Recommended: Interrogation and false confession
Fare v. Michael C. is a case from 1979 where the United States Supreme Court reviewed what would make a juvenile’s confession inadmissible in court (Elrod & Ryder, 2014). The case begins with the respondent, Michael C., a 16-year-old juvenile being taken into custody by Van Nuys police in California on the suspicion of murder. He was immediately taken to the police station for questioning. Prior to the beginning of questioning, police fully advised Michael of his rights under Miranda v. Arizona. At the beginning of the questioning, Michael, who was on probation in the Juvenile Court, asked for his probation officer to be present.
A good interrogator can get someone to admit to anything if they used the right tactics, and to do this to someone that is mentally handicapped just shows how messed up these techniques
In the Central Park jogger case: The boys were told that hairs linked them to the victim’s body, which turned out not to be true. Interrogators are encouraged to falsely tell suspects they believe them to be guilty, and that another suspect or physical evidence has implicated them. Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau’s report supporting reversal of the convictions reveals other troubling aspect of the five suspects’ confessions-besides investigator’s lies that physical evidence linked the boys to the victim’s
This is significant because it enabled the wrongfully accused to prove that they did not commit the crime for which they falsely confessed. In 2004, Drizin and Leo studied 125 of these cases to determine the causes. Physical and psychological coercion have been found to induce false confessions, especially in children. Brenton Butler was 15 years old when he went into that
In the book “Picking Cotton”, the former Burlington Police Chief Mike Gauldin, who was the lead detective on Jennifer’s case, was certainly sure that Ronald Cotton was the guy he was looking for after Jennifer picked him twice (Jennifer, Ronald, Erin 80); also, on the McCallum’s case, the polices also chose to trust eyewitnesses when they did not have enough physical evidences. Furthermore, judges can be wrong sometime. Wise and Safer, who are authors of the report “ what US judges know and believe about eyewitness testimony”, surveyed 160 U.S. judges to determine how much they know about eyewitness testimony on a small test( Wise, Safer, 427-432). However, the survey responds the average judges in the U.S. only 55% correct within 14 questions (Wise, Safer, 431-432). Moreover, most of the judges who were surveyed did not know key facts about eyewitness testimony.
Moreover, due to these trust and police interrogation techniques, it is not difficult for juveniles to be put in situations where they are being manipulated into thinking that their only and best option is to confess to a crime. The Reid Technique and the use of maximization and minimization interrogation methods “rely on tactics such as lying, deception, and the contamination error to manipulate suspects into confessing” (Luna, 2018) and are applied regardless of the suspect's age. While adults may be more capable of recognizing these law enforcement tactics, such as fake sympathy followed by psychological manipulation, juveniles are less experienced and more likely to trust law enforcement officials. Consequently, they are less able to detect and resist these deceptive practices. Furthermore, a significant topic in the research on false confessions is whether the suspect understands their Miranda
The police then determine if the suspect is guilty and continuously interrogate, accuse, and even threaten the suspect for hours until they confess, whether they are guilty or not. On many occasions the people who are coerced into false confessions are have severe mental impairments that prevent them from functioning as a normal person with out the impairments would.
Take the case of the case made against the female police officer, the explanation is that most police officers become seen as professionals who are always ready and able because they are mostly needed to ready at all times in case of danger or a certain event. Take the second case of Dr. Grigson who uses the confirmation bias that all people who he is convicting are guilty psychopaths and will commit murder continuously if they aren’t stopped by the police force. Take the case of the last case where Edith James states that the Texas law doesn’t wish to ruin a young man’s life even if the evidence is pointing toward the person and that they aren’t guilty at all since they are still just kids. These three examples suggest that confirmation bias which is where someone believes something and always has it confirmed is used in this case where a certain person was convicted for a crime that he didn’t
After going through this process, four out of the five suspects ended up confessing to the crime, because they were led to believe they could go home if they admitted they did it. Lastly, coerced-internalized confessions typically occur if the suspect is “anxious, sleep-deprived, confused, and subjected to a highly suggestive interrogation that often includes the presentation of false evidence” (McGrath, ScienceDirect Topics). When a suspect turns to this type of confession, interrogators can spot a weakness present in the suspect and take advantage of it, leading the suspect to be under the impression that
Those ten years of Beverly’s life were ones that she would never get back, which rings true for all convicted based on false confessions. Detective Riley, the detective in Beverly’s case, suggested different choices to Beverly on how she could have “blocked the memory” of killing Roger, but Beverly knew she didn’t kill him. After many relentless “meetings,” Detective Riley convinced Beverly to sign a statement declaring her guilt in the murder of Roger, but this was only obtained through using her own family against her. Detective Riley told Beverly that she would never see her family again if she didn’t plead guilty to the charges brought against her. In June 2003, an United States Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the decision to grant Monroe a habeas corpus petition.
With the interesting topic of police interrogations and confessions, author Richard Leo executed the effort of informing an audience, gave great examples to give a visual of what’s being discussed, and kept the material interesting. Being that the article is so long, it important to write in a way to keep readers intrigued. The stories of Adrian Thomas and Ngo Truong were great examples to use to explain the effects of giving false confessions and what happens when police officers force people to confess with violating interrogation tactics. Leo also gave background information to give reader the facts on why interrogators use the tactics they use to get voluntary confessions. For instance, Leo stated that police detectives receive specialized
Over the years people have confessed to crimes they have not committed. People have went to jail and sent to jail for crimes they did not commit, because of the intimation they endured during their interrogation. For instance, some people are physically, mentally, and emotionally threatened during interrogations. People are afraid so they often give false confessions or someone else name in an attempt to remove themselves from the situation. However, if psychologist were present during interrogations they would most likely be able to prevent false confessions.
To be a good interrogator it requires more than confidence and creativity although it does help, but interrogators are very well trained in the mental tactics of social impact. An interrogators task is to get someone to confess to a crime, but it is not easy. While it isn’t easy for them, sometimes they will end up with confessions from the innocent testifies because of the expertise in psychological manipulation interrogators have. The interrogation process has been manipulated over the years and they are using unethical approaches to gain information or a confession from suspects. But in the law of confessions, it is required that confessions are not coerced but be voluntary so that it is admitted into evidence.
Cognitive Interview Technique on Detecting Deception The inability to recognize fabricated statements can greatly damage the investigation process of a crime. Standard police interviews were often ineffective and most police officers never received formal training. In 1975, the RAND Corporation completed a survey of law-enforcement professionals and discovered that only 2% of the officers had received any formal training on how to interview people (Geiselman & Fisher, 2014). The memory of a witness or victim of a crime can be susceptible to contamination by an interview if conducted incorrectly.
Description: The Confessions a case indicating innocent people violated by the justice system that breach trust and the belief of being honest will prevail. Bike, O. (1997). The Confessions. Retrieved October 8, 2015. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/the-confessions/
