What Is a False Confession?
A false confession is where a person admits that they are guilty when in fact they are not responsible for the crime. False confessions can occur through the use of coercion or force to obtain the statement. They may also result from the mental incapacity of the accused person. Although false confessions may seem unlikely, they actually occur regularly and can present many problems during a criminal trial.
False Confessions | LegalMatch
… confessions that look real can actually be false, even if they’re corroborated by informants and forensic science.
Saul Kassin, John Jay College of Criminal Justice
Page Description
A Textbook Example of False Confessions:
Learn how false confessions can occur under coercion
or mental duress, and the issues
they pose in criminal trials.
False confessions refer to situations in which individuals admit to committing a crime despite being innocent. There are several key points related to false confessions that are important to understand:
Causes: False confessions can occur due to various reasons, including but not limited to: police coercion, psychological manipulation, duress, fear, exhaustion, diminished mental capacity, intoxication, and the desire for leniency or to protect someone else.
Types: False confessions can be categorized into three main types: voluntary false confessions, which occur when individuals falsely confess without any external pressure; coerced-compliant false confessions, which occur when individuals confess to stop or avoid further interrogation or punishment; and coerced-internalized false confessions, which occur when individuals come to believe that they have actually committed the crime due to prolonged and intense interrogation tactics.
Risk factors: Certain individuals may be more vulnerable to making false confessions, such as juveniles, individuals with intellectual or developmental disabilities, those with low cognitive abilities, and individuals who are psychologically or emotionally vulnerable. Additionally, lengthy interrogations, lack of access to legal representation, and deceptive interrogation tactics can increase the risk of false confessions.
Consequences: False confessions can have serious consequences, including wrongful convictions and imprisonment of innocent individuals, loss of freedom, damage to reputation and livelihood, emotional distress, and financial burdens.
Prevention and detection: Implementing safeguards during interrogations, such as recording interrogations, providing access to legal representation, training law enforcement officers on effective and ethical interrogation techniques, and using evidence-based interviewing methods, can help prevent false confessions. Additionally, thorough investigation and consideration of corroborating evidence can help detect false confessions and prevent wrongful convictions.
Legal implications: False confessions present challenges in the criminal justice system, as they can be compelling evidence to secure convictions. However, courts and juries should consider the circumstances surrounding the confession, the presence of corroborating evidence, and the potential for coercion or other factors that may have led to a false confession.
Importance of exoneration efforts: In cases where false confessions have resulted in wrongful convictions, efforts to exonerate the innocent individual and rectify the injustice are critical. This may involve re-investigating the case, DNA testing, and legal proceedings to overturn the wrongful conviction.
Overall, false confessions are complex phenomena that can have serious legal and societal implications. Understanding the causes, types, risk factors, consequences, prevention and detection methods, legal implications, and the importance of exoneration efforts are key points to consider when examining false confessions in the criminal justice system.
The Central Park Five: a timeline
Central Park Five appear in New York City court in 1989
1 Yusef Salaam | The Marshall Project | The New Yorker
2 Case Not Closed: The Story Of The Central Park 5 (Part 1 of 3)
9 jun. 2011
3 Case Not Closed: The Story Of The Central Park 5 (Part 2 of 3)
10 jun. 2011
5 Miscarriages of Justice ~ (1)Central Park 5 Case ~ Bad Confession (youth) Part 1 of (3)
22 aug. 2010
Central Park 5 case concerns 5 youths that were running wild around central park assaulting persons.They were arrested and soon after a woman Trisha Miley was found raped and badly beaten and unconcious. They were interrogated and 4 out of 5 of them confessed to raping the woman.
Subsequently a serial rapist and murderer Matiais Reyes operating in that area was caught and he admitted to raping that woman. It appeared the teenagers were innnocent. Post DNA…Why did they confess to a crime they didn’t commit. Disturbing and uncannily accurate confessions; and who is to blame?
Did the police hold and interrogate them long enough to deceive and trick them into confessing.
Were they merely parrots to police interrogators?
