Come on Brendan, what else? On June 4, 1982, 19-year old Rebecca Lynn Williams was raped and stabbed to death 38 times inside her Culpeper, Virginia apartment. The town of West Memphis, Arkansas was shaken on May 6, 1993 when the naked bodies of three murdered boys—Christopher Byers, Michael Moore and Steve Branch—were found in a drainage ditch. A neighbor named Danial Williams and his roommate Joseph J. Dick, Jr. were soon brought in for questioning and confessed to the crime. Even though there was no physical evidence linking him to the crime, Purvis would eventually confess to the murder and was sentenced to life in prison. The classic example of this type of false confession is the Lindbergh kidnapping case. He was questioned for four straight days and reached the point where he experienced a psychotic episode and started banging his head against the wall. He had an IQ of 72 and appeared to have details of the crime fed to him during 12 hours of interrogation. A tip from an informant eventually led authorities to 19-year old Juan Rivera, who had an IQ of 79 and was in custody on a burglary charge. All four men claimed that they only confessed and pleaded guilty after being threatened with the death penalty. Her body was discovered by her 16-year old son, Peter Reilly, but police were suspicious by his supposed lack of emotion and immediately brought him in for questioning. But false confessions are fairly common. They would soon be convicted of the crime and in January 1993, John Purvis was finally released after serving nine years. She was killed in her home in Boulder, Colorado, in 1996. He authored an amicus brief in the Dassey case, in support of U.S. Supreme Court review. It was not until January 2012 that the charges against Rivera were finally dismissed and he was released from prison. In these records you will find the most recent and the most authoritative articles on the topics, people and events … In 1998, Rivera received a retrial because his first trial was littered with procedural errors. 7 Voluntary False Confession – a false confession knowingly given in response to little or no police pressure. In 2011, a deal was reached where the West Memphis Three would be released from prison if they entered an Alford plea, officially pleading guilty to the crime while maintaining their innocence. There are three main types of coerced or false confessions in the criminal justice system. Since no trace of their DNA was found at the scene, police were forced to look for other suspects, and Dick eventually named two more accomplices, Derek Tice and Eric C. Wilson, who subsequently confessed to being involved. In 1977, Reilly was granted a new trial after evidence was uncovered that a state trooper had seen him driving his car five miles away at the time the murder was supposedly taking place. The West Memphis Three were soon charged and found guilty of the murders, with Echols being sentenced to death. You need more than a confession." To make things even more tragic, her 18-month old daughter, Shane, died of dehydration in her crib after being neglected for several days. One month later, police brought in 17-year old Jessie Misskelley, Jr. for questioning, and he eventually confessed that he and two other teens, Damien Echols and Jason Baldwin, had murdered the three boys as part of a satanic ritual. Remarkably, he was found guilty again because the prosecution claimed that Staker had consensual sex with someone else that night… even though she was only 11 years old! In order to avoid the death penalty, he would enter an Alford plea and was sentenced to life in prison. Deskovic was questioned on eight separation occasions, and on January 25, 1990, he was administered a polygraph test without a parent or counsel present and told he had failed. The jogger case is notorious but not unique. Officer: Then why didn’t you tell us that? Wilson also had an alibi for the time the murder took place and the eyewitness who implicated him was another mentally challenged man who later admitted to lying. Such rulings happen over and over again in DNA exoneration cases. Brandon Garrett is the Justice Thurgood Marshall Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of Virginia School of Law. Washington had an IQ of 69 and was coerced into making all his confessions. Hopefully, the Supreme Court has learned from cases like McCollum’s and will use the Dassey case as an opportunity to reaffirm that the Constitution requires special care when vulnerable people are interrogated. The attack left her in a coma and she had no memory of the incident after she recovered. False confessions can be categorized into three general types, as outlined by American Saul Kassin in an article for Current Directions in Psychological Science: Voluntary false confessions are those that are given freely, without police prompting. After failing a polygraph test, the exhausted Reilly was interrogated for several hours. In the meantime, here are five cases that