One topic I have become interested in the last few years are the false confessions of juveniles and how they are treated by the law. My personal experience with this happened when I was thirteen, I was strongly interrogated by police about my father’s drug use and drug trafficking. I could feel them pressuring me and putting words in my mouth. Later that night my father was sent to jail and I was thrown in foster care. I don’t quite remember the statement that I had written it was years ago but I do remember the extreme physiological pressure I felt from the police around me I felt as if they were not helping me or on my side. I knew I had done nothing wrong, but they treated me as if I was the perpetrator, I only wrote what they told me to so I could go home. This ordeal has now changed my whole life. Growing up in foster care IV developed distaste for the juvenile justice system and how they treat their adolescent’s. I believe police interrogations play a strong role in false confessions and In my personal opinion juveniles should not be interrogated without a lawyer or a immediate family member in the room. Many do not know that police have the right to lie to juveniles about evidence that they don’t have to produce a false confession. Tom barker and David Carter, both deans of criminal justice colleges stated “There are numerous circumstances in which police officers lie. They lie to complaints, victims, and criminal suspects. Officers even lie in court, on official reports and to supervisors.” (1) In the end police will lie about anything that they can just to “fluff up” cases and to end the predicaments as soon as they can.
I hope to use the information from my research so I can support my belief on juvenile justice. I a...
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... false confessions: current research, practice, and policy recommendations. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2010. Print.
Leo, Richard A.. Police interrogation and American justice. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2008. Print.
Nakaya, Andrea C.. Juvenile crime: opposing viewpoints. Farmington Hills, MI: Greenhaven Press, 2005. Print.
Rosenthal, Sadie, and Anne James. Juvenile death penalty: representation resources. Washington, D.C.: American Bar Association, Juvenile Justice Center, 2001. Print.
"The Innocence Project - Home." The Innocence Project - Home. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Apr. 2014. .
Warden, Rob, and Steven A. Drizin. True stories of false confessions. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press, 2009. Print.
West of Memphis. Dir. Amy Berg. Perf. NA. Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, 2013. Film.
The Juvenile Justice system, since its conception over a century ago, has been one at conflict with itself. Originally conceived as a fatherly entity intervening into the lives of the troubled urban youths, it has since been transformed into a rigid and adversarial arena restrained by the demands of personal liberty and due process. The nature of a juvenile's experience within the juvenile justice system has come almost full circle from being treated as an adult, then as an unaccountable child, now almost as an adult once more.
McCann, Joseph. “A Conceptual Framework for Identifying Various Types of Confessions.” Behavioral Sciences and the Law 16 (1998): 441-453. Web. 8 January 2014.
Hale, Robert L. A Review of Juvenile Executions in America. Vol. 3. Wales: Edwin Mellen, 1997. Print.
I wanted to look at the investigative and criminal procedures following the arrest of an alleged criminal and the powerful effects via testimonies and evidence (or lack thereof) it can have on a case.There is an importance of the courts in regards to crime that can’t be over looked. The primary function of the criminal justice system is to uphold the established laws, which define what we understand as deviant in this society.
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...
False confessions are receiving more public attention now that people are speaking out about having to serve jail time for a crime they did not commit. 2015 was a year to remember for false confessions starting in January when a man was released after serving 21 years in prison. The protocols that interrogators are trained to follow are dangerous because they allow investigators to have complete influence on innocent people to make false confessions.
Garrett, B. L. (n.d.). The Substance of False Confessions. Criminal Justice Collection. Retrieved November 23, 2010, from find.galegroup.com.uproxy.library.dc-uoit.ca/gtx/retrieve.do?contentSet=IAC-Documents&resultListType=RESULT_LIST&qrySerId=Locale%28en%2C%2C%29%3AFQE%3D%28su%2CNone%2C28%29%22Wrongful+Convictions+%28Law%29%22%3AAnd%3ALQE%3D%28RE%2CNone%2C3%29ref%24&sgHitCo
Leo, R. A., & Thomas, G. C. (1998). The Miranda Debate: Law, Justice, and Policing. In R. A. Leo, & G. C. Thomas, The Miranda Debate: Law, Justice, and Policing (p. 343). Boston, Massachusetts: Northeastern University Press.
A movement has started in our country to renovate the juvenile justice system. This movement wants to erase any differences between young offenders and adult criminals. Almost all fifty states have changed their juvenile justice laws, allowing more youths to be tried as adults...
juvenile justice” (Elrod & Ryder, 2011) is to detour juvenile crimes and not be so easy on
In order to better understand why people confess to crimes they have not committed, Kassin an...
Medalie, R., Zeitz, L., & Alexander, P. (1968). Custodial Interrogations in Our Nation's Capital: The Attempt to Implement Miranda. Michigan Law Review, 1347.
From the moment an innocent individual enters the criminal justice system they are pressured by law enforcement whose main objective is to obtain a conviction. Some police interrogation tactics have been characterized as explicit violations of the suspect’s right to due process (Campbell and Denov 2004). However, this is just the beginning. Additional forms of suffering under police custody include assaults,
Vito, Gennaro F., and Clifford E. Simonsen. Juvenile justice today. 4th ed. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson/Prentice Hall, 2004. Print.
They are often intimidated by adults and authority figures, and are more likely to be the victims of coerced confessions, which are often false. Juveniles are less likely to invoke their Miranda Rights, including their right to legal representation. The juvenile death penalty disproportionately affects children of color. It is subject to the same racial disparities, which has been discovered throughout the use of capital punishment. Many adolescents cannot fully grasp the results of their actions. The death penalty does not act as a deterrent for them, because they cannot fear something they don’t understand. Teenagers often feel that nothing bad can happen to them. Most juvenile offenders have had terrible childhoods. Teens may grow out of the effects of their childhoods and make something of themselves with guidance and rehabilitation. Adolescents are more impulsive than adults as they underestimate risks and overvalue short-term benefits. They are more susceptible to stress, more emotionally volatile, and less capable of controlling their emotions than adults. Juveniles are not considered adults under the law due to their difficulty with decision-making and immaturity. Many youths