Information about miscarriages of justice:
A miscarriage of justice primarily is the conviction and punishment of a person for a crime they did not commit. The term travesty of justice is sometimes used for a gross, deliberate miscarriage of justice. Miscarriage of justice” is sometimes synonymous with wrongful conviction, referring to a conviction reached in an unfair or disputed trial.
Causes of miscarriages of justice include:
Plea bargains that offer incentives for the innocent to plead guilty
Confirmation bias on the part of investigators
Withholding or destruction of evidence by police or prosecution
fabrication of evidence or outright perjury by police (see testilying), or prosecution witnesses (e.g. Dr Charles Smith)
Biased editing of evidence
Prejudice towards the class of people to which the defendant belongs
Poor identification by witnesses and/or victims
Overestimation/underestimation of the evidential value of expert testimony
Contaminated evidence
Faulty forensic tests
false confessions due to police pressure or psychological weakness
Misdirection of a jury by a judge during trial
perjured evidence by the real guilty party or their accomplices (frameup)
Perjured evidence by supposed victim or their accomplices
Conspiracy between court of appeal judges and prosecutors to uphold conviction of innocent
6 Miscarriages of Justice ~ (2)Central Park 5 Case ~ Bad Confession (youth) Part 2 of (3)
22 aug. 2010
7 Miscarriages of justice ~ (3)Central Park 5 Case ~ Bad Confession (youth) Part 3 of (3)
22 aug. 2010
8 Central Park Five’s Yusef Salaam: Donald Trump Needs to Be Fired from Running for President
9 Innocence Project | Barry Scheck & Kevin Richardson | Talks at Google
4 okt. 2017
Co-Founder Barry Scheck speaks about The Innocence Project with Kevin Richardson, one of the men wrongly convicted in the Central Park Five case.
The Innocence Project, which is currently celebrating its 25th anniversary, was founded by acclaimed lawyers Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld who realized that the emerging DNA evidence that was being used to identify the perpetrators of crimes could also be used to exonerate those who had been wrongly convicted. The organization began as a legal clinic at Cardozo Law School and became an independent nonprofit (still affiliated with Cardozo) in 2004. Since its founding, 351 people have been exonerated by DNA evidence of crimes for which they didn’t commit. The Innocence Project has helped in more than half of these cases.
The Innocence Project understood early on that each wrongful conviction was a learning opportunity, exposing flaws in the system that contributed to these terrible injustices. It advocates for science- and research-based reforms to prevent wrongful convictions. The organization has worked to pass more than a hundred state laws designed to reveal and protect against wrongful convictions, including laws that protect against eye witness misidentifications and false confessions, leading contributors to wrongful convictions.
Co-Founder Barry Scheck will talk about his groundbreaking work to disrupt the status quo of the criminal justice system and introduce you to a person helped by the Innocence Project who will share his story of perseverance on the long road to justice.
10 Why Would a Kid Falsely Confess to a Crime? | Joshua Tepfer | TEDxGrinnellCollege
2 apr. 2015
11 Trump Makes Outrageous Statement On Central Park 5
19 jun. 2019
13 CENTRAL PARK 5: New Documentary Examines Their Wrongful Imprisonment
29 dec. 2012
15 CENTRAL PARK FIVE – ANTRON McCRAY FULL VIDEO CONFESSION
26 aug 2018
In June of this year (2018) case documents for the 1989 attack on a jogger and several others were made public record by order of the court.
On the night of April 19, 1989, in Central Park, NY, a jogger was brutally raped and beaten.
The teens were interrogated for hours before they made these statements. The attack took place on Apr. 19 and the video confessions were recorded on Apr. 21.
In 1990 all five were convicted and received sentences ranging from 5 to 13 years.
During trial the DA relied heavily on their video confessions. They all later retracted their statements, saying they were coerced.
In 2002, all five moved to vacate their convictions on the grounds of newly discovered evidence: specifically, a confession by convicted rapist and murderer, Matias Reyes, who Korey Wise met in prison. Reyes’ DNA was a positive match to semen found at the original crime scene.
The motions to vacate were granted.
In 2012 a documentary was made called “The Central Park Five” by Sarah Burns.
Sources:
PBS – “The Central Park Five” By Sarah Burns
16 Jerk Cop Steals Old Lady’s Seat
