A couple of "must watch" programs

 Please watch these 2 programs and pay attention to how injustice unfolds in both these cases. One deals with misconduct of law enforcement and the other shows how misconduct by "family" and law enforcement causes false allegations to be become a fictitious reality.These stories are real and they happen to families across this country everyday! Lives and families are ruined by assumptions, prejudice and the desire to convict.

Frontline "The Confessions"

ABC 20/20 -Kids Accuse Dad of Sexual Abuse

Comments

  1. Dave SimmonsNovember 28, 2010 at 8:28 AM

    Taken from a conversation about "The Confessions" being discussed on the FL1 forums under Yates County:

    Joe Friday: Watch this documentary and wrap your mind around everything that happens and unfolds. Cameras and recordings do help, but doesn't always reveal everything that occurs.

    I will tell you that if suspect #1 had simply stood up and walked out of that first "non-custodial" interrogation, which incidentally is not always protected by Miranda, many of the events that followed may have been much different. You may also find Investigator Ford chillingly familiar.

    Mean Gene: Joe, thanks for posting the video. There is an old saying I learned in college while taking a criminal justice course. "Bad cops make bad laws". If a rogue cop does something that is so offensive to the sense of justice something will be put in place so that it doesn't happen again. My sense is Virginia is much more conservative than New York. I doubt they would have been convicted in New York. In listening to the four talk it is apparent that they certainly were suspectible to the tactics used by the Investigator.

    My response: Gene, I do agree that it appears these gentlemen did not posses strong personality types to "overcome" the aggressive nature of these interrogations. But maybe rather than weak personalities contributing to their convincing confessions, perhaps it was their inexperience with the law, aggressive interrogation techniques and the fear created by the process; coupled with lack of understanding that they just couldn't get up and walk away. They certainly were not a custodial situation being arrested or restrained, but they certainly were detained in a fashion that the assumption that they were "free to go" at any time was never evident to them. These men in comparison to the real perpetrator, who was experienced with the law and process, did refuse to handled in the same manner. He simply knew from experience where it was going to go.

    However I do not agree that in a crime where physical evidence did exist, but it didn't link any of the suspects to the scene, that any prosecutor in possession of a written or recorded confession, or confessions as in this case, wouldn't be vigorously pursuing these convictions any differently; no matter how ridiculously the facts didn't add up as they did in this case. It is unfortunate that "blind ambition" to "close and convict" a high profile case fulfills an additionally high award to the prosecutor's political record. What appears to be justice, just isn't always the case.

    In my mind, the most egregious crime that becomes committed is when the prosecution is aware of their wrongful convictions and they continue to stand behind those actions and decisions because it reflects badly upon their record. Lives are needlessly destroyed or at least extremely altered when we disregard the facts and truth and permanently take away their innocence. Yes, they are marked physically and mentally forever. We see it here and we see it equally across this nation. It is exposed in documentaries, news articles and in books; but it continues because it really doesn't hit each us close enough to home to feel and finally understand its effects. Then and only then, will a trusting naive public start to understand how quickly things can get out of hand when justice is not being properly served.

    I apologize for being long winded, but understanding what can happen and does happen, answers many things about how corruption occurs in the many topics of debate in these forums. It boils down to integrity and truth backed by corroborated facts; "just the facts", not assumptions.

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