NCJ Number
133793
Journal
Prosecutor Volume: 25 Issue: 2 Dated: (Fall 1991) Pages: 23-32
Date Published
1991
Length
10 pages
Annotation
The interrogation of criminal suspects is essential to the investigation process and, in a large percentage of solved cases, a confession plays a vital part.
Abstract
Nevertheless, when a confession is presented as evidence at a criminal trial, it is often subjected to unwarranted attack. To elicit a confession from a guilty suspect, the interrogator must be allowed to use techniques which effectively decrease the suspect's resistance to confess, while at the same time increase a desire to tell the truth. Out of necessity, these techniques are psychologically sophisticated. They involve persuasion, insincerity, and, potentially, trickery and deceit. But they do not involve coercion, compulsion, brainwashing, or hypnosis, and they do not remove a suspect's free will. Proper interrogation techniques allow the suspect to terminate an interrogation at any time by either leaving the interrogation room in a noncustodial situation or by respecting the custodial suspect's invocation of his Miranda rights. If the suspect makes no reasonable attempt to terminate the interrogation, a claim of duress or compulsion is not substantiated. 16 footnotes