Three False Convictions, Many Lessons

C Anderson David

Description

A new perspective on the roles of psychopathology, confirmation bias, false confessions, the media and internet (amongst other causes) of unjust accusations. Putting lack of empathy at the fore in terms of police, prosecutors and others, it considers a wide range of other psychopathological aspects of miscarriages of justice.

Sujets

• Sociologie, société et politique
• Psychology

Informations

• Publié par: Waterside Press
• Date de parution: 21 septembre 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781910979143
• Langue: English

Extrait

Three False Convictions, Many Lessons
The Psychopathology of Unjust Prosecutions
David C Anderson and Nigel P Scott
Copyright and publication details
Three False Convictions, Many Lessons: The Psychopathology of Unjust Prosecutions
David C Anderson and Nigel P Scott
ISBN 978-1-909976-35-1 (Paperback)
ISBN 978-1-910979-14-3 (Epub ebook)
ISBN 978-1-910979-15-0 (Adobe ebook)
Copyright © 2016 This work is the copyright of David C Anderson and Nigel P Scott. All intellectual property and associated rights are hereby asserted and reserved by them in full compliance with UK, European and international law. No part of this book may be copied, reproduced, stored in any retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, or in any language, including in hard copy or via the internet, without the prior written permission of the publishers to whom all such rights have been assigned worldwide.
Cover design © 2016 Waterside Press Ltd.
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Cataloguing-In-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book can be obtained from the British Library.
Printed by Lightning Source.
e-book Three False Convictions, Many Lessons is available as an ebook and also to subscribers of Myilibrary, Dawsonera, ebrary, and Ebscohost.
Published 2016 by
Waterside Press Ltd.
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Table of Contents
Copyright and publication details ii
About the authors x
Acknowledgements xi
Dedication xiii
Publisher’s note xiv
Glossary of relevant terms xv
Dramatis Personae xviii
Introduction 29
Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito 29
Stefan Kiszko 30
Darlie Routier 31
A reluctance to acknowledge mistakes 31
Human psychology, superstition and belief 32
The internet age and mass media 33
Avoiding mistakes 33 The Law, The Human Brain and Psychopathy 35
Medicine and law: How both need to be controlled 37
The science of empathy, psychopathy, and modern concepts of evil 37
Gender differences in empathy and systemising 40
Testosterone effects on the brain/specific syndromes 42
The Psychopathy Checklist 43
High functioning (non-criminal) psychopaths 44
Are there psychopaths within the justice system? 45
The danger of relying on confessions 48
Trust and exploitation in unjust prosecutions 49
The importance and dangers of trust 49
On WYSIWYGs and WYSIJACs 50
The cancer of collective psychopathy 51
Witch-burning and exploitation of sympathy and horror 52
Some provisional thoughts 52 Murder in Perugia: An Improbable Conviction 55
The Kercher case 55
Occam’s Razor versus dietrologia 56
Inspector Occam’s reconstruction of Meredith’s murder 57
Rudy Guede’s troubled past 59
Rudy Guede’s troubled present 59
Criminal profiling 61
Dietrologia: An improbable case is constructed 65
Romance and classical music 66
Amanda first on the crime scene 67
The strange case of the missing phones 68
Meredith’s body discovered 70
Occam applied to Perugia’s polizio-judicial system 71
Psychopathy and the justice system 72
The Monster of Florence 74
Prejudicial effect of the civil case in Italian law 75
Forensic shortcomings 76
Abuse of DNA evidence 77
Errors of omission and the time of Meredith’s death 78
The necessity that the break-in was simulated not real 79
False and contrived witnesses 79
Destruction of important evidence 80
The unfortunate case of the shoe prints 80
Human rights issues 81
Willing exploitation of the press 81
A crime within a crime? 82 Italians in Court: One Man’s View From No Man’s Land 85
A hard time seeking to convince the press and media 86
Observations from court during the appeal 87
Courtroom ritual 88
An invitation to meet the prosecutors 88
John Follain: A critique 90
Press and media when the court was in session 93
Two years later: The appeal against the appeal 94
‘A nonsensical pile from Nencini (viz a nonsencini )’ 94
Postscript: A week after the declaration of innocence 95
Six months later — The ‘motivation’ report 96 The Psychopathology of the Press 99
The nature of corporations and the press 99
Press coverage in Italy 100
The UK press 104
The USA press 111 Internet Trolls 113
Attacks on Knox are ‘all for Meredith’ 113
Why do trolls matter? 115
The followers — and what drives the trolls 115
Trolls harass and threaten offline as well 116
