TheAgitator.com
Making Up Evidence an “Honest Mistake”
Monday, July 21st, 2008It’s a few months old, but here’s a pretty crazy case of prosecutorial malfeasance from Santa Clara County, California.
San Jose Det. Matthew Christian created a fake DNA report signed by a fictitious lab technician to use as a prop while interrogating a man under investigation for sex crimes against a developmentally disabled neighbor. Police are allowed to lie to suspects in an effort to extract information or confessions, so Christian hadn’t violated any laws in actually creating the report.
The problem is that the fake report somehow made its way into Deputy District Attorney Jaime Stringfield’s file, along with a real report stating that no DNA could be found on the blanket in question. At a preliminary hearing, Stringfield then proceeded to question the Det. Christian about the fake report. Christian obliged with false testimony.
"This blanket that you seized, did you submit it to the crime lab for analysis?" she asked.
"Yes," Christian said.
"Are you aware of any results?" she asked.
"Yes. There was semen found on the blanket," Christian said.
Superior Court Judge Gilbert T. Brown ordered Kerkeles to stand trial. Stringfield listed Roberts, the fake analyst, among her trial witnesses.
Stringfield blamed the defense attorney for not pointing out the discrepancy in the two reports. But according to the article, defense attorneys twice asked for more information on the reports. Stringfield declined their requests. The defense finally made a third request, this time for the resume of the fictitious lab technician who signed the fake report, at which time Det. Christian remembered that he had made the whole thing up.
An "internal committee" of prosecutors later concluded that Christian’s fake report, false testimony, and memory lapse, and Stringfield’s failure to notice the fake report, failure to notice the real report, and failure to distinguish between the two—were all "honest mistakes."
[...] A truly head-spinning legal imbroglio. [...]
This is utterly disgusting. Just the fact that cops are allowed to lie to suspects to enact confessions is disturbing. If I told you that I had 30 witnesses and DNA that proved you were involved and if you plead guilty you’d get 15 years instead of life or the chair, wouldn’t you confess to something you’ve never been a part of? Hell, I’d say I killed JFK, even though I wasn’t born at the time.
After all the episodes of Homicide and The Wire that I’ve watched I’d have to say… no. No way would I ever say anything to a cop without a lawyer present.
“Police are allowed to lie to suspects in an effort to extract information or confessions, so Christian hadn’t violated any laws in actually creating the report. ”
As I recall from law school, this it not entirely true, Radley. There is a line of cases that say that police can lie up tthe point where they produce physical evidence. So they can SAY a DNA report came back conclusive, but once they SHOW you the report then it becomes unlawful as too coercive. This may only be in certain jurisdictions however.
I do think that lying to suspects in some forms is a reaonable tool of an interrogation, though, espcecially since the suspect can end the interrogation at any time or ask for a lawyer.
Frankly, the court rulings that police can lie and fake evidence in order to trick confessions out of witnesses do deserve to backfire against the prosecution. I mean, if I am ever being interrogated, I think, in light of these cases, I am obligated NOT to assume anything that the police say is true. Why should I do otherwise, since the courts have said mendacity is an acceptable government technique and an interrogator will suffer no penalty for the lies? It would be perfectly reasonable for any witness to assume the cops are deceiving him and to render no cooperation.
Meanwhile, the cop in this case not only verbally lied, but falsified a government document (the crime lab report) as well. Between this and earlier cases of police submitting DUI arrest reports filled in with template data that did not fit the actual arrest, there is a whole “creative fiction” aspect to police work that I find very disturbing. How long before they really can’t tell the difference between something real and something they just made up?
Nick T., apparently there is no problem with them in San Jose. According to the article, “…Galea, the San Jose police captain, said fake reports, while legal, were rare.” They even have a process in place for such things: “Galea said normal procedure would require an officer to write the word ‘ruse’ on such a document after it was used in an interview.”
The icing on the cake is that the prosecutor continues to insist, in public, that the guy is guilty.
See what happens when cops lie to witnesses:
http://www.latimes.com/news/la-me-lapd18-2008jul18,0,3320206.story
It reminds me of the episode of the Wire - might have been the first one of Season 5, where they use the copy machine as a lie detector test to get a confession. The paper comes out and just says “FALSE” in huge font.
Faking physical evidence seems to be a bad strategy because I think it crosses the line to where an innocent person would still confess, feeling their case was already lost, and then the jury has a reason to doubt a confession. On the other hand, it seems like Interrogations 101 says “tell the supsect you already know it’s him, and that his buddy ratted him out” That does not strike me as very risky at all to illicit false confessions and that’s not a far cry from saying “we’ve got lab results that point to you.”
