A Seattle University linguist has shown that
arrested suspects soften their language into a more deferential form, avoiding direct commands and deliberately weakening
their statements as not to be confrontational. This submissive form of
speech, technically referred to as the "female register" (probably because it was found in (traditionally submissive) women's speaking patterns), uses
conditional forms of verbs such as "might", "may" or "should", questions
instead of assertions, and weakening phrases like "kind of". Not surprisingly,
hard-nosed cops often ignore statements like "I better get a lawyer, hadn't
I?", and suspects end up confessing without a lawyer present. (via
Unknown News)