Hijacking of the Wikipedia page 117
The curious case of Harry Rag 118
Anonymous blogging 121
A brush with Harry 122
Harry Rag’s exultation at the Nencini verdict 122
The baiting of Harry Rag 123
The pernicious effect of anonymous pseudonyms 124 The Murder in England of Lesley Molseed 127
The Kiszko Case 127
Existing works on the Kiszko case 128
My first contact with Stefan Kiszko 129
Lesley Susan Molseed 131
Overwhelmed by spurious raw data 132
Important witnesses ignored 133
Police pressurised to solve the crime 134
A disjointed sequence of police interviews 136
Final interrogation 138
Kiszko’s false confession and retraction 140
Understanding the mind-set of the police 141
The author’s memories of the case 142
Trial, conviction and eventual release 144
DNA and the real killer 146
Analysis of the elements that led to false conviction 147
The new investigation 148
Confirmation bias and the false ‘confession’ 149
Sucked into a judicial black hole 150
Misconception about hormones and aggression 151
Weaknesses in Kiszko’s defence 152
The role of press sensationalism 153
The horror for Stefan 154
The long road to innocence and freedom 154
Finally a sound police investigation 155
What is the current relevance of the Kiszko case? 157
Weaknesses in investigation, the false confession, and confirmation bias 158
Postscript: The quest for the Yorkshire Ripper 160 Injustice in Texas: The Case of Darlie Routier 163
Fairytale turned nightmare 164
Conviction: Justice or ‘just is’? 167
Weaknesses in confrontational judicial systems 169
Crime author Barbara Davis: A shaft of light 170
Tampering with witnesses 171
Failure, omission, negligence or incompetence? 171
Might the investigation be compromised? 172
Convicted because of silly string? 172
Why, and how, could a mother do this? 173
Death Row 173
Alteration of transcripts 174
What was the role, if any, of Darin Routier? 174
Main lessons from the case 175
Darlie’s role in her own conviction 176
The USA’s most prolific killer 177
So might there just be a connection? 179 The Psychopathology of Victims and Victimisation 181
Trust and its exploitation by others 181
The hypothetical psychopathic policeman or prosecutor 182
Supposed lack of emotion: A standard prosecution trick 183
Manipulation of witnesses 185
The false confession 186
The plea bargain 187
Fast track trials 188
False and contrived witnesses 189
The so-called ‘prison snitch’ 191
Confirmation bias and the exploitation of family anguish 191
Exploitation of sympathy for the family 192
Lesley Molseed’s family 193
The family of Darlie Routier 194
The David Camm case 194
The murder of Anni Dewani 194
The strange case of Dr Jeffrey MacDonald 195
Conclusions 196 Sex, Hormones, and Crimes of Physical Aggression 199
Hormones 199
The critical role of the testes in determining gender 200
The differences in male and female gonadal function 201
Sex hormone priorities in men and women compared 203
Acts of physical aggression; gender differences 204
Gender differences in manifestations of psychopathy 206
Darlie Routier and her improbable biology 207
Sex hormones and Stefan Kiszko 208
Some conclusions 208 Witch-hunts Through the Ages 211
From shamanism to monotheism and Christianity 211
Heresies and the origins of witch-hunting 212
The witch-burning epidemic 212
The Black Death and two misogynistic psychopaths 213
Heinrich Kramer’s catch-all formulae 214
The modern-day witch trial of Amanda Knox 216
Arthur Miller defines the witch-burning phenomenon 218
Witch-hunts continue today 219
Belief fosters invention 220
The prosecutorial psyche revealed 221
Evil as a force 222
The witchcraft delusion extends to others 224
The sexist nature of the witchcraft fantasy 224
Total control 225 Witnesses, Evidence and Forensic Science 227
The scientific method 227
Forensic science 228
The vital importance of high quality, uncontaminated crime scene data 229
The role of science in the trial process itself 230
Intrinsic unreliability of certain forms of evidence 231
Tampering with witnesses 234
Undue weight given to a confession, even if retracted 235
The question of the paid court expert 236
Filming all aspects of the collection of evidence 237
Conclusions 240 Preventing Injustice: A New Psychopathological Approach 245
A less pejorative term 245
The purpose of the criminal justice systems 246
Can justice systems be improved? 247
The need for a modern understanding of science 248
Recognising the empathy system and its defects 248
The violent criminal 249
Psychopathology of press and public 251
Italian problems 252
American problems 254
British problems 255
Problems that affect all three jurisdictions 256
‘Cloning’ 258
Intrinsic problems 259
What can and should we learn 259
Some of our tentative suggestions summarised 260
Conclusion 264
Select Bibliography 266
Index 271
About the authors
David Anderson is a retired British physician, endocrinologist and former Professor of Medicine in Manchester