relied heavily on a false confession to get a conviction. Under to the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, due process requires that all confessions obtained by the police must be voluntary. LegalMatch provides legal insights in their online law library to help you with your case. He eventually came to believe the police’s assertion that he had blacked out and forgotten he committed the murder, so he signed a confession. convicted on voluntary false confessions). This case is one in which Mr. Johnson, a college graduate, confessed to a serious crime he did not commit. March 1st Interrogation and Confession These are: voluntary false confessions, compliant false confessions, and; persuaded false confessions. (pause) We know, we just need you to tell us. These are cases, and they often happen in high-profile cases that are in the news, where people come out of the woodwork and volunteer confessions to crimes that are in the news that they didn’t commit. Examples of Voluntary False Confession. Both state and lower federal courts are guilty of failing to take voluntariness seriously. One of the most common interrogation methods used by … He was a known drug and alcohol user with a history of mental illness and could not provide accurate details about the murder until they were fed to him by police. 1.1. Often the factual circumstances manifest the purpose underlying false confessions. In most cases, confessors usually recant these confessions quickly after the interrogation ends. It would be 16 years before new DNA testing was done and it wound up matching Steven Cunningham, a convicted inmate who was serving time for another murder and subsequently confessed to killing Correa. Even though they are now free, they have never been officially exonerated and the real killer of the three boys remains unpunished. However, in 2012, Trump claimed he had been coerced into naming them by the prosecutor, and both he and Erickson would give sworn affidavits recanting their testimony. High-profile rulings have affirmed now-infamous false confessions because they failed to properly analyze whether they were voluntary. More than 1 out of 4 people exonerated by DNA evidence had made a false confession or incriminating statement prior to being convicted. A vulnerable, intellectually disabled juvenile is unlikely to accurately or voluntarily confess. Instrumental voluntary false confessions are ones in which an individual comes forward on his/her behalf and confesses to the crime. However, the confession strong enough to garner a guilty verdict from the jury and Deskovic received a sentence of 15 years to life in prison. The real killer of Rebecca Lynn Williams has never been found. 3. On August 17, 1992, an 11-year old girl named Holly Staker was raped and murdered while babysitting in Waukegan, Illinois. Here are ten controversial cases where a conviction was made possible by a very questionable confession. ... classified known false confession cases into three categories. The “Paradise Lost” series, a trilogy of documentaries about the case, garnered national exposure for the West Memphis Three and much outrage about their convictions. Acting on an eyewitness tip, police were eventually led to a 20-year old resident named Johnny Lee Wilson and after being interrogated for nearly four hours, he confessed to the crime. He reads on a second-grade level.”. Brendan: That’s all I can remember. Five Harlem youths – Anton McCray, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana, Yusef Salaam, and Kharey Wise—had been in the park the night of the attack and were brought in for an interrogation. Wilson was released after serving his sentence, and Tice, Williams and Dick would receive conditional pardons from Virginia governor Tim Kaine in 2009. The case remained cold until 2004 when a young man named Chuck Erickson told police he believed he had repressed memories of having committed the murder with his friend, Ryan Ferguson. One year later, police turned their attention to a farmhand named Earl Washington Jr., who was in custody for another crime. On the basis of Reyes’ confession, their convictions were officially vacated. What are records? Astonishingly, false confessions are fairly common. After being subjected to many hours of interrogation, suspects can reach a breaking point where they ultimately decide to tell the authorities what they want to hear. It’s extremely, extremely important you tell us this, for us to believe you. The popular Netflix documentary Making a Murderer told a compelling story with several unexpected twists. On September 28, 1973, 51-year old Barbara Gibbons was found murdered at her home in Canaan, Connecticut. In 2006, Jeffrey Deskovic was finally exonerated and released. Take the case of Henry McCollum, whose confession was found voluntary in a brief statement by the North Carolina Supreme Court. JonBenet Ramsey Case – JonBenet Ramsey was a 6-year-old beauty queen. Indeed, as more and more wrongful