09x08 - Police interrogations and false confessions

[bunniefuu]

LAST WEEK TONIGHT
WITH JOHN OLIVER

Welcome to "Last Week Tonight"!
I'm John Oliver.

Thank you so much for joining us.
It has been another busy week.

The flagship of the Russian Navy sank,

the Kardashians returned to TV,
though I hadn't realized they'd left,

and in Tennessee,
a state lawmaker

discussing a bill to criminalize
camping on public property

made this incredible argument.

I want to give you
a little history on homelessness.


to live on the streets for a while.

So, for two years,
h*tler lived on the streets

and practiced his oratory
and his body language

and how to connect
with the masses,

and then went on to lead a life
that got him in the history books, so.

A lot of these people,
it's not a dead end.

They can come out of these homeless
camps and have a productive life.

Or in h*tler's case,
a very unproductive life.

I support this bill.

The f*ck are you talking about?
What is your point?

He's basically using the age-old,

"What if the homeless person
you passed on the street was Jesus?"

Except in his example,
the person is h*tler. Adolf h*tler.

And the homelessness
somehow only made him stronger.

But instead of going
down that wormhole,

we're going to focus
on the midterm elections.

They're happening in November,

and in the run-up are some
very important party primaries.

Pennsylvania's is a month away,

and it's a state that could well
determine who controls the Senate,

and its primary
was shaken up recently by this.

By the way,
I endorsed another person today,

Dr. Oz in Pennsylvania.

Dr. Oz.

Great guy. A good man.

When you're in television for 18 years,
that's like a poll.

That means people like you.
But he's a great guy.

I hadn't heard that voice
in a while,

and to be honest,
I really haven't missed it.

The first growl was like hearing
the sound of a cranking lawn mower

you know is about
to sexually harass you.

Now, as for his claim there
that "being on TV for a long time

is like a poll showing
that people like you",

that is just not true,
believe me.

I've been on TV in this country
for 16 years now,

and I still get YouTube comments
like, "I hope he stops soon",

"Why is less funny
Mr. Bean so mad?"

and "The most unwatchable thing,
why does he always look sick?"

And I don't know!

But yes,
Tr*mp has endorsed Dr. Oz.

We've talked about Dr. Oz's daytime
snake-oil carnival in detail before,

so I didn't think his campaign
could surprise me, but it has.

'Cause it's been a shitshow.

Starting with the fact that, for years,
he's lived in New Jersey,

and his social media
still frequently shows him

at his North Jersey mansion.

He is running for office in a state
he doesn't seem to want to live in,

a savvy political move
known as the Eric Adams Special.

And when he wasn't in New Jersey,
he was often here in New York,

and the reason I know
that is his show filmed in this studio.

His offices were actually
right across the hall from ours.

I'm not saying that that is why,

after we made this prop
of a giant alligator giving the finger,

we set it up in our reception area
directly facing his offices,

but it did seem an appropriate way
for him to be greeted every morning.

Now, as if to overcompensate
for questions about his residency,

Dr. Oz has been posting photos
and videos from all over Pennsylvania

like this one of him and his wife
at a Pittsburgh Penguins game.

And let's take a moment to appreciate
his wife's expression there.

'Cause that is a look that just screams
"I'm in Pittsburgh with Dr. Oz."

He's also been going out
of his way to empathize

with the concerns of regular
Pennsylvanians, like this.

Thought I'd do some grocery shopping,
I'm at Wegner's

and my wife wants some vegetables
for crudité, right?

Here's a broccoli, that's two bucks.
Not a ton of broccoli there.

Here's some asparagus,
that's $4, yup.

Carrots, that's four more dollars.
That's $10 of vegetables there.

And then we need some guacamole,
that's $4 more.

And she loves salsa, yeah,
there's salsa there, $6?

Must be a shortage of salsa.

Guys, that's $20 for crudité
and this doesn't include the tequila.

I mean, that's outrageous,
and we got Joe Biden to thank for this.

So, there is a lot to unpack there,

starting with the fact
that Dr. Oz went to a grocery store

dressed like Dexter
before a serial m*rder.

Then there's the fact
that he calls the store "Wegner's",

which is not its name.

That is a Redner's,
He would've known

if he'd simply looked
at the sign above his head.

