Why would someone falsely confess

Kassin said: "The average person scratches his or her head. Wait, you thought you were gonna confess to involvement in a rape and go home? What were you thinking? What they were thinking has a lot to do with the minimization tactics that were used in the interrogation. Nobody confesses to raping the jogger. They implicate the others. Each of them pitches himself as having played a minor role; others raped her. That's different than getting five confessions.

They didn't confess. Each one actually saw his own confession as a ticket home. Although there was no DNA evidence linking the five defendants to the crime, two juries convicted them based on the false confessions. Their convictions were vacated in after another man confessed to the crime. They all served between six to 13 years in prison. According to the Innocence Project , a national organization that works to exonerate the wrongly convicted through DNA testing, 28 percent of exonerations obtained from using DNA evidence involved defendants who made false confessions.

Of those, 49 percent were 21 years old or younger at the time of their arrest. Jeffrey Deskovic was just 16 years old when he was arrested for the rape and murder of his classmate Angela Correa in Westchester County, New York. Despite the lack of physical evidence connecting Deskovic to Correa's rape or murder, he was convicted in He spent 16 years in prison before he was exonerated in based on a re-examination of DNA evidence, after the Innocence Project took on his case.

His conviction was later overturned. Deskovic recently graduated from Pace Law School in May and is working to become a lawyer. Other researchers have created experiments where psychologically coercive techniques were used to capture false confessions in an experimental setting. How can we evaluate whether a wrongfully accused person has confessed?

According to false confession expert Saul Kassin, there are certain factors to look for. Age is a factor as juveniles are more vulnerable, especially those under 14 years old. Persons with mental illness or with low IQs are also prone to falsely admit guilt. Also, the longer the interrogation period, the likelihood of a false confession increases. Kassin also looks at the content of the confession.

Are the facts consistent with statements from others? Does the confession contain accurate facts only known to the perpetrator? The confession comes, often, when the suspect feels trapped, like they have no way out.

They forget about their "right to remain silent. In other cases, people might confess just to get out of the interrogation room, thinking that they'll easily be cleared later once more facts come to light, Kassin told Science magazine. People from all walks of life falsely confess, but young people and those with mental disabilities are the most vulnerable, according to the National Registry of Exonerations.

Moreover, people who are stressed, tired or traumatized while talking with police are more likely to give false confessions, Kassin told Science magazine. That said, innocent people typically can't put together a false confession on their own, said Kassin, who's spent his year career studying false confessions. A confession is more than just a simple, "I did it. But it's not surprising. They show photographs.

They take them to the scene of the crime. Interrogators may know how to produce a good confession, but they aren't the only ones at fault. Once someone has admitted to a crime in rich detail, nearly everyone believes it, including forensic scientists. Once a confession is made, it sets in motion a forensic confirmation bias, a study in the Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition suggested.

Like with any confirmation bias, once forensic scientists have heard about a confession, they are more likely to seek, perceive and interpret evidence that confirms what they think they already know, according to the study. This is critical because the confession alone isn't enough to get a conviction — it must be corroborated with additional proof.