I don’t have a problem with some degree of chicanery and deception in police interrogations, and a judge and jury has the ability to gage whether it was coerced or not, false or not, under the specific circumstances.
When cops lie, it destroys their credibility for everything they do. Combine that with the overcharging strategy prosecutors use to extort confessions and guilty pleas out of defendants and soon every conviction becomes suspect.
It’s no longer about fighting crime, it’s about presenting an image that they’re fighting crime. Perception is all that matters.
Odds that the cop will get cited for perjury? Guessing zero percent.
Odds that the prosecutor will get cited for prosecutorial misconduct, using a falsified lab report to elicit false testimony on the stand? Guessing zero percent.
Odds that this has happened to some other innocent defendant who got thrown in jail based on evidence falsified by the police and used by the prosecution? As noted earlier with DUI cases, probably 100%.
Sweeping this under the rug with the “honest mistake” copout only makes it much more likely that this sort of thing will happen again. Cops and prosecutors don’t have to fear any repercussions for their seriously wrong actions.
“When cops lie, it destroys their credibility for everything they do.”
What credibility?
Excellent link, #8 aberrant. I think it illustrates a very real danger of police lying to get confessions. And, I would think that the “we already have someone willing to testify that you did it” lie is one of the most common police lies.
And, though I have little sympathy for the gang in that story, I can certainly see how someone who was NOT a scumball would be legitimately pissed if an interrogator told him that someone he knew was testifying that he killed someone. Basically, the cops are telling that witness that the “ruse” testifier is looking to send him to prison for the rest of his life.
Two more observations:
First, particularly when the cops’ claim is a lie, if that otherwise innocent witness later does something to the “ruse”, I’d almost say it was entrapment. It’s definitely someone induced by police to do something that they wouldn’t have otherwise done.
Second, if the police REALLY believe their witness is a violent person, then they actually must be expected to know there “ruse” testifier will be a target. They are negligent not to assume that. Minimally, they are knowingly endangering someone and, maximally, they are calling out a hit.
Just goes back to an old beliefe that I have, ask for a lawyer and shut up.
Nick, that episode of the wire is based on an actual story. The cop put a steel sieve on the suspect’s head with a couple of wires running from the sieve to the photocopier. He had put a piece of paper in the copier beforehand with the word “LIE” on it really big. He then asked the guy a question, hit the copy button, showed the “result”, and got a confession. This is many years ago. Obviously, the suspect was low-IQ, but if I remember he was actually guilty.
I can’t find a link to the original, but I remember seeing it related first-hand from the cop who did it on tv one time.
D.A. Buller says: “We all make mistakes”
I say: Horse shit!
This was not a mistake. And the selective memory loss of the detective is almost as believable as the “I don’t recall” tactic used by politicians and CEO’s at senate hearings. Using a fake lab report is really pushing it, in my opinion. Presenting it in court as factual is criminal. I believe exaggerating the evidence against a suspect during interrogation might be permissable (and useful) on occasion. Intelligent investigators know, however, that if the suspect calls their bluff, the investigation is probably fucked. But the fact that the detective testified to the legitimacy of the ruse in a court of law should end his police career.
The police I’ve heard interviewed about the subject generally oppose any requirement that recordings of all interviews be made available to the defense for review and for presentation to a jury. They claim that if juries saw the interrogation techniques used to elicit confessions they might not regard the confessions as credible.
Somehow I don’t think it occurs to them that there may be a reason juries wouldn’t find confessions produced by certain techniques credible.
If they weren’t cops/judges/prosecutors, they’d be criminals and in jail. What kind of people would routinely destroy people’s lives and call it “an honest mistake” and/or not pursue due process? I’ll bet that if they were the one facing charges, they’d be screaming bloody murder for innocent until proven guilty.
“You guys don’t just get it, when we beat them with a phone book, its the best way to get a confession”
An internal committee of prosecutors failed to fault a fellow law officer… an officer whose job it is to help prosecutors get convictions?
What a surprise.
An “honest mistake”… Of course, when there are minor discrepancies in testimony to a federal agent (such as the Martha Stewart & her stockbroker debacle), that’s worth throwing someone in jail for lying to authorities.
I guess prosecutors are allowed to lie to get you to confess, but you’re not allowed to lie in any of your answers to them. Seems logical…
Why cops lying surprises any reader of the agitator is beyond me.
This is the same class of people that can commit felonies in order to bust you for committing the same felonies (see drug war).
If the bad guys can lie all the time
to keep themselves out of jail ….
why can’t the good guys lie
to get the bad guys where they belong??
I don’t see a problem here.
Oh..I get it…the ole’ double standard.
Well, shame on those bad, bad police
officers for not being truthful!
