Last week we heard the testimony of Ariel Pineda, who testified that he had performed the interrogation of Daniel Marsh – who was 15 at the time of the crimes and had just turned 16 when questioned by Detective Pineda.
He testified that it was about a four-hour interrogation – it was apparently performed with an FBI agent present, but without the presence of an attorney.
Mr. Marsh would originally state that he had nothing to do with and no knowledge of the murders. While Detective Pineda stated that he “never threatened or promised him anything,” he did tell him that there were two people who said Mr. Marsh did it. Eventually the young defendant would admit to having committed the unthinkable acts.
There is increasing concern about the vulnerability of certain types of defendants to interrogation tactics and the fear that some tactics might lead to false confessions. We might question the propriety of putting a minor into an interrogation situation for four hours without the presence of an attorney.
The state legislature now has moved closer to providing additional protections to minors accused of homicide. Under a bill introduced by Senator Ted Lieu, which was unanimously approved last week by the California Senate, key law enforcement interviews would be videotaped.
Governor Brown now has until Oct. 13 to sign Senate Bill 569, veto it or allow the measure to become law on Jan. 1, 2014, without his signature.
“The virtue of videotaping interrogations of children lies not only in its ability to guard against false confessions but also how it can develop the strongest evidence possible to help convict the guilty,” Senator Lieu said about Senate Bill 569 after citing research indicating that false confessions by children under 18 have led to an increase in wrongful convictions.
He added, “Requiring videotaping of the interrogations of juveniles suspected of homicide would improve criminal investigation techniques, reduce the likelihood of wrongful conviction and further the cause of justice in California.”
Senator Lieu pointed to the research of professors Drizin and Leo of the University of San Francisco School of Law, suggesting that false confessions are often extracted from the most vulnerable suspects. Specifically, in a database of 125 proven false confessions compiled by Drizin and Leo, 33 percent involved confessions from juveniles, most of whom confessed to brutal murders.
Furthermore, in a more recent review of exonerations between 1989 and 2004 (Gross, Jacoby, Matheson, Montgomery, & Patil, 2005), 42 percent of the cases of juvenile exonerees involved false confessions, compared with 13 percent of the cases of adult exonerees.
Finally, among the youngest of these juvenile exonerees (aged 12 to 15), 69 percent confessed to homicides and rapes that they did not commit.
Lieu said he was concerned about how children may be the most vulnerable to false confessions or coercion because of their immaturity. Research has demonstrated that brain development continues throughout adolescence and into early adulthood. The brain’s frontal lobes – responsible for mature thought, reasoning, and judgment – develop last.
“Adolescents use their brains in a fundamentally different manner than adults,” he said. “They are more likely to act on impulse, without fully considering the consequences of their decisions or actions. Videotaping their interviews will help ensure accuracy.”
SB 569 would specifically require the interrogation of a minor who is suspected or accused of committing homicide to be videotaped by law enforcement agencies statewide. It would provide various exceptions from the videotaping requirement.
The legislation would require that the prosecution show by clear and convincing evidence that an exception applies to justify the failure to make that electronic recording and it would require the Judicial Council to develop related jury instructions.
Senator Lieu added that three injustices occur from false confessions: an innocent person is incarcerated; the real perpetrator remains free to commit crimes; the victims’ families are subjected to double emotional trauma – the loss of a loved one and the guilt over the conviction of an innocent child.
SB 569 is co-sponsored by the American Civil Liberties Union; the California Public Defenders Association; and the California Attorneys for Criminal Justice. It is also supported by the Friends Committee on Legislation of California; the National Association of Social Workers – California Chapter; and Taxpayers for Improving Public Safety.
“The goal is to prevent false, coerced confessions. At first, it’s hard to understand the fuss,” writes Steven Greenhut. “Who confesses to crimes they didn’t commit? But the research is shocking. False confessions for serious crimes are surprisingly common, especially among adolescents who might not understand the consequences of what they are saying.”
The Innocence Project writes, “While it can be hard to understand why someone would falsely confess to a crime, psychological research has provided some answers – and DNA exonerations have proven that the problem is more widespread than many people think. In approximately 25% of the wrongful convictions overturned with DNA evidence, defendants made false confessions, admissions or statements to law enforcement officials.”
There are exceptions – for instance, police can use as evidence non-videotaped confessions that take place spontaneously.
PORAC (Peace Officers Research Association of California) opposes the legislation, calling the electronic-recording criteria too “rigid” and complaining that it overreaches, adding “unnecessary restrictions on officers conducting these interrogations.”
Juvenile Court Judges of California opposes this bill because of concerns that this bill’s language is cumbersome and that procedures to determine whether there was a proper excuse for not recording the interview would delay court proceedings.
However, the Innocence Project believes, “The electronic recording of interrogations, from the reading of Miranda rights onward, is the single best reform available to stem the tide of false confessions.”
