People face ethical dilemmas every day. But it is perhaps, most prevalent in the law enforcement profession. Law enforcement officers face ethical dilemmas constantly. Some of the ethical issues that police face each day are: racial profiling, officer discretion, police officer loyalty, police officer abuse, and interrogatory deception. This paper will discuss the purpose of interrogatory deception, ways in which it is used, some of the current debates over the practice, and a landmark ruling in the Miranda case of 1966 which attempted to cease the use of intimidation and coercion practices of the police.
The purpose or “goal of [an] interrogation is to facilitate the act of confessing [and obtaining truth]” (Leo & Thomas, 1998). The problem arises when an officer sits down with a suspect in an attempt to gain information or a confession; however, the suspect refuses to cooperate. So how can an officer facilitate the process and get a suspect to talk or even better, confess? Years ago this was accomplished by police through the use of force also known as police brutality. That practice has been abandoned due to the infringement of individual rights. Police were forced to seek an alternate means of obtaining information that did not rely on inhumane practices. This turnaround came in the form of trickery and deceit; called interrogatory deception. This type of psychological coercion is taught and practiced daily by today’s law enforcement. It is based on the utilitarian standpoint by police that the means justifies the outcome. This type of interrogation is performed in a way “which elicits admissions by deceiving suspects who have waived their right to remain silent” (Skolnick & Leo, 1992). For example, an officer co...
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...t, “A variety of factors can contribute to a false confession during a police interrogation. Many cases have included a combination of several of these causes. They may include [but not limited to]: duress, coercion, diminished capacity, mental impairment, ignorance of the law, fear of violence, the actual infliction of harm, the threat of a harsh sentence, and even misunderstanding the situation” (Innocence Project). All of these factors have a huge effect during an interrogation. If one is ignorant to the law he may confess in order to end the uncomfortable nature of the situation. Unaware that he or she has now compromised themselves. As a result The Innocence Project has advocated recording interrogations as a means to protect the suspect and law enforcement personnel and perhaps forcing officers to act more ethically and resulting in less legality issues.
In order to incriminate Danial Williams, Joseph Dick, Eric Wilson, and Derek Tice with the rape and murder of Michelle Moore-Bosko, Detectives Maureen Evans and Robert Ford conducted long, grueling interrogation sessions using many provocative and manipulative tactics. Throughout this process, Ford and Evans coerced the suspects into renegotiating their perception of the crime until an entirely new reality was created. This new reality evolved as the police elicited additional confessionary evidence to account for each new piece of physical evidence from the crime scene. Eventually, in an iterative process that had police editing their theories of the crime and then forcing the suspects to claim this new reality as their own, the reconciled reality of the crime became one that was consistent with both the criminal evidence and the suspects’ new perception. An analysis of empirical m...
The Central Park Jogger case is one of false confessions to a crime, with a little help from police, which the defendants did not commit. Evidence taken at the crime scene did exclude the defendants, however, because of videotaped confessions they were sentenced to prison for a crime they admitted to committing even though they did not. It was not until many years later did the original perpetrator step forward from prison to admit he was the one who committed the crime with evidence (DNA) and firsthand knowledge of the scene. The five original defendants were released from prison but until serving a lengthy term. There are cues that can be noticed when investigators are conducting preliminary interviews that have a very high rate of success in determining the guilt or innocence of an individual. Some of these cues may be verbal such as a rehearsed response (Kassin, 2005). Other types of cues may be nonverbal body language such as a slouching (Kassin, 2005).
The act of interrogation has been around for thousands of years. From the Punic Wars to the war in Iraq, interrogating criminals, prisoners or military officers in order to receive advantageous information has been regularly used. These interrogation techniques can range from physical pain to emotional distress. Hitting an individual with a whip while they hang from a ceiling or excessively questioning them may seem like an ideal way to get them to reveal something, but in reality it is ineffective and . This is because even the most enduring individual can be made to admit anything under excruciating circumstances. In the Fifth Amendment of the Bill of Rights there is a provision (“no person shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself” ) which reflects a time-honored common principle that no person is bound to betray him or herself or can be forced to give incriminating evidence. This ideology of self-incrimination has been challenged heavily over the past s...
Inbau, F. E., Reid, J. E., Buckley, J. P., & Jayne, B. C. (2013). Criminal Interrogation and Confessions (Fifth Edition ed.). Chicago: Jones & Bartlett Learning, LLC.
Depending on what study is read, the incidence of false confession is less than 35 per year, up to 600 per year. That is a significant variance in range, but no matter how it is evaluated or what numbers are calculated, the fact remains that false confessions are a reality. Why would an innocent person confess to a crime that she did not commit? Are personal factors, such as age, education, and mental state, the primary reason for a suspect to confess? Are law enforcement officers and their interrogation techniques to blame for eliciting false confessions? Regardless of the stimuli that lead to false confessions, society and the justice system need to find a solution to prevent the subsequent aftermath.