And finally, what is that slap-dash
crudité nightmare right there?

No bell peppers? No celery?
And where's the hummus?

A crudité platter requires
a thick dip, Mehmet.

If the dip ain't thick,
the dip don't stick!

I can only imagine his wife's face when
he brought those ingredients home,

except I don't actually have to,
'cause it looked something like this.

And that is not the only time

Dr. Oz has tried to connect
with voters over high prices.

One of his favorite things to do now
is show himself pumping gas on TikTok.

You know why gas is costing
so much money these days?

Because of Joe Biden's mismanagement
of our energy production.

I fill up my gas t*nk
almost every other day.


how much I'm spending on groceries.

The cost of living,
it's skyrocketing.

Gas prices, look at this, guys,
risen to the highest in 14 years.

I always pick the middle.
It's almost five bucks. That's crazy!

Gas prices are a real concern.

But Dr. Oz
is worth over $100 million.

It's a little weird for him to act like
it's specifically straining his budget.

But maybe he's only posting
those videos

to push slightly less relatable
content further down his page.

Like, I don't know, this one.

Cool. That is Dr. Oz
wakesurfing with the caption

"Surfin' through hashtag Italy"
to the song "My Life Be Like".

And the truth is,
that is what his life be like,

because he's f*cking rich, which
means he gets to do stuff like that.

But what he doesn't get to do, though,
is stand in front of gas pumps

and pretend he's personally affected
by those numbers.

Many Republicans actually doubt
Dr. Oz's conservative bona fides,

which may be why
he's tacked so hard to the right

on issues like g*n rights and abortion,
posting this statement

that he supports "defending
the most vulnerable, the unborn".

Maybe that shift to the right, and the
Tr*mp endorsement, will help him win.

But if that happens,
it'll be pretty remarkable.

Because for a man who's made a career
out of talking into a camera,

it is amazing how bad he's been
at doing that during this campaign.

It's honestly hard
to pick a low point,

but I do have to show you
this one video from last month,

where he seems,
best-case scenario, exhausted.

I wanna give a big shoutout to all the
Pennsylvania high school wrestlers

who are competing today in Hershey
at the PI-double-A state championships.

Penn State head wrestling coach
and American wrestling legend...

Cael Sanderson,
you all know who he is,

has said repeatedly
that Pennsylvania high school wrestling

is the best in the country.

And then if the state,
the Penn State program could actually,

you know, get all these folks,
they'd be unbeatable!

I agree.

I don't know
what I like most there,

the fact he seems to be performing
a Cameo no one requested,

the shoutout to "Cael Sanders,
y'll knoweeiz",

or the fact that that was posted
at 6:57 PM.

Did you pregame a high school wrestling
match, you deeply weird man?

I'm not saying that if Dr. Oz loses,

Pennsylvanians will have a better
option on the Republican ticket.

They won't. His main opponent
is this guy, Dave McCormick,

the former CEO
for the world's biggest hedge fund.

But this campaign
has actually taught me something.

Because I talked a lot of sh*t
about "The Dr. Oz Show",

and I did that
because it was unremittingly terrible.

But what is now clear
is that I didn't appreciate

how hard his staff had to work
to make sure that it wasn't even worse.

He had to abandon his show
to go run for Senate,

and if any of his staff
are coming back to our office

in the coming weeks
to clear their stuff out,

we've actually left a new special
message for them on our alligator:

"I'm sorry, he seems
like a f*cking nightmare".

Because he really does.

And now, this!

And Now...

The Profound Despair
of Hollow Chocolate Bunnies.

I remember being a kid
and biting into the Easter chocolate,

and it was hollow and being
so angry that I'd been duped.

When I was growing up,
we would have the hollow ones.

I was always disappointed
in the hollow ones.

Because you thought
they were solid?

You get it
and it left me empty.

- So, are they solid?
- Yeah, right?

- Bite off the top of it, and it's...
- You don't want to see it hollow.

- No hollow chocolate bunnies for me.
- What's the point?

What's the point of eating air?

Not one of the ones you got
when you were a kid

that was hollow on the inside
which was so disappointing.

It must be a solid chocolate bunny.
That's what we need.

Solid chocolate Easter bunny.

- A solid?
- Some of them are hollow.

So, then some of them
have things in them.

