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False Confessions Pros And Cons

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False Confessions
One of the biggest problems that our criminal justice system is facing is false confessions, whether they are coerced or done for attention. In an article written by the Innocence Project, it states "More than 1 out of every 4 people wrongfully convicted but later exonerated by DNA evidence made a false confession or incriminating statement."(1). What would lead someone to open their lives to judgment and persecution, by confessing to a crime that they didn 't commit? There are many possible reasons, ranging from duress, ignorance when it comes to community laws, and mental impairment. Some individuals also don 't have the mental capacity to understand just what they are admitting to, and the training for interrogations …show more content…

A common reason that individuals have confessed to crimes they haven 't committed, is due to being under extreme duress or coerced by investigators determined to get to the bottom of cases. (2) Once an investigator has decided that an individual is guilty, it becomes less about the actual crime and more about this individual molding their idea of what happened to that of the investigators. Investigators will withhold food and water. Sometimes interrogating for hours. (2) As time progresses individuals become more desperate and some individuals will even begin to believe that what investigators are telling them is the truth. A perfect example of this is the case of Marty Tankleff. A young man, who after hours of manipulation in the interrogation, believes that he blacked out and attacked his parents, killing his mother while placing his father in a coma, in which he would never wake up, and ultimately …show more content…

The last one I would like to discuss in this paper is the credibility of a false confession given by an individual without the mental capacity to understand not only what he is saying, but his vulnerability of being manipulated by investigators. As also discussed in Dr. BLANKS article. Individuals with a lower IQ or mental capacity are inclined to be more easily persuaded, that is even more in cases involving youth. An excellent example of this would be the Brendan Dassey case as presented by the Netflix series "Making a Murderer". A case in which a young man 's ability to truly understand what is being explained to him is inhibited by his low IQ. He not only waives his rights for legal counsel in the initial interrogations but without legal council is guided into giving his

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Adnan was found guilty for the murder of Hae Min Lee but never once confessed or confirmed his involvement. It was Adnan’s friend Jay who connected the dots throughout the investigation by providing the police with important details of Hae’s murder. If police had conducted a Guilty Knowledge test with Adnan during his interrogation, the police would have had the opportunity to ask him those specific questions pertaining to the murder and monitor his reactions. With The Guilty Knowledge Test, only Adnan would know the answers to important questions such as the whereabouts of Hae’s vehicle and how she was murdered. The Guilty Knowledge test is very effective at identifying innocent participants and has a 98% accuracy rate (Dahl, 2016).

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Ryker did not confess voluntarily under Kansas case law. Under this case law, to determine voluntariness

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Followed by the lack of corroboration, which is an important aspect in courtrooms, “corroboration will add credibility to the memory and lack of it may raise doubts about the allegations.” Loftus considers that relying on memory is not a valid way of justice; the legal system needs to improve when eyewitness testimonials are used in the courts. Loftus confides as a psychologist that psychological science has taught them about human memory and that the research has revealed the limits of human memory. Adding on, these research findings need to be incorporated in procedures to improve the court system. She hopes readers will acknowledge the fact that the use of memories in a trial can be problematic since they are “dangerous” and can lead to false

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Stevenson has a few examples, but the most impactful is the story of Joe Sullivan. Joe is a child who committed a crime, but because of that, the police assumed he committed a different crime of which he is innocent. There is little evidence that Joe committed the other crime, but the police

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In this case, those tactics were pushed to the extreme. The interrogators showed complete dominance in order for Miranda to confess. The Fundamentals of Criminal Investigation declares, “He must dominate his subject and overwhelm him with his inexorable will to obtain the truth” (Document F). In this examination, the rudiments of investigations over-stepped their “dominance” and nearly forced a confession. The accused must be informed of their rights to avoid this mistreatment, otherwise the person suspected is practically compelled to speak, even though they might not do so normally (Document G).

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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.

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Perhaps they feel guilty over the committed crime, or they are hoping for a more lenient punishment. It is also possible that some don't thoroughly understand their rights, and thus talk

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Within The Crucible, it is evident that people are coerced to lie. This involves both kids and adults, and they mainly do this because of Abigail. During the trials, if you were accused nothing could save you. If you denied it, you would be hung. If you admitted it, you would be hung.

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From this one can conclude that people are trying to stop false witnesses. This is happening by sending them to jail. Three false witnesses in a murder case received double-digit prison sentences (O’Grady). This shows that people are taking steps to the right path of justice. A more specific example can be Austasia Kapteyn.

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There are many factors that contribute to a wrongful conviction. Eyewitness misidentification is the greatest cause. The mind is not a tape recorder; it does not record events exactly as it’s seen. Sometimes the witness or victim would choose the wrong person at photo arrays and lineups. The memory of a witness in a crime scene is like any other evidence it must be preserved carefully.

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If you commit a crime, you can usually escape penalization if no one testifies against you. Therefore you 've got an interest to keep witnesses from testifying. If criminals habitually achieve deterring testimony, however, the criminal justice system withers, and laws will be broken with freedom from liability. Witness intimidation could be a basic threat to the rule of law. Empirical information on intimidation has been difficult

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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.

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