The Los Angeles Times Calls for Recording of Interrogations

One month after DNA evidence exonerated a pair of North Carolina brothers who were convicted of rape and murder based on their coerced confessions, an editorial in Wednesday’s


Los Angeles Times


outlines how law enforcement can prevent future missteps and wrongful convictions.

Mentally disabled half-brothers Henry Lee McCollum, 50, and Leon Brown, 46, spent 30 years behind bars before they were released last month.  Their cases are among the roughly 30% of DNA exoneration cases where innocent defendants made incriminating statements, delivered outright confessions or pled guilty.

Research shows that innocent people sometimes confess to crimes they did not commit as a result of mental health issues and aggressive law enforcement tactics. The electronic recording of custodial interrogations, from the reading of Miranda rights onward, is the single best reform available to stem the tide of false confessions. The


Los Angeles Times


writes:

Outfitting all those interrogation rooms wouldn’t be cheap, and storing the interviews would take some logistical configuring. But those are minor hurdles. Since 2010, Congress has considered several bills that would have provided matching federal funds to install recording systems, but it has failed to pass them. It should do so.

But even if it doesn’t, the Legislature should work with Gov. Jerry Brown to recraft legislation requiring the recordings. It would protect both the integrity of the criminal justice system and the innocent.

 



Read the full editorial

.