The solid...
Which, they're hard to find.

- That's a good point there.
- I felt like I was denied this.

- The solid.
- We got the hollow.

- A very particular child.
- And I wanted the solid.

- I'll buy myself one this year.
- Good for you!

Moving on. Our main story tonight
concerns police interrogations.

You're probably familiar with them,

they're a staple of countless TV shows,
including ones you might not expect.

Did you k*ll your father
with this axe?

No, I didn't.

Lie to me again and I'll arrest you
for m*rder, capisce?

Honey, I'd like a mineral water,
no ice.

And I'd like your balls
in a blender, but ain't life a bitch.

No, you're not understanding me!
I want you to confess!

- Confess?
- Confess!

Holy sh*t, Pinkie Pie's
about to f*ck that dragon up.

I was not expecting
a clip from "My Little Pony"

to look like a deleted scene
from "Training Day".

But you can see why interrogation
scenes are so popular on TV:

they're inherently dramatic,

and can result in a confession,
moving the story along.

But it's not just audiences who
find them compelling, juries do, too.

Confessions are viewed
as the "gold standard"

when it comes
to an indicator of guilt,

as they can apparently be more
persuasive than even DNA evidence.

Listen to these jurors in high-profile
trials explain the key evidence

that convinced them to convict.

We felt that no one
would confess three times

if they didn't do it.

He could have continued to deny it.
If you did not hurt that baby,

you would go to your grave
saying "No, I didn't".

It was very hard to imagine
why anybody would make up

something that not only
incriminates them

but have, is full of details
that sound like they happened.

Confessions are wildly persuasive.

Because we think that they're one of
those things that only guilty people do

you know,
like posting a Notes app apology,

or refusing to answer
any of Ronan Farrow's questions.

But here is the thing:
in all those jurors' cases,

the confession
later turned out to be false.

That last juror was from the case
of the Central Park Five,

or as they're now known,
the Exonerated Five.

Of all the convictions that have been
overturned through DNA testing,


involved false confessions.

And you may find that
hard to believe.

'Cause it can be very hard
to comprehend

how someone could confess
to something they didn't do.

Just watch Lester Holt
struggle to get his head around it,

while talking to a journalist
who covered a false confession case.

The more I investigated it,

the more I came to believe
that he might be telling me the truth.

There's not a shred of forensic
or physical evidence.

- But he confessed!
- Yeah.

You can't possibly fathom admitting
you did something that you didn't do.

Nobody does that.

Nobody would think
they're capable of doing it,

but the truth is,
a skilled interrogator

could probably get you or I to admit
we kidnapped the Lindbergh baby.

Exactly.
Honestly, a skilled interrogator

could probably even get me to admit
that I am the Lindbergh baby.

It does kind of make sense,
considering that this body type

is a physique best described
as "92-year-old dead baby".

The truth is,
there are a number of reasons

an innocent person might confess
to something they didn't do,

and a lot of that comes down to what
happens in a police interrogation room.

So, tonight, let's talk
about police interrogations,

what tactics they use,

and how damaging they can be,
particularly for the innocent.

And let's start
with some history here.

It used to be, police could basically
t*rture people to get confessions,

a practice that came to be known
as using the "third degree".

But in 1936,

the Supreme Court declared
physical coercion unconstitutional,

meaning that police departments
had to adopt new techniques.

And it says something
that their early attempts to do this

featured some
pretty basic instructions,

like in this film from the Texas
Department of Public Safety.

Look the suspect in the eyes
to observe eye movements

and physical changes
that might indicate deception.

If you can't look him in the eyes watch
an imaginary X on the forehead or nose.

It's the same effect.

Once deception is detected,
you know you're on the right track.

Okay, hold on. Was drawing
the X really necessary there?

Were they genuinely worried
their officers wouldn't know

how to look at a forehead
without visual representation?

Because if they cannot spot
a forehead,

I'd argue maybe they should
not be trusted to spot a criminal.

But eventually, one particular
approach became the standard:

the Reid technique, named after
one of its creators, John E. Reid,

a former Chicago police officer
turned polygraph expert.

He formed a training firm
that now claims to have trained

"hundreds of thousands
of investigators"

and has "influenced nearly every aspect
of modern police interrogations".

