False Confessions: Especially Damning
It is a knee-jerk response. If they said they did it then they must have done it! No piece of evidence carries more weight. Investigations come to a halt after a suspect confesses. Prosecutors and defense attorneys bargain for plea deals. Even if rock solid exculpatory evidence is brought forth, the damage is done. Doubt regarding innocence will remain forever no matter how convincing the evidence of innocence.
Our country has a long, well documented history of false confessions. It began well before there was a Declaration of Independence or a Constitution when, technically, the colonies were under British rule. In the communities of Salem and Andover Massachussetts a group of teenage girls accused people they didn’t like of being witches. Before the governor finally put a halt to the hysteria, many people were hanged and estimates set the number of people who confessed to engaging in witchcraft at around 50.
Another story surrounds Stephen and Jesse Boorn, two brothers living in Vermont in 1812. When their brother-in-law, Russell Colvin, went missing they became prime suspects due to an ongoing quarrel. Eventually both brothers confessed to murder. Shortly before one of the brothers was scheduled to be hanged Colvin was found in New York and returned to Vermont.
Such stories can be humorous on the surface, but, in real life they are tragic.
Up until the 1930s, police were allowed to coax confessions from suspects using physical force known as “the third degree”. After Edwin Borchard published his book, “Convicting the Innocent” detailing the cases of 65 people who were wrongfully convicted, the Supreme Court put a halt to physical methods of interrogation. But it wasn’t long before psychological interrogation techniques replaced beatings and torture. The Reid technique is perhaps the most widely used method of interrogation across the US. In this approach police have used deception, presented the suspect with false evidence, threatened friends and family members, claimed that cooperation will result in leniency, insinuated that the crime was justified and leaked crime scene information to the suspect to make the eventual confession credible. In many cases the interview process is unrecorded except for the final confession. In some cases the “confession” is transcribed by detectives and signed by suspects who are not even literate. It is perfectly legal for police to lie to suspects and the courts consistently allow this practice. While the exact number of false confessions will never be known, among exonerations over that last 20 to 30 years false confessions have played a role in over 20% of the cases.
In his brilliant book, “Duped”, Saul Kassin examines many cases of false confessions and explores why innocent people confess. His research backs up his theories. He has been criticized for being in it for the money, for padding the statistics, and for conducting research that does not mirror what occurs in the “real” world. With over 18,000 state, local and federal law enforcement agencies in the US employing over 900,000 officers it is understandable that the establishment tries to find fault with his work. Any book royalties Kassin earns are paltry by comparison to the massive stream of money flowing through the law enforcement industry.
Other countries have adopted alternative methods of suspect interviews with the goal of discovering the truth rather than simply obtaining confessions. Studies show these methods result in conviction rates comparable to using the Reid technique while avoiding the problem of false confessions from innocent people. There is no denying that the Reid method is effective at getting people to confess. It is much harder to know if the person testifying is guilty or innocent.