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No More Delay: Proven Policy Solutions for New York City
Washington, DC: Videotaping Police Interrogations
The Problem: Innocent people confess to crimes they did not commit at an alarmingly high rate. As a result, the wrongfully convicted lose years in prison, public safety is endangered as the real criminals remain free, and the integrity of the justice system is damaged. Since 2000, ten individuals convicted of felony crimes in New York City have been exonerated by DNA evidence. Five of these individuals falsely confessed to the crime.
The reasons for false confessions are not fully understood. Possible reasons range from voluntary confessions, in which an individual makes a confession in order to protect someone else, to involuntary or coerced confessions during which police interrogators use aggressive tactics. While cases in which a false confession was made due to police coercion are infrequent, they foster distrust of police practices and of confessions in general.
Relations between the community and the NYPD have been damaged in the past by high profile allegations of misconduct. The Civilian Complaint Review Board received 3,700 reports of police misconduct from the community during the first half of 2009.21 After rising rapidly between 2002 and 2006, the number of complaints has remained near record levels since. While the vast majority of reported instances of misconduct are not substantiated, the number of reports shows that tensions between the community and the police forceremain high.
In the high-profile Central Park jogger case, five youth were wrongfully convicted of rape and assault after confessing to the crimes. While the confessions of four of the youth were videotaped, the hours of interrogations leading up to the confessions were not. After the youth retracted their confessions, there were allegations of police coercion during the interrogations. The youth served between five and eleven years in prison (one of the individuals was tried and convicted as an adult) before being exonerated by DNA evidence. It is unknown why the suspects confessed to a crime that they did not commit. Because the interrogations were not recorded in their entirety, we will never know. The case remains a major stain on New York’s criminal justice procedures.
The Solution: Videotaping Interrogations
Washington, DC’s police force, the Metropolitan Police Department, began videotaping the interrogation of suspects in 2006. The police department issued a General Order that outlines the department’s policy of electronically recording “custodial interrogations.”
Impact
In DC, as in many other jurisdictions where the practice has been adopted, the police department was initially opposed to videotaping interrogations. However, once it was implemented, videotaping has operated successfully in DC, as it has in over 500 other law enforcement agencies across the country.
Once police officers have time to get used to the practice, the overwhelming majority of them support videotaping interrogations, according to a report by the Northwestern University School of Law. After speaking with hundreds of police jurisdictions, the researchers found that “virtually every officer with whom we spoke, having given custodial recordings a try, was enthusiastically in favor of the practice.”
The videotaping of interrogations does not necessarily prevent suspects from falsely confessing to a crime. However, what it does do is allow fact finders—prosecutors, defenders, juries, and judges—to go back later and to see what actually took place during the interrogation. A detective from Washington, DC’s police force wrote an editorial in the Los Angeles Times about his experience with taking a false confession and the realization, after watching the video, that he had inadvertently fed facts about the case to the suspect
Videotaping an interrogation from beginning to end provides a permanent record of what was said and done, how the suspects acted, and how the officers acted. This method not only protects suspects, but also helps police officers and prosecutors perform their jobs more effectively. There are many ways in which videotaping interrogations benefits police departments and prosecutors:
Implications for New York
The City Council introduced legislation in 2004 that would have required the practice of videotaping interrogations by the NYPD. At the time, a spokesperson for the department argued that the requirement would be “a massive logistical problem for the NYPD.”26 The legislation required that all interrogations be recorded and that they be kept for a period of ten years.
The legislation was never adopted. However, the assertion that the NYPD is unable to adopt the videotaping of interrogations because of logistical problems is not a very convincing one. For example, there were no reported problems associated with the Washington, DC police force adopting the practice. While it is true that the NYPD is larger than any other police force in the country, the nation’s second largest police force, which serves the city of Chicago, successfully complied with a 2005 state law requiring them to videotape interrogations. The ChicagoPolice Department estimated that it would need $4 million for purchasing equipment, setting up interrogation rooms, and training officers.
The City Council should improve on its 2004 proposed bill by passing new legislation which details specific recommended procedures for police interrogations. According to the Innocence Project, there are certain procedures that must also be in place in order to ensure that electronic recordings achieve their full effectiveness. First, the entire custodial interrogation must be recorded in all felony cases. Recording should begin with and include the delivery of the suspect’s Miranda rights and continue, unaltered and uninterrupted, until the end of the interview. Second, a recording with both video and audio is preferable to just audio. Finally, the video should utilize a neutral angle that shows both the suspect and the interviewers.
These reforms have a record of successful implementation in hundreds of jurisdictions across the country. There is no reason to doubt that once enacted, the NYPD will support the videotaping of interrogations as much as other police departments that have adopted the practice.
Washington, DC: Videotaping Police Interrogations
The Problem: Innocent people confess to crimes they did not commit at an alarmingly high rate. As a result, the wrongfully convicted lose years in prison, public safety is endangered as the real criminals remain free, and the integrity of the justice system is damaged. Since 2000, ten individuals convicted of felony crimes in New York City have been exonerated by DNA evidence. Five of these individuals falsely confessed to the crime.
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The reasons for false confessions are not fully understood. Possible reasons range from voluntary confessions, in which an individual makes a confession in order to protect someone else, to involuntary or coerced confessions during which police interrogators use aggressive tactics. While cases in which a false confession was made due to police coercion are infrequent, they foster distrust of police practices and of confessions in general.
Relations between the community and the NYPD have been damaged in the past by high profile allegations of misconduct. The Civilian Complaint Review Board received 3,700 reports of police misconduct from the community during the first half of 2009.21 After rising rapidly between 2002 and 2006, the number of complaints has remained near record levels since. While the vast majority of reported instances of misconduct are not substantiated, the number of reports shows that tensions between the community and the police forceremain high.
