The recent decision of the New Jersey Supreme Court in State v. O.D.A.-C. is helpful in understanding why false and improperly induced confessions can survive a challenge before a judge. A prosecutor is required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a person who is being interrogated waived the rights to have an attorney and to not make any incriminating statements. Thereafter a judge must evaluate the totality of the circumstances and find beyond a reasonable doubt that the statement was voluntary and could be admissible at a trial. Under the facts of this case it is doubtful that a prosecutor could have met the high burden of proof that would support a court’s determination that in the totality of the circumstances that there was no impropriety. The trial judge and one of Appellate Division judges who reviewed the matter ruled that the suspect’s confession was admissible. Two judges of the Appellate Division correctly reversed the trial court and a unanimous Supreme Court affirmed.

An interrogation is not an interview. After being discharged from a hospital after a 10-day stay for psychological treatment, the suspect in O.D.A.-C was brought to the police station. The detective minimized and undermined the Miranda warnings throughout the interrogation by saying the warnings were just a formality and that anything that was said would be confidential between them and that any admission would be helpful to him.

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