The Reid technique's
become one of those things

that just culturally
comes with being a cop

like their fondness for donuts,

or their complicity in the perpetuation
of state-sponsored v*olence.

And when it comes
to questioning suspects,

there are two major phases
to the Reid technique:

the interview, where you determine
whether someone is a suspect,

and the interrogation,
where you try to get them to confess.

Now, in the interview stage,

the goal is to gauge how truthful
the answers you're getting are.

The approach
is similar to a lie-detector test:

you essentially start with some
basic questions to set a baseline,

then move to so-called
"behavior provoking questions",

when you analyze the suspect's verbal
and, crucially,non-verbal behavior.

This Reid training film,
for instance,

explains how "barrier postures"
like crossing your arms

are a sign that you are lying.

In the next two illustrations
we're going to see,

each subject moves
into a barriered posture

after they were asked
the critical question.

Why do you think Bob said
he saw you selling marijuana?

Come on, how should I know?

Who knows why people say things?
I sure don't.

Mark, have you ever thought
about sexually touching a child?

No, not seriously.

Now, hold on.
First, let's acknowledge,

those are community theater actors
trying their hardest to convey guilt.

And we should give
the first actress her flowers

because she showed up to that
non-union gig ready to work.

As for this guy, he's doing a pretty
spot-on Kevin Spacey impression there

between the facial resemblance,
the haircut,

and the unconvincing denials
of sexual attraction to children,

he's really nailing it!

And I know that that looks dated,
but it's still very much in use.

That video is available for purchase
right now on Reid's website.

It was $100
and it was not remotely worth it.

But there is a big issue with relying
on that sort of behavioral analysis.

While Reid claims that investigators
trained in their technique

have shown an average accuracy of


the truth is much less impressive,

as this retired
homicide investigator explains.

The Reid people admit that it's not
based on any science whatsoever,

just based on their own observations.

The real science says it's baloney.
It doesn't work.

When they've done experiments
with it,

they pretty much show that
the accuracy is like flipping a coin.

It's 50/50.

Right, it's basically chance.

It's got around the same
accuracy as a BuzzFeed quiz,

"Answer 17 Questions About Pizza

and We'll Tell You
Which Gilmore Girl You Are".

I'm a Rory? What the f*ck
are you talking about, BuzzFeed?

I'm a Lorelei all day.
I talk fast,

I carry the weight
of the world on my shoulders

and God,
do I look good in a peacoat.

And I have to tell you:
Reid & Associates will insist

that their interview technique is part
of an overall approach that works,

if you follow all of the instructions
in their 400-page manual to the letter.

But this thing is so full of caveats
and outright contradictions,

you can find support in it for nearly
any conclusion that you want to reach.

For instance,
when it comes to eye contact,

it advises that "when a person
is being less than honest,

he may not maintain
direct eye contact",

but also, others
"may overcompensate by staring".

Meaning, if you have eyes,
you're basically f*cked.

And I'm not saying that Reid
is the only problem here,

there's a whole industry of consultants
who train cops to spot liars.

But it's all bullshit.

"Years of research has demonstrated
that behavioral cues,

like eye-blinking and arm-crossing,

are simply not reliable
indicators of deception".

Which does make sense.

People move their bodies
in all sorts of ways

whether they are telling the truth
or not.

The only truly honest body movement
that humans are capable of

is when someone accidentally
walks through a spider web.

That's it. Then, and only then,

are your gestures completely truthful
and void of pretense.

f*cking sh*t!

So, thanks to this junk science,

police can essentially assure
themselves of their own certainties.

And if they have decided you
are guilty, you're in big trouble,

because that is when
the interrogation begins.

And while they'll say
that they are looking for the truth,

Reid trains officers
to steer the conversation

away from anything
that's not a confession.

Many guilty people introduce
their denials with permission phrases

such as, "Can I say one thing?
Would you just listen to me?

But sir, if I could only explain".

When the interrogator
hears those phrases,

it's important to interject yourself
and stop the person from continuing,

because if you let him talk,
he'll say the words, "I didn't do it".

And the more often a person
says they didn't do it,

the more difficult it becomes for us
to get a confession.

Yes! The telltale signs of guilt:
"Would you please listen to me?"

"Can I explain?"
and, "I'm telling you I didn't do it".