According to “Sleep Deprivation and False Confessions” and “False Confessions to Police and their Relationship with Conduct Disorder, ADHD, and life adversity,” it tackles on the causes of false confessions and who is more prone to such factors. Based on “The Role of Deception” and “How the Police Generate False Confessions: An Inside Look at the Interrogation Room” by Trainum, James L, it focuses on the methods police interrogators use to coerce a false confession. Lastly, ways to prevent false confessions from recurring will be recommended through “Miranda Rights Comprehension in Young Adults with Specific Language Impairment,” “Miranda Rights and Wrongs: Matter of Justice,” and “Police-Induced Confessions: Risk Factors and Recommendations.” Due to these reasons, the modern justice system needs to be updated and enforced to avoid similar cases of coerced false
...expert testimony in assessing the reliability of disputed confessions. The reason people make false confessions is typically due to a combination of factors such as psychological vulnerabilities, nature of the custodial confinement and the police interviewing tactics. Standardized psychological tests have been devised in order to assess personality factors such as suggestibility and compliance that render some people more vulnerable than others but these should never bee looked at in isolation. Studies indicate that reported cases are only the ‘tip of the iceberg’. It appears that young people are particularly vulnerable and often make false confessions in order to protect others. It is not only people with learning disability or major mental illness´ that are susceptible to make false confessions; depending on the context, anybody can.
Many of today’s interrogation models being utilized in police investigations have an impact on false confessions. The model that has been in the public eye recently is the social psychological process model of interrogation known as the “The Reid Technique.” There are two alternatives used by the police today to replace the Reid Technique, one is the PEACE Model and the other is Cognitive Interviewing. These methods are not interrogation techniques like Reid but interview processes.
Voluntary false confessions, compliant false confessions, persuaded false confessions. A voluntary false confession is one that is given in the absence of police interrogation (Kassin & Wrightsman, 1985). These may be the result of a psychological disturbance, desire for notoriety or fame, need to expiate guilt over imagined or real acts, desire to protect a criminal, provide an alibi for a different crime, or for revenge (Kassin & Wrightsman, 1985). Compliant false confessions are given in agreement to police coercion or pressure. These are typically to escape from the stress of an interrogation, to take advantage of a perceived suggestion or promise of leniency, or to avoid an anticipated harsh punishment (Ofshe & Leo, 1997). Persuaded false confessions are those which occur when “ police interrogation tactics cause an innocent suspect to doubt his memory and he becomes temporarily persuaded that it is more likely than not that he committed the crime, though he has no recollection of committing it (Leo, 2009). These types of false confessions cause suspects to suffer cognitive dissonance because of the accusers telling him that he committed a crime but the innocent suspect has no memory of it, so he believes that he just does not remember committing the crime. These types of false confessions occur much less than compliant false
The nine segments of the interrogation process is extensive but will be briefly summarized below. The first stage includes confrontational statements indicating plausible guilt to convey to the suspect that his guilt is known to be true by the interrogator. The following stage develops through posing questions to unfold a theme as to how and why the crime transpired. It is here the interrogator makes note of whether the suspect is emotional or non-emotional and acts accordingly by tailoring an approach to the suspects personality using a moral approach, for example. The third step handles the denials by acutely dismissing them, as “suspects who deny their involvement in criminal activity are less likely to offer a confession later in the interrogation”. Fourthly, the interrogator aims to overcome the objections of the suspect by reinstating the theme and prompting a confession. The fifth stage refers to the retention of the suspect’s attention, this step is crucial as guilty suspects tend to withdraw psychologically at this point, therefore the interrogator must capture and retain their attention through visual aids or increasing proximity. Stage six pertains to appealing to the passive suspects who are now willing to listen and could be outwardly emotional, here is where interrogators empathetically urge the suspect to tell the truth.
There are also limitations to this study that researchers could further researcher or analyze such as other interrogation techniques and the amount of experience that professionals have gained. Nevertheless, the results found in this study will allow one to make the general assumption that false judgements can be made by real detectives and others who make decision in their
Minimization should continue to be used as an interrogation technique because it does effectively increase the rate of true confessions. However, there is still a potential risk for innocent suspects to give false confessions. Using the minimization technique, police officers can gain the suspect’s trust to confess to crime by minimizing the severity of the crime and expressing empathy for why they commit it. Suspects are more likely to give a confession because they believe that it will help them escaped severe consequences. Russano, Meissner, Narchet, and Kassin (2004) emphasized that confessions gathered through the minimization tactics can be admissible as evidence during the trials which benefits the legal system.
Mr. Duane also commented that police make mistakes, innocently, inadvertently or unintentionally with any statements they presented to the convicted, which is kind of linked up to his second and fifth reason, that there are no benefices in return to admit guilty even if that person is guilty or innocent. Police are human, if they can get any important information, whether the information is extensive or it is just a slip of the tongue, that significant detail can convict a person. Likewise, the police are willing to lie or they might just have faulty recollection of what actually happen when presenting a statement, nonetheless that is a way they could “crucify” the convicted. I believe the police are present to secure/guard the people and their
Leo, R and Ofshe R. The Social Psychology of Police Interrogation: The Theory and Classification of True and False Confessions. 16 Studies in Law, Politics and Society 189,
The purpose of police interrogations is to questions suspects in such a way as to obtain a confession, but as we learned in class this can lead into people giving false confessions and putting innocent people in jail. In the article, Public Defenders Push Strict Laws for Interrogation Footage a man named Adrian Thomas gave a false confession after being interrogated for ten hours and was told that if he gave a confession it would save his son’s life even though the police knew that the son was already dead. Thomas’s confession was coerced since the interrogation lasted for ten hours and they withheld information that Thomas’s son was already dead. Thomas was lucky that in his case the confession was recorded and evidence of coercion was present,