Advanced Criminal Law :: West Memphis 3
Professor James R. Elkins College of Law
West Virginia University |Spring|2011|

 

 

 

Coerced and False Confessions

False Confessions
Saul Kassin, Professor of Psychology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice; YouTube video

Chris Ochoa: A True Story of a False Confession
Innocence Project; YouTube video

Michael Crowe Case
National Geographic; YouTube video

Floyd Brown: A False Confession
Floyd Brown, mentally disabled, from Wadesboro, North Carolina, was held in the Dorothea Dix mental hospital, without trial, for 14 years by the State of North Carolina under the charge of murder. [YouTube video]

The Makings of a False Confession
Eddie Lowry; 10 years in prison; YouTube video

Interrogation
YouTube video

Chuck Erickson: Police Interrogation Video
YouTube video [pt.2: Ryan Ferguson][ pt.3: Ryan Ferguson case] [pt.4] [Free Ryan Ferguson]

Johnnie Lee Savory Discusses His Confession (at Age 14)
YouTube video [pt. 2] [pt.3: new trial] [pt.4] [Get Busy Living, or Get Busy Dying]
[In 2006, Johnnie Lee Savory was paroled and released after serving 30 years in prison.] [Coalition Seeks DNA Testing For Man Who Insists He's Innocent of Murders That Occurred When He Was 14] [Clemency Petition] [Journey for Justice] [Audio: Johnnie Lee Savory, in a 2008 interview tells his story] [Steve Drizin on justice for Savory]

False Confession: Episode of "Justice"
Episode of TV drama--"Justice"; fiction; pt2 || pt3 || pt4 || pt 5 [app. 41 min.]

West Virginia Coerced Confession Case
The West Virginia Record

Kentucky 15 Yr. Old Youth's Coerced Confession
Lexington Herald-Leader

Coerced Confessions
Prof. Richard A. Rosen, University of North Carolina School of Law
Public Defender Conference, 2008

Coerced/Nonvoluntary Confessions
Hollida Wakefield & Ralph Underwager

Coerced (False) Confessions
Robert Owens

What Makes Criminal Suspects Give a False Confession?
Liliana Segura

A Tale of Two Decisions (or, how the FBI gets you to confess)
Steve Bergstein [Blogger Posts 9/11 Opinion Withdrawn] [Blog entry]

Alleged Cases of Wrongful Conviction from False Confessions
[Paul G. Cassell, College of Law, University of Utah]

The Truth About False Confessions and Advocacy Scholarship
Richard A. Leo & Richard J. Ofshe; a response to Paul Cassell's "Alleged Cases of Wrongful Conviction from False Confessions"

The Consequences of False Confessions: Deprivations of Liberty and Miscarriages of Justice in the Age of Psychological Interrogation
Richard A. Leo & Richard J. Ofshe

Inside the Interrogation Room
Richard A. Leo, University of San Francisco

Wrongful Convictions and False Confessions
Richard A. Leo

False Confessions and Legal Safeguards in the 2lst Century
Richard A. Leo, Steven A. Drizin, Peter J. Neufeld, Bradley R. Hall & Amy Vatner]

Filmmaking in the Precinct House and the Genre of Documentary Film
Jessica Silbey

Police Interrogation: Practices and Techniques

Richard A. Leo, Police Interrogation and American Justice (New Press, 2008)

Gisli H. Gudjonsson, The Psychology of Interrogations and Confessions: A Handbook (Wiley, 2003)

Joseph P. Buckley, Essentials of the Reid Technique: Criminal Interrogations and Confessions (Jones and Bartlett Publishers, 2004)

David E. Zulawski & Douglas E. Wicklander, Practical Aspects of Interview and Interrogation (CRC, 2nd ed., 2001)

Stan B. Walters, Principles of Kinesic Interview and Interrogation (CRC, 2nd ed., 2002)

Don Rabon, Interviewing and Interrogation (Carolina Academic Press, 2005)

Fred E. Inbau, et.al, Criminal Interrogation and Confessions (Jones & Bartlett Publishers, 2004)

G. Daniel Lassiter, Interrogations, Confessions, and Entrapment (Springer, 2006)

Tom Wells & Richard A Leo, The Wrong Guys: Murder, False Confessions, and the Norfolk Four (New Press, 2009)

Nathan Gordon & William L. Fleisher, Effective Interviewing and Interrogation Techniques (Academic Press, 2nd ed., 2006)

Gregory DeClue, Interrogations and Dispute Confessions: A Manual for Forensic Psychological Practice (Professional Resource Press, 2005)

Footnote: In postrial court filings, attorneys argue "that jurors relied on the statement Mr. Misskelley gave the police to convict Mr. Echols and Mr. Baldwin, even though it was deemed inadmissible except in Mr. Misskelley's trial. Several jurors have acknowledged that they knew about the confession before the trial, though they did not say so during jury selection." [Shaila Dewan, "Defense Offers new Evidence in a Murder Case That Shocked Arkansas," New York Times, Oct. 30, 2007, A16]

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