administration of justice in Nigeria. Existing linguistic studies in Nigeria have examined investigator’s communicative acts through the identification of power play, questioning, deception and concealment strategies in coercive investigative discourse, with little attention paid to non-coercive investigative discourse involving ARs in correctional centres. Therefore, this study was designed to examine language use in ARs’ crime narratives, with a view to determining the pragmatic acts, the goals of the acts involved and the pragmatic strategies deployed to influence investigative interviewer’s (II) pragmatic interpretation of the crime narratives. Jacob Mey’s Pragmatic Acts Theory was adopted as the framework, while the descriptive design was used. Purposive sampling was deployed for the selection of Agodi Custodial Centre, Ibadan, of the Nigerian Correctional Service, Oyo State Command, because it is the facility holding most of the command’s ARs. Fifty ARs approved by the Controller of Corrections Oyo State Command were interviewed using Preparation and Planning, Engage and Explain, Account, Closure and Evaluation (PEACE) model. The interviews were audio-recorded. The data were subjected to pragmatic analysis. The evoked practs were denying, distancing and justifying. Denying was evoked through descriptive/explanatory and emphatic statements to contend the negative image attached to ARs to instigate doubt of the rape accusation. Distancing was engaged to show ARs’ disconnection from the crime situation and the victims, while justifying presented rationalised arguments to reduce the severity of the crime. The practs were employed to achieve three goals, namely impression-controlling (for face-maintaining and facesaving), allegation-refuting and offence-minimising, to avoid the punishments attached to rape. The pragmatic strategies deployed were identity-framing, identity-reframing, attention-seeking, information-controlling, crime-relabelling and attention diversion. Identity-framing drew on indirect referencing by association with generalised stereotypes (age group and social values) suggestive of the associated beliefs for maintenance of the supposed trustworthy profile; while identity-reframing depended on crime admission for redefinition of self. Attention-seeking (fishing for pity, exaggerating self-worth and selfsoothing) was relied on for emotional exploitation, in order to gain emotional support through personal stories shared to self-prove for investigator’s validation. Informationcontrolling (sharing extraneous information and withholding information) was positioned to intentionally conceal clear and concise information about the crime from the investigative interviewer to show innocence or feign ignorance. Crime-relabelling drew on stereotypic allusion to sexual relationship for crime redefinition, where the ARs shared same status – “the adult status” with their underage victims as if they were in a sexual relationship between two consenting adults. Attention diversion (playing the victim and blaming the victim) was relied on by the ARs to attack the image and character of the victims and their parents as crime enablers to deflect attention from the ARs. The crime narratives by Accused Rapists in Agodi Custodial Centre, Ibadan, Nigeria, deploy practs and pragmatic strategies to influence narrative interpretation in their favour. Therefore, investigators need to take cognisance of the narrative-influencing tactics of accused rapists to prevent perversion of justice.