LINCOLN, Neb. (KMTV) — In Nebraska, police officers who are investigating crimes can legally lie during an interview in order to find out the truth.
A bill in the Nebraska Legislature would ban that practice from being used on anyone under 18 years old.
On Wednesday, the Judiciary Committee held a hearing on whether police officers should be allowed to use deception, such as lying about the crime or promising leniency that they can control when interviewing juveniles about crimes.
The bill, from Sen. John Cavanaugh, would ban the tactic that he fears currently leads to minors falsely confessing to crimes.
“Children, in particular, are most susceptible to say, 'well maybe I forgot, or maybe I didn’t.' So, the argument here is not necessarily that individuals are knowingly false confessing; sometimes people are false confessing because they’ve been brow-beaten into thinking they actually did it,” said Cavanaugh.
Laurie Roberts with the Innocence Project said false confessions are the most common contributing factor in exonerations.
“Because we know these tactics increase the chances of a false confession and increase the chances of a wrongful conviction, which allows real perpetrators to remain in their communities in the position of committing more crimes, and this is especially true when the suspect is a juvenile,” said Roberts.
As expected, the bill was opposed by state and local police unions.
“This is a bill that is an attempt to fix a problem that simply doesn’t exist,” said President of the Nebraska Fraternal Order of Police.
Jim McGuire, representing Omaha Police and the Nebraska Fraternal Order of Police, said using deception is not critical, but a necessary tool in finding the truth in some cases.
“Sometimes it’s just, you have to come up with something just to judge their body language, it is not an attempt to trick them, all we want them to do is tell us the truth,” said McGuire.
A couple of senators feared there would be a lot of gray area in the bill, and questioned what tactics could be considered deceptive.
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