According to their literature, for the recording to be effective, “the entire custodial interrogation must be recorded. This record will improve the credibility and reliability of authentic confessions, while protecting the rights of innocent suspects.”
“In some false confession cases, details of the crime are inadvertently communicated to a suspect by police during questioning. Later, when a suspect knows these details, the police take the knowledge as evidence of guilt,” research has found.
“Often, threats or promises are made to the suspect off camera and then the camera is turned on for a false confession. Without an objective record of the custodial interrogation, it is difficult to gauge the reliability of the confession,” they note.
“For law enforcement agencies, recording interrogations can prevent disputes about how a suspect was treated, create a clear record of a suspect’s statements and increase public confidence in the criminal justice system. Recording interrogations can also deter officers from using illegal tactics to secure a confession,” they continue.
Over 800 jurisdictions nationwide, including the states of Alaska, Minnesota and Illinois, regularly record police interrogations. A 2004 study conducted by Illinois officials of 200 locations that implemented this reform found that police departments overwhelmingly embrace the measure as good law enforcement whose time has come.
—-David M. Greenwald reporting
[quote]While Detective Pineda stated that he “never threatened or promised him anything,” he did tell him that there were two people who said Mr. Marsh did it. [/quote]
Why do you keep using this as an example when you have idea if it’s false? I tend to believe it because only Marsh could’ve known that it might be true because he had possibly told his friends about it.
“Why do you keep using this as an example when you have (no) idea if it’s false?”
Because it illustrates the risk that without proper safeguards, we cannot rely on the confession. In essence, whether the confession is accurate or false is actually irrelevant, the key point is to use proper safeguards to ensure that an experienced minor would not be coerced into admitting something that he has not done.
“PORAC opposes the legislation, calling the electronic-recording criteria too “rigid” and complaining that it overreaches adding “unnecessary restrictions on officers conducting these interrogations.”
I do not understand this objection. What “restriction” is being placed on officers by the mere fact of the recording of their actions ?
It they are acting within the confines of the law, how does the ability to replay those actions hamper them in their job ?
[quote]Because it illustrates the risk that without proper safeguards, we cannot rely on the confession.[/quote]
No, actually that example doesn’t illustrate it at all unless it is proven to be false.
If you get the right result from the wrong process, it’s still a problem, you were just fortunate enough to avoid a bad outcome.
[quote]If you get the right result from the wrong process, it’s still a problem, you were just fortunate enough to avoid a bad outcome. [/quote]
No, you need to use an example of where an interrogater used a lie to get a confession from a minor.
At least the interrogation in the Marsh case was audio recorded.
“…whether the confession is accurate or false is actually irrelevant….”
Except to helping to assure that the guilty get justice and the innocent are not improperly convicted.
Thank you for the research reports. When was the year of the Drizen-Leo study? What was the number of subjects in the Gross, et al, study?
It surprises me that all interrogations in police facilities aren’t already recorded. Many off-site confessions would get picked up by the recorders that most police seem to be wearing. I can’t understand the objections unless there’s some prohibition on admissibility of non-recorded confessions that might get volunteered where no devices picked them up.
You keep implying that the hearing testimony suggests the Marsh case involves illegal interrogation with lies from questioners that could have led to a false confession. This innuendo is a giant leap to make from what we know about the numbers of misleading statements used to obtain false confessions in general and about the testimony you reported about this specific case.
[quote]You keep implying that the hearing testimony suggests the Marsh case involves illegal interrogation with lies from questioners that could have led to a false confession. [/quote]
Yes Justsaying, it’s kind of funny that just a few days ago David was telling us not to rush to judgement.
There is no rush to judgment. I’ve stated my concern. The IP lays out what they believe best practices are. I don’t believe those were followed here. It was audio recorded, not video. That leaves a lot of information out. We don’t know when questioning started, the IP recommends the entire process be recorded from start to finish.
Also I still have a problem that a kid at 16 cannot consent to medical treatment but can apparently consent to waiving his or her miranda rights.
good start but don’t understand why they would limit it to juveniles
“A business buzzword that describes a set of defined methods, processes, systems or practices used by a company or organization to meet performance and efficiency standards within their industry or organization. Best practices are guidelines which are used to obtain the most efficient and effective way of completing a task using repeatable and proven procedures.”
You are misusing the term. “Best practices” are developed by the organization or profession involved, based on their expertise, experience, evaluations, research, outside input, etc. What someone thinks somebody’s else’s “best practices” are their opinions and recommendations. How you think this interrogation might have measured up to the Innocence Project’s ideas of how police should operate is not measuring against “best practices.”
You are taking it even another step by judging on things “we don’t know.” You don’t know that interrogators lied to Marsh or that the recorder wasn’t turned on and off when the Innocence Project recommends.
Then, you go even farther by criticizing things that reportedly happened which you know were done correctly by law. You think a 16-year-old shouldn’t be allowed to waive Miranda rights, that video recordings should be required instead of audio recordings, that kids shouldn’t be tried as adults regardless of the crime.
