Lord Mandelson admits public were misled over relationship with Russian oligarch - Telegraph.

I have remarked before that, during my brief stint as a criminal lawyer, I noticed that the bad guys are fond of the passive voice. Thus, not "I deceived the public", but "the public were [sic] deceived." My amateur psychological theory is that it disassociates the wrongdoer from his victims to make them appear the subject, not the object, of his sentences. Are there any psychologists among my readers who care to comment?