If an investigator is trying to get you
to confess, they can grind you down.

Interrogations can last from
a couple of hours to double-digits.

One study of false confessions
found that they came

after an average
of 16.3 hours of questioning.

Which can be utterly exhausting.

Innocent people
can wind up confessing

just to escape
the stress of that situation.

That was the case
with Robert Davis,

who at just 18
was suspected of double m*rder

and interrogated
for over five hours.

What can I say
that I did to get me out of this?

When will I go home?

When will I go home today?
Will I go home now?

I can't promise you.
Look, you work with me,

and I'm gonna do everything I can
to make sure your mom,

and we can get you,
maybe get you home.

Robert, I'm gonna come straight out
and tell you what I'm getting.

Since you're not going to tell me.
You stabbed that woman.

- I stabbed her.
- You stabbed her, didn't you?

One or two times.

Do you think by me telling you this,
it's gonna get me home tonight?

Tonight? Today? I doubt it.

Then why am I lying
about all this to you,

just so I can go home?

- You're not lying.
- I am lying to you.

I am lying to you
full front to your face.

He lied about stabbing someone,

then admitted that he'd lied,
but by that point, it was too late.

He actually went to prison for 13 years
before being exonerated.

The notion that people cr*ck under
pressure and falsely confess

really shouldn't be that hard
to understand,

it's a concept
that even children's cartoons get.

Because remember that "My Little Pony"
scene from earlier?

This is how it continued.

No! No! No! No!

What do you want to hear?

Tell me what you want me to say
and I'll say it!

"Tell me what you want me to say
and I'll say it!

I kidnapped the Lindbergh baby!

Is that what you want to hear,
you pink psycho?"

And the thing is, people might assume
that, even if they falsely confess,

they can later recant, and the real
evidence will prevail and clear them.

But that's actually very unlikely.

As soon as the police get a confession,
thorough investigations tend to stop.

I'm going to answer the question that
you may have had for a while now:

why don't people just invoke their
constitutional right to an attorney?

The truth is, approximately 80 percent
waive their Miranda rights,

and willingly submit
to a police interrogation,

for a number
of understandable reasons.

Sometimes, people think, "I don't
need a lawyer, I didn't do anything".

Or they believe they're being brought
in as a witness, and not a suspect.

But not having a lawyer
makes you incredibly vulnerable.

Because a lawyer might clue you in
to an absolutely insane power

that police in America
have been given by the Supreme Court.

In the US, a detective can legally lie
about the evidence to a suspect.

It is lawful for detectives
to turn to a suspect and say,

"You say you didn't do this,

but we've got your fingerprints
on the m*rder w*apon",

or, "We have a victim
who had hair in her grasp,

and we tested the hair,
it's yours",

or, "The shoe prints we found
at the scene are yours,"

or, "That polygraph
you wanted to take, you failed it."

It's true. The police in this country
can flat-out lie to you,

to make you think
you have no choice but to confess.

And some of the lies
they tell are simply ridiculous.

An investigator in Florida
told a suspect they had "a laser,

the kind that you sh**t
on Star Wars",

and with it, they could
actually lift fingerprints off bodies.

A technology that,
to be clear, does not exist.

Although, having said that,
I'm now pretty sure

that we're one bad pitch meeting
away from the Star Wars laser

getting its own 10-episode series
on Disney+.

The laser will be voiced by Oscar Isaac
and we'll all cum.

Now, allowing the police
to lie to suspects is crazy.

Most countries do not allow it,
and for good reason.

It is far too powerful a tool.
Remember Robert Davis?

It might still be hard for you
to imagine

why he confessed to doing
something that he didn't do,

but look at what the interrogator
was claiming in that room.

I've got evidence out the ass.

Dust is made up of mostly
of human dead skin.

That can be picked up.
That DNA.

I'm not gonna be able
to keep you from the worst, Robert.

If you don't talk to me,
I can't keep you from the worst.

- I wasn't there.
- Robert, you were. You were there.

The evidence
shows you were there.

The evidence shows it.
I can't lie about the evidence.

"I can't lie about the evidence",
he lied as he lied about the evidence,

and did it gesturing with all the
theatrical nuance of a high schooler

auditioning for "A Few Good Men".

The overwhelming pressure
of a police interrogation,

coupled with their ability
to invent evidence,

can actually make people
question their own memories.