convictions are discovered, often as a result of newly av… He is also the co-owner of a pop culture called The Back Row. There are three types of false confessions: 'voluntary', 'pressured-compliant' and 'pressured-internalized'. At her funeral, police noticed that one of her fellow students, 17-year old Jeffrey Deskovic, was crying profusely and became suspicious when they discovered he’d been absent from school during the time Correa went missing. In 1994, Washington would receive clemency from the governor of Virginia and had his sentence commuted to life in prison. On April 13, 1986, the small town of Aurora, Missouri was shocked when one of its most respected citizens, 79-year old Pauline Martz, was murdered. This time, the prosecution produced one of the kids Staker had babysat as an eyewitness. The cases of Brendan Dassey and Steven Avery are not isolated events, but have help raised awareness of the flaws with our criminal justice system. On August 17, 1992, an 11-year old girl named Holly Staker was raped and murdered while babysitting in Waukegan, Illinois. Voluntary or Involuntary Confessions Why the five boys confessed isn't known, Kassin says, but the police interrogation may have played a role. Police investigated a neighbor named John Purvis, who suffered from schizophrenia and was looked upon as the town “weirdo”. © 2020 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Satellite Information Network, LLC. Voluntary false confessions arise when innocent people offer self-incriminating statements without pressure from police (often to protect someone else or to gain attention in high-profile crimes, as when 200 people confessed to the 1,932 kidnapping of Charles Lindbergh’s baby son). On the other hand, a spontaneous or voluntary false confession involves a person confessing to a crime he or she did not commit, absent police interrogation. Almost without exception, in DNA exoneration cases, false confession statements were contaminated with details that supposedly only the culprit could have known. Lying is presently permitted under 1969 Supreme Court decision known as Frazier v. Cupp. An inmate named Omar Ballard eventually confessed to committing the murder on his own and his DNA was present at the crime scene. When law enforcement officials are under great pressure to solve a case, finding the right perpetrator can become a secondary priority and if necessary, they will use coercion and intimidation to obtain a confession from a suspect. Sometimes they may be sacrificial, to divert attention from the actual person who committed the crime. The first time he was questioned, Purvis’ mother broke up the interrogation when she saw detectives attempting to intimidate her son. One – there is a category of false confessions known as voluntary false confessions. The state police has always maintained their position that Reilly was the real killer and while he has made many attempts to find out who really killed his mother, authorities have always refused to release their files about the case and Barbara Gibbons’ murder remains unsolved 40 years later. The next time they brought Purvis in for questioning, they made sure mother wasn’t present and he was coerced him into making a taped confession. However, the Norfolk Four are still required to register as sex offenders and they continue to fight to clear their names. An involuntary confession that was coerced by a police officer cannot be used against a defendant in court, regardless of whether it was true. Dr. Richard Leo, a false confessions expert who testified in the Beatrice 6 case, which is discussed below, has identified three types of false confessions. Most false confession cases involve police interrogations. The investigation was not reopened until 1992 when evidence came to light that Hamwi had been murdered by two hitmen who were hired by her ex-husband. The legal standard for an involuntary confession is whether law enforcement officers used tactics that undermined the suspect’s ability to exercise free will. The Juan Rivera case is a prime example of how much weight a false confession can carry. By that time, the Central Park Five had already served their sentences and been forced to register as sex offenders after being released. This is a high standard and a difficult one for a defendant to meet. She had been beaten and burned alive when the killer set her home ablaze. There is minimal to no pressure from the police because the person usually confesses right away (Schwartz, 2016, p. 36). Take the case of Henry McCollum, whose confession was found voluntary in a brief statement by the North Carolina Supreme Court. False confession cases always result from the way that an interrogation has taken place. However, Wilson suffered from mild retardation and had an IQ of 76. People who are intellectually disabled can struggle to understand the consequences of their actions and are similarly vulnerable. 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