Nick T, why do you think limited lying to suspects is ok? Your mention of the subject being able to stop it at any time seems like a very odd idea of an effective restriction on the police. Wouldn’t everyone stop the interrogation if they weren’t too frightened, confused, or ignorant to do so?
“After all the episodes of Homicide and The Wire that I’ve watched I’d have to say… no. No way would I ever say anything to a cop without a lawyer present.”
Yeah. I work for a weekly newspaper and I covered a murder trial recently where DVDs of the police’s interviews of the defendant were played. It was right out of “Homicide” telling the suspect she should ‘help herself’ and tell the truth. Which she finally did and she helped herself into life in prison for getting someone to commit first-degree murder for her.
Under the hours of interrogations, her story was constantly changing, with multiple, nonsensical explanations for things, so I tended to not take seriously the defense’s claim that she’d been badgered into confessing. She really appeared to be trying to weasel her way out of it, by admitting just enough and then digging her hole deeper.
If she’d just asked for a lawyer, they’d probably have gotten her, at the most, as an accessory after the fact, or been faced with the choice of letting the actual killer plea to second-degree murder in exchange for testimony against her.
I always hated the idea that the cops could lie to a suspect and that if you lied - it was a crime.
To #23
Just a thought…
If the “good” guys are allowed to lie, cheat, and steal (etc) …and they then do…are they still able to be called “good” guys.
To #23 JTFJ
For someone who claims to want just the facts, that is exactly what the gang in blue didn’t do here. They LIED in COURT and presented FALSE EVIDENCE in court. That is a crime. Why do you support criminals (even if they wear a uniform)?
“Wouldn’t everyone stop the interrogation if they weren’t too frightened, confused, or ignorant to do so?”
Nancy, you want to stop any interrogation where the suspect is too confused or ingorant to make a good decision in choosing to answer questions? Of course some people might continue for other reasons: Perhaps someone thinks they can convince the police they are innocent by not “lawyering up” and seeming really straight forward and (seemingly) honest. Maybe someone knows that he is guilty and figures he’s caught and wants to get the best deal and come clean to the police, but may need a little prodding.
People’s problem here seems to be with the very idea that police are telling lies. That can’t be the point by itself, obviously. The problem is what the lies create or lead to. When cops lie in court it perverts justice and likely violates someone’s due process rights, when cops lie on affidavits for search warrants… you get the idea. When cops lie to suspects in an interrogation the risk or cost is incredibly small. Lies about lab results, snitches or eye-witnesses are not likely to elicit a false confession, even from confused or ingorant people. I think we can say that from human understanding AND from the fact that no serious reform groups on the topic have ever pointed to police deception tactics as a cause of false confessions, while meanwhile pointing to prolonged, inhumane detentions or beatings that do.
What would have interrogations be? This is a long-established tool for police to uncover evidence and solve crimes and you would have police sit there and say “come one, please confess.” The fact that a suspect can ask for a lawyer or simply refuse to speak should provide sufficient protections as well against false confessions assuming the suspect exercises those rights.
Nancy, as the great Thurgood Marshall (roughly) said from the Supreme Court bench, “we require people to *choose* to exercise their constitutional rights.” Yes some people will make poor decisions in that moment of how to best assert those rights. Nothing can or should be done to prevent that other than better education, and if people are frightened or intimidated then the law says that the confession is coerced.
Transcript from a trial I witnessed firsthand:
Defense Counsel: Detective Pace (names not changed), in your training to become a detective, they taught you several methods in which to take a statement from a suspect, correct?
Det. Pace: Yes
DC: You can video record the interview?
Pace: Yes
DC: You can audio record the interview?
Pace: Yes
DC: You can have the suspect write down a statement and sign it?
Pace: Yes
DC: You can take notes yourself and have the suspect sign those notes?
Pace: Yes
DC: You didn’t use any of those techniques in this case, did you?
Pace: No
DC: So, there is no way for us to verify here in court the accuracy of the notes you took, or the conclusions you make, is there?
Pace: No
DC: No further questions.
That trial was a total farce. I had to keep from laughing anytime the defense counsel questioned any of the witnesses.
“If they weren’t cops/judges/prosecutors, they’d be criminals and in jail. What kind of people would routinely destroy people’s lives and call it “an honest mistake” and/or not pursue due process?”
There is at least one other such group, known as “doctors.”
“Nick, that episode of the wire is based on an actual story. The cop put a steel sieve on the suspect’s head with a couple of wires running from the sieve to the photocopier.”
According to Snopes, that’s just urban legend.
No, anyone spraying these cockroaches in the face with Raid would be making an “honest mistake”.
It depends on what your definition of “is” is.