That happened
with Christopher Tapp,

who served 20 years in prison
for a m*rder he did not commit,

and was heavily manipulated
during his interrogation.

I wasn't there. The way I think you're
telling it to me is like I was there.

The police told me a few times
if there was something that horrific,

you would definitely hide it
and it would go in your subconscious.

It's like me, some of the brutal stuff
that we see out on the streets,

my mind shuts down on me
because I don't want to remember it.

I started second-guessing myself
during all this.

I started to not believe in myself
or who I was.

I don't know, because right now
everything I've been saying,

what I think is right in my head,
it's been wrong.

That is terrible,
and it's more than a little infuriating

how that investigator convinces him
of doubting his own memory

by making it seem
like it happens all the time.

You half expect him to say,
"You know how you can't remember

if it was the Berenstein Bears
or Berenstain Bears?

Or if Shaq was in a movie
called "Shazaam"

or maybe it was Sinbad and the movie
was actually called "Kazaam?"

That's what your brain's doing
right now but with m*rder!

Brains are weird, huh?"

All these tactics
are incredibly manipulative,

and they work
especially well on certain people.

Research shows false confessions
were a factor in 34 percent

of cases in which children
were wrongly convicted,

and a stunning 69 percent of cases
in which people with mental illness

or intellectual disabilities
were later exonerated.

And look, there are some limits
on what police can do.

Some judges won't allow
a confession if the police

promised you leniency
in exchange for it.

But many cops
walk right up to that line

by suggesting a confession
might reduce prison time

or spare you the death penalty.

You just saw
that happen with Robert Davis,

when that officer told him
he could "keep him from the worst".

Also, police are told
not to feed you information

about the crime
that is not publicly available,

as it's obviously damning
for a jury to hear

that you knew details
only the guilty party would know.

But that happens all the time, too.

One study of DNA exonerations found
that 94 percent of false confessions

were contaminated
by allegedly inside information.

And the thing is, even if police
engage in these tactics, crucially,

the jury may only see the confession,
not the interrogation that led up to it.


of interrogations at all.

And in the rest, it's up to the police,
who might only record the confession.

That's it.

And you just cannot get the full story
from seeing one short clip.

Imagine if the only clip

you'd ever seen of the show
"One Tree Hill" was this.

Dr. Jameson,
please call extension 2524.

Dr. Casper to the ER.

Dr. Capser to the ER.

Nurse Henderson to Admitting.

Nurse Henderson to Admitting.

Do you want to know
what "One Tree Hill" is about?

It's about a high school
basketball team.

But you'd have no way
of knowing that from that clip.

All you would know
is that it contained

the most perfect 20 seconds
of television that has ever existed.

The problem with police interrogations
right now

is the same problem that we have
with policing at large,

they're emboldened
to act however they'd like

in a system where they hold
an undue amount of power,

with very few protections for civilians,
especially the most vulnerable.

There can be little to no consequences
for extracting a false confession.

Just listen to this man,

who was a 19-year-old
former special education student

at the time of his arrest
for raping and murdering a woman.

After being interrogated
over the course of four days,

including, fun fact, two polygraphs
conducted by Reid & Associates,

he confessed under pressure,

and spent nearly 20 years in prison
until finally being exonerated by DNA.

The officers that worked on my case,
as well as state's attorneys,

they've all retired with pension,
full pension.

There was no repercussion,
no retribution,

no criminal charges, nothing.

They actually exceeded in their job.

They retired as captains,
majors, lieutenants.

The head state's attorney,
Michael Waller, retired,

and they gave him
a plaque for good job.

That is maddening.

That state attorney certainly
doesn't deserve a "good job" plaque,

unless it came with another
drop-down plaque

that read "at f*cking up innocent
people's lives you monumental assh*le".

And while I've spent tonight showing
you people who were exonerated,

there are still
many incarcerated people

fighting convictions that have every
hallmark of a false confession,

like Brendan Dassey
from "Making a m*rder*r,"

who was 16 when he confessed to
a m*rder that he could not describe,

and Melissa Lucio, whose incredibly
manipulative interrogation

we featured in our
Wrongful Convictions piece,

and who is set to be ex*cuted
in just 10 days.

