Law Commons^™

Selling Confession: Setting The Stage With The "Sympathetic Detective With A Time-Limited Offer", Richard Leo, Deborah Davis, William C. Follette

Richard A. Leo

The effectiveness of an interrogation tactic dubbed the “sympathetic detective with a time limited offer” was tested. Participants read two versions of an interrogation transcript, with and without the tactic. Those who read the sympathetic detective version believed the detective had greater authority to determine whether and with what to charge the suspect, more beneficent intentions toward the suspect, and viewed confession as more wise. However, regression analyses indicated that for innocent suspects, only perceptions of the strength of evidence against the suspect and the detective’s beneficence and authority predicted the perceived wisdom of false confession. Interrogation tactics were generally …

Police “Science” In The Interrogation Room: Seventy Years Of Pseudo-Psychological Interrogation Methods To Obtain Inadmissible Confessions, Brian Gallini

Brian Gallini

A Dark Descent Into Reality: Making The Case For An Objective Definition Of Torture, Michael W. Lewis

Michael W. Lewis

The definition of torture is broken. The malleability of the term “severe pain or suffering” at the heart of the definition has created a situation in which the world agrees on the words but cannot agree on their meaning. The “I know it when I see it” nature of the discussion of torture makes it clear that the definition is largely left to the eye of the beholder. This is particularly problematic when international law’s reliance on self-enforcement is considered. After discussing current common misconceptions about intelligence gathering and coercion that are common to all sides of the torture debate, …

The Gatehouses And Mansions: 50 Years Later, Richard Leo, K. Alexa Koenig

Richard A. Leo

In 1965, Yale Kamisar authored “Equal Justice in the Gatehouses and Mansions of American Criminal Procedure,” an article that would come to have an enormous impact on the development of criminal procedure and American norms of criminal justice. Today, that article is a seminal work of scholarship, hailed for “playing a significant part in producing some of the [Warren] Court’s most important criminal-procedure decisions” (White 2003-04), including Miranda v. Arizona. The most influential concept Kamisar promoted may have been his recognition of a gap that loomed between the Constitutional rights actualized in mansions (courts) versus gatehouses (police stations). Kamisar passionately …

Interrogation Through Pragmatic Implication: Sticking To The Letter Of The Law While Violating Its Intent, Deborah Davis, Richard A. Leo

Richard A. Leo

In response to increasing evidence that police interrogation procedures can and do elicit false confessions from innocent suspects, American Courts have offered guidelines intended to protect suspects from coercive interrogations and to ensure the voluntariness and reliability of any confessions obtained. However, faced with legal prohibitions against police promotion of suspect confessions through use of physical coercion or explicit incentives for confession, American police interrogation tactics have evolved to rely on the use of pragmatic implication to nevertheless convey strong incentives for suspects to confess guilt—practices that have essentially diluted or circumvented the intended protections and that have continued to …

United States Supreme Court Amicus Curiae Brief Filed By Richard A. Leo In Florida V. Powell, 130 S. Ct. 1195, Richard Leo

Richard A. Leo

This amicus brief, filed in Florida v. Powell, 130 S. Ct. 1195 (2010), addresses the question of whether a suspect is adequately informed of his right to the presence of counsel during custodial interrogation when advised only of his "right to talk to a lawyer before answering any of our questions."

The Gatehouses & Mansions: Fifty Years Later, Alexa Koenig, Richard Leo

Alexa Koenig

In 1965, Yale Kamisar authored “Equal Justice in the Gatehouses and Mansions of American Criminal Procedure,” an article that would come to have an enormous impact on the development of criminal procedure and American norms of criminal justice. Today, that article is a seminal work of scholarship, hailed for “playing a significant part in producing some of the [Warren] Court’s most important criminal- procedure decisions” (White 2003-04), including Miranda v. Arizona. The most influential concept Kamisar promoted may have been his recognition of a gap that loomed between the Constitutional rights actualized in mansions (courts) versus gatehouses (police stations). Kamisar …

Stop Taking The Bait: The Dilution Of Miranda Does Not Make America Safer From Terrorism, Ryan T. Williams

Ryan T. Williams

On December 25, 2009, a Nigerian tried to blow up a plane over Detroit, Michigan. On May 1, 2010, an American tried to set off explosives in New York's Times Square. Neither man succeeded. After both arrests, lawmakers clamored for more flexibility to interrogate terror suspects and for the suspension (if not elimination) of their Miranda rights. The Supreme Court subsequently decided three cases that severely dilute Miranda protections and Fifth Amendment rights. An examination of these decisions reveals that they fail to make America safer from terrorism.

Worse still, the dilution of American citizens' rights sends a dangerous message …