To imply that the FBI or the DA or Davis police did something wrong because you have concerns with current legal “best practices” is a waste of energy.
“You don’t know that interrogators lied to Marsh or that the recorder wasn’t turned on and off even though the Innocence Project recommends different actions.”
“You don’t know that interrogators lied to Marsh or that the recorder wasn’t turned on and off even though the Innocence Project recommends different actions.”
i think i would trust the innocence project’s recommendations here. i don’t think a lot of people really understand how fragile memory, recollections, and other such things are. it is easy to contaminate and get a false positive.
David wrote:
> Finally, among the youngest of these juvenile
> exonerees (aged 12 to 15), 69 percent confessed
> to homicides and rapes that they did not commit.
Not a lot of 12-15 year old kids are out killing and raping so I’m guessing that the number of kids convicted AND exonerated is very very small (does the study have this number)?
> In approximately 25% of the wrongful convictions
> overturned with DNA evidence, defendants made false
> confessions, admissions or statements to law
> enforcement officials.”
Notice how it says false confession, false admission OR false statement.
There is a big difference between telling a cop you killed someone (a false confession) and telling a cop that you were not smoking pot (a false statement)…
[quote]Also I still have a problem that a kid at 16 cannot consent to medical treatment but can apparently consent to waiving his or her miranda rights.[/quote]
Not an accurate statement. Girls can get an abortion without their parents knowing.
“Girls can get an abortion without their parents knowing.”
not universally. there are special provisions there.
MO:
[quote]Girls can get an abortion without their parents knowing.
[/quote]
SP: [quote]not universally. there are special provisions there.[/quote]
Actually, yes universally. And there is no age limit.
[quote]Minors in California have the right to obtain information about contraception options (condoms, birth control pills, diaphragms, etc.). Teenagers also have the right to obtain contraception without an adult’s permission or knowledge. In fact, clinics and health care providers may not give parents any information about their children’s medical treatment, questions or prescriptions of contraception without the child’s consent.
California provides state funding for teenagers to obtain contraception and family planning services, including testing for sexually transmitted infections like HIV/AIDS.
You can go to clinics like Planned Parenthood and obtain contraception without giving them identification and without any parent or adult accompanying you. If you tell clinic providers that you are unable to pay, they will help you obtain free services paid for by the state of California through a program called Family PACT (California’s Family Planning, Access, Care, and Treatment program). You do not need to give your real name to obtain this funding.
Minors in California have the right to leave school to obtain medical treatment and/or consultation without their parents consent. This provision allows minors to make decisions about their health while maintaining their privacy.
Minors in California have the right to obtain an abortion without notifying their parents or any other adult. Again, California provides funding through the Family PACT program so if you or a friend needs an abortion, you can get funding for medical treatment without involving a parent or guardian. Though we encourage all young women to talk about their choices with a trusted adult, we know that many teenagers who experience violence at home cannot safely talk to their parents or obtain their help with difficult decisions about pregnancy.” [/quote][url]http://www.prochoicecalifornia.org/in-our-state/current-laws.shtml[/url]
Here is a shorter summary from Planned Parenthood:
[quote]California
No parental involvement requirement.[/quote]
I’m emphasize again- no age limit.
“i think i would trust the innocence project’s recommendations here. i don’t think a lot of people really understand how fragile memory, recollections, and other such things are. it is easy to contaminate and get a false positive.”
There’s nothing wrong with the IP’s ideas on these issues. Everything they’d like to see happen hasn’t, and maybe never will since there are competing interests at play in these matters. I think most educated people are now aware of the problems with memories, eyewitnesses, etc.
One thing everyone shares is a desire to convict the guilty ones and make sure the innocent ones suffer only the minimum indignities needed to clear them. Kind of like we tolerate at the airport.
JS: “….only the minimum indignities needed to clear them.”
You don’t want to depend on a public defender and a private attorney and investigator and depositions and some expert witnesses will cost you $100,000 or more, and its not refundable.
Its not uncommon that innocent people are wrongly charged with a crime(s) just in order to bankrupt them, if they’ve offended the wrong person or agency.
eagle eye
[quote]You don’t want to depend on a public defender and a private attorney and investigator and depositions and some expert witnesses will cost you $100,000 or more, and its not refundable. [/quote]
I wonder if it would have a beneficial effect on the decision making of the DA’s office if the money spent on defense was refundable in the case of acquittal. Would it not make it more likely that the DA would not
“roll the dice” or “over charge” or add “enhancements” if they knew that there would be a cost for over reaching. The recent case that illustrates this for me is the prospective juror who was tried for perjury
even though she was not seated on the jury and no possible harm could have been demonstrated from the telephone call between she and her incarcerated son.
I understand that in some cases of privately brought law suits, the court costs for both sides are paid by the “loser” of the case. I am thinking that some version of this might have beneficial effects when it is the
“public” bringing the case before the court.