So, what can we do?
We should absolutely require

all interrogations
be recorded in their entirety

so juries have the full context
of what happened in that room.

We should also make it illegal
for police to lie to suspects.

Because it is madness that
they're currently allowed to do that.

And there's actually a growing
movement for some reform here.

These three states have now banned
police from lying to juvenile suspects,

and New York has introduced legislation
that would ban lying to all suspects

and require courts to evaluate
the reliability of confession evidence

before allowing it to be used.

And that should be adopted
absolutely everywhere.

And if you're thinking,
"Hold on, John, how will investigators

get guilty people to confess
if they can't intimidate or lie to them?"

Not to be a total bitch, but their job
is literally to investigate,

so maybe they could
try doing some of that.

You can productively interrogate
someone without lying to them.

The U.K. now uses something
called "the Peace method",

where they ask open-ended questions

and let the suspect
give their own account.

And I am not saying that that system
is perfect, it clearly isn't.

Among other things,
they still haven't gotten the Queen

to confess to k*lling Diana
on camera.

But it's at least a start.

And in the meantime, there's actually
a lot of cultural conditioning

regarding police interrogations
that we need to start undoing.

Because think about it, how many
dramas have you seen on TV

where roughing up the bad guy
led to solving the crime?

How many shows have
there been where the bad guy

seemed guilty
and the officer's gut feeling

was confirmed
by the end of the episode?

Our misconceptions
about police interrogations

have been hammered
in by crime dramas,

and they've been hammered
in deep.

And perhaps one small way
to help undo that damage

is for shows to present
a slightly more accurate picture

of what can really happen
in that room.

This fall, meet two tough cops.

Expert interrogators...

Knock knock!

Who won't take no for an answer.

You son of a bitch.
You're guilty, you dirty rat bastard!

- What are you talking about?
- The m*rder in the alley.

- I didn't do it.
- No!

- I can't hear that.
- We cannot hear you say that.

They're highly trained.

- You're lying!
- No, I'm not.

You looked away.
That is lying.

Now you're staring.
That's lying, too.

More lies.

And incredibly skilled.

- What are you doing?
- I'm making eye contact.

- No, you're not.
- Yes, I am.

- Are you looking at my forehead?
- No.

And they'll say anything
to get what they need.

- Have you seen "Rogue One?"
- The "Star Wars" movie?

- That "Star Wars" film.
- I think I saw it once, yeah.

You're probably
familiar with lightsabers.

Probably less familiar
with the fact that we have them,

and they have the ability to pull DNA
from a dead body with a single...

I cannot lie about this.

It's true.
He can't lie about the...

And I mean anything.

You ever get to work and not
remember any of your commute?

Maybe it was like that,
but with m*rder.

Is this dress black
and blue or gold and white?

You've got two choices!

Confess to one count of m*rder two,
or two counts of m*rder one!

You've got to help us help you.
Help us help you help us convict you.

- m*rder*r says what?
- What?

That counts! That counts.

No!
Are you allergic to your own victim?

Did you just blow a dead body
on me?

Yes.

I got evidence coming out
of every hole of my body!

- Those can't be the only choices!
- You've got two choices!

Those can't be the only choices!

What about the one count of m*rder
two, or two counts of m*rder one!

I want a third choice!

One count of m*rder two,
or two counts of m*rder one?

Guys, it's been


I can't take much more of this.

If you help me out a little bit,

maybe I can make sure that you get
to sleep in your own bed tonight.

Fine. I did it.

Yes!

Ace in the hole, baby.

Sorry about the delay, fellas.
Here's your perp.

We don't need any more suspects.

The one you brought us yesterday
just confessed.

But this was the guy you were supposed
to interrogate yesterday.

Who the hell is this?

I just came in here
to charge my phone.

That's perfect!

Look at that!

You're still going to jail.

- Put him in the cuffs.
- My pleasure.

His phone battery dies
and he goes to prison.

"I'm gonna charge my phone
in an interrogation room."

Who does that?

Don't forget your phone!

I'm gonna piss!

"The Confesstigators."

Hey, it ain't ruining my life.

Thanks so much for watching.
We're off next week. Good night!

G...

U...

I...

- L...
- T...

Y...

The victim says you did it.
Are you calling the victim a liar?!

That never happens.

Innocent man says what?