The Art Of False Confessions

“Why would you confess if you aren’t guilty?” A false confession is a difficult thing for most people to wrap their heads around. I’ll admit that with my knowledge of how the legal system works, I can’t believe anyone would allow themselves to be interrogated by a trained detective without a lawyer present. But that’s an easy thing to say when you aren’t arrested off-guard and thrown into an isolated sterile room with a stranger — especially if your intelligence is at the level of a child.

The Central Park Five, The Norfolk Four, The West Memphis Three, and now Steven Avery and Brendan Dassey’s case of Netflix’s Making a Murderer is just the latest case of convictions due to what appears to be a false confession. False confessions are making their way into the prime time entertainment industry. On one hand I could look at this as exploitative– cashing in at the expense of those who are falsely convicted. I could look at this as drawing much needed attention to the unsettling interrogation techniques carried out by people we’re expected to trust. Maybe the TV networks aren’t the ones exploiting innocent people after all– at least in this particular situation.

RELATED: Making A Murderer: The Case For And Against Steven Avery And Brendan Dassey

So looking into it more I discovered that most detectives use a method of interrogation called the Reid Technique. Here are the summarized nine steps:

Step 1 – Positive confrontation. The investigator should stand directly in front of the suspect and in a confident manner and tone of voice confront the suspect with a statement of guilt.

Step 2 – Theme development. Once the investigator sits down, he should present some type of moral justification for the suspect’s act. This presented justification is called a theme. One effective means of presenting this justification to the suspect is to place the moral blame for his actions on some other person or some outside set of circumstances. This procedure is founded on a very basic aspect of human nature — most people tend to minimize their responsibility for their actions by placing blame upon someone or something else.

Step 3 – Handling denials. Discourage from denials and return to theme.

Step 4 – Overcoming objections. The suspect’s objections clearly indicate the investigator is making substantial progress in his pursuit of the truth. Generally, the investigator should accept these objections as though they were truthful; indeed, his response should be a statement of agreement. The investigator should then use the objection to his advantage in the further development of his theme.

Step 5 – Procurement and retention of suspect’s attention. The interrogator moves in physically closer to the suspect.

Step 6 – Handling the suspect’s passive mood. If the suspect cries at this point, infer guilt. As the investigator repeats the central statements, he should continue to display an understanding and sympathetic demeanor in urging the suspect to tell the truth, perhaps even using gestures of sympathy such as a hand on the suspect’s shoulder.

Step 7 – Presenting an alternative question. The alternative questions and accompanying supporting statements should be based on an assumption of guilt. By merely requiring a suspect to nod his head or say the word “yes” it is much easier for him to admit his guilt than requiring some type of narrative response.



Step 8 – Have the suspect orally relate various details of the offense.

Step 9 – Convert an oral confession to a written confession.

What I gathered from reading about this technique along with the false confession cases was that the detectives appear to be trained to enter an interrogation under the assumption that the person in question is guilty. The detective’s job is to get a confession– not actually question the subject and gather information. This technique is in absolute contrast to what directly follows in our court system: “everyone is innocent until proven guilty.” If you’ve already been “proven” guilty by providing a confession, then the court trial really just becomes a formality. You know, to let your peers decide your fate, after you’ve already confessed.

The “theme development” exploits our human nature to divert blame or responsibility– especially in a mentally-vulnerable person. This would explain why in cases such as the Central Park Five, The West Memphis Three and Norfolk Four, multiple suspects were brought in and ultimately confessed– kind of. The suspects only confessed as accomplices and did not admit to taking part in the actual rapes or murder. In most cases like this, the suspects’ stories never match. Doesn’t matter: they all confessed, the stories aren’t important anymore.

What’s also interesting is that the more detailed instructions of the Reid Technique states that an innocent person will not advance past step 3: denial. At this point interrogation either ends or continues with the purpose of gathering information on alternate suspects. This would explain why in some cases, ethics appear to have been thrown to the side and an interrogation goes on for several hours if it isn’t moving past a denial. If the interrogator already has a suspect in front of them, it’s easier and less time consuming to just get a confession.

The public wants a face to blame for a crime and unfortunately, in a lot of cases, detectives along with the media will be happy to oblige. Trials and interrogations are time consuming and cost money. Who needs the truth if it’s expensive? Time is money. It’s best just to stress someone into confessing and then work out the details later. And who knows, maybe years later someone completely random will come forward or slip up. Maybe they’ll say they acted alone and DNA evidence will back it up. Oh, that’s what happened in the Central Park Five and Norfolk Four cases? Well, at least we had someone to blame for the time being.

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Randi Nord lives in Pontiac, Michigan and is a journalist for the Pontiac Tribune.