In the high-profile Central Park jogger case, five youth were wrongfully convicted of rape and assault after confessing to the crimes. While the confessions of four of the youth were videotaped, the hours of interrogations leading up to the confessions were not. After the youth retracted their confessions, there were allegations of police coercion during the interrogations. The youth served between five and eleven years in prison (one of the individuals was tried and convicted as an adult) before being exonerated by DNA evidence. It is unknown why the suspects confessed to a crime that they did not commit. Because the interrogations were not recorded in their entirety, we will never know. The case remains a major stain on New York’s criminal justice procedures.
The Solution: Videotaping Interrogations
Washington, DC’s police force, the Metropolitan Police Department, began videotaping the interrogation of suspects in 2006. The police department issued a General Order that outlines the department’s policy of electronically recording “custodial interrogations.”
- The police department is to electronically record, in their entirety, custodial interrogations of persons suspected of committing a crime of violence when the interrogation takes place in police interrogation rooms equipped with electronic recording equipment.
- The recording is to begin when the subject first enters the interview room and end only when the subject leaves the interview room.
- The policy also states that interrogations are not to be conducted unless the suspect has waived his or her Miranda rights.
- If the subject has not previously been read his or her Miranda rights, the recording is to include the reading of these rights to the suspects and his or her waiver of the rights
- If the rights have been waived before the suspect enters the room, the interviewer is to review the rights card with the subject and ask the subject to affirm that he or she was informed of and waived these rights.
Impact
In DC, as in many other jurisdictions where the practice has been adopted, the police department was initially opposed to videotaping interrogations. However, once it was implemented, videotaping has operated successfully in DC, as it has in over 500 other law enforcement agencies across the country.
Once police officers have time to get used to the practice, the overwhelming majority of them support videotaping interrogations, according to a report by the Northwestern University School of Law. After speaking with hundreds of police jurisdictions, the researchers found that “virtually every officer with whom we spoke, having given custodial recordings a try, was enthusiastically in favor of the practice.”
The videotaping of interrogations does not necessarily prevent suspects from falsely confessing to a crime. However, what it does do is allow fact finders—prosecutors, defenders, juries, and judges—to go back later and to see what actually took place during the interrogation. A detective from Washington, DC’s police force wrote an editorial in the Los Angeles Times about his experience with taking a false confession and the realization, after watching the video, that he had inadvertently fed facts about the case to the suspect
At first, the suspect couldn’t tell us anything about the murder, and she professed her innocence. As the interrogation progressed, she became more cooperative, and her confession included many details of the crime. The suspect said she had beaten the man to death and dumped his body by a river. She said she made purchases with the victim’s credit card and tried to withdraw cash using his ATM card…Then we discovered that the suspect had an ironclad alibi… Reviewing the tapes years later, I saw that we had fallen into a classic trap. We ignored evidence that our suspect might not have been guilty, and during the interrogation we inadvertently fed her details of the crime that she repeated back to us in her confession.If we hadn’t discovered and verified the suspect’s alibi—or if we hadn’t recorded the interrogation—she probably would have been convicted of first-degree murder and would be in prison today. The true perpetrator of the crime was never identified, partly because the investigation was derailed when we focused on an innocent person.
Videotaping an interrogation from beginning to end provides a permanent record of what was said and done, how the suspects acted, and how the officers acted. This method not only protects suspects, but also helps police officers and prosecutors perform their jobs more effectively. There are many ways in which videotaping interrogations benefits police departments and prosecutors:
- For police departments:
- A permanent record is created that shows what was said and done, how the suspects acted, and how officers acted.
- Officers are less vulnerable to allegations of abusive conduct.
- Voluntary admissions and confessions are indisputable.
- Officers do not need to make detailed notes and are therefore able to concentrate on the suspect’s demeanor and statements.
- Officers are no longer required to recall details of what was said and done days or weeks later.
- Public confidence in police practices may increase because of added transparency.
- For prosecutors:
- Taped confessions strengthen their case, providing irrefutable evidence in the courtroom with the defendant’s own words.
- They eliminate the problem of suspects changing their stories once in court.
- They allow the jury to see how the suspect looked before being “cleaned up” for court.
- Recordings dramatically reduce the number of defense motions to suppress statements and confessions.
Implications for New York
The City Council introduced legislation in 2004 that would have required the practice of videotaping interrogations by the NYPD. At the time, a spokesperson for the department argued that the requirement would be “a massive logistical problem for the NYPD.”26 The legislation required that all interrogations be recorded and that they be kept for a period of ten years.
The legislation was never adopted. However, the assertion that the NYPD is unable to adopt the videotaping of interrogations because of logistical problems is not a very convincing one. For example, there were no reported problems associated with the Washington, DC police force adopting the practice. While it is true that the NYPD is larger than any other police force in the country, the nation’s second largest police force, which serves the city of Chicago, successfully complied with a 2005 state law requiring them to videotape interrogations. The ChicagoPolice Department estimated that it would need $4 million for purchasing equipment, setting up interrogation rooms, and training officers.
The City Council should improve on its 2004 proposed bill by passing new legislation which details specific recommended procedures for police interrogations. According to the Innocence Project, there are certain procedures that must also be in place in order to ensure that electronic recordings achieve their full effectiveness. First, the entire custodial interrogation must be recorded in all felony cases. Recording should begin with and include the delivery of the suspect’s Miranda rights and continue, unaltered and uninterrupted, until the end of the interview. Second, a recording with both video and audio is preferable to just audio. Finally, the video should utilize a neutral angle that shows both the suspect and the interviewers.
These reforms have a record of successful implementation in hundreds of jurisdictions across the country. There is no reason to doubt that once enacted, the NYPD will support the videotaping of interrogations as much as other police departments that have adopted the practice.