WEBVTT - #118 Wrongful Conviction: False Confessions - Thomas Cogdell 0:00:01.560 --> 0:00:05.160 Welcome to Wrongful Conviction, False Confessions. I'm Laura and I writer. 0:00:05.160 --> 0:00:06.280 And I'm Steve Drissen. 0:00:07.200 --> 0:00:09.520 So far, we've told you the story of Robert Davis 0:00:09.520 --> 0:00:12.959 in Virginia and the Dixmore five in Chicago, two cases 0:00:13.000 --> 0:00:16.120 that show how the interrogation room works and how racial 0:00:16.160 --> 0:00:20.479 biases can script false confessions. Today's episode is about how 0:00:20.600 --> 0:00:25.360 interrogation tactics designed for seasoned adult criminals are often used 0:00:25.360 --> 0:00:28.920 on the most vulnerable among us. We're going to take 0:00:28.960 --> 0:00:32.800 you to Camden, Arkansas, where a twelve year old boy 0:00:33.280 --> 0:00:36.560 is left to fend for himself against grown ups who 0:00:36.600 --> 0:00:40.400 suspect him of murder. The interrogation tape is bad enough, 0:00:40.800 --> 0:00:44.640 but the worst parts happened off camera. This is the 0:00:44.680 --> 0:00:46.239 story of Thomas. 0:00:45.880 --> 0:00:59.520 Cogdal I do a lot of searches online to try 0:00:59.560 --> 0:01:03.320 to keep up to date about cases involving false confessions 0:01:03.320 --> 0:01:06.520 and juveniles, and this case came on my radar screen. 0:01:07.120 --> 0:01:11.200 When I saw these interrogation tapes, I was absolutely floored. 0:01:11.920 --> 0:01:16.000 You know, Robert Davis was eighteen, he was well over 0:01:16.080 --> 0:01:20.679 six feet tall. But Thomas Cogdell, he was a boy. 0:01:21.319 --> 0:01:23.240 He hadn't started shaving yet. 0:01:23.720 --> 0:01:25.760 This is the first video I had seen where adult 0:01:25.800 --> 0:01:28.240 tactics were being used on someone as young as Thomas 0:01:28.280 --> 0:01:30.760 twelve years old. I'm a mom. I've got kids not 0:01:30.920 --> 0:01:34.160 much younger than Thomas, and the way the cops railroaded 0:01:34.160 --> 0:01:36.720 this child, it brings me to tears when I hear this. 0:01:37.120 --> 0:01:40.039 You have two boys, I have three boys. I remember 0:01:40.120 --> 0:01:42.800 what my boys were like when they were twelve years old, 0:01:43.200 --> 0:01:46.240 and they reminded me very much of Thomas. 0:01:45.880 --> 0:01:49.480 Cogdele and that the climax of this interrogation they turn 0:01:49.640 --> 0:01:52.640 off the camera, that's when the heat really gets turned up. 0:01:52.960 --> 0:01:57.480 What happened off camera? I wanted to know what happened. 0:02:00.640 --> 0:02:04.360 Thomas's story starts in Camden, Arkansas, a small town about 0:02:04.360 --> 0:02:07.680 twelve thousand people one hundred miles south of Little Rock. 0:02:08.160 --> 0:02:11.919 Now Camden's a beautiful place, but like too many smaller towns, 0:02:12.240 --> 0:02:16.000 modernity has been hard for Camden. Once upon a time, 0:02:16.000 --> 0:02:18.680 it was home to a naval ammunition depot that employed 0:02:18.680 --> 0:02:20.800 a lot of people, and it was even known for 0:02:20.880 --> 0:02:23.320 being the home of the man who invented gray Pet 0:02:23.440 --> 0:02:26.440 soft drinks, which were really popular in the fifties and sixties, 0:02:27.080 --> 0:02:30.519 but gray Pet fizzled out and the ammunition depot closed 0:02:30.639 --> 0:02:32.840 at the end of the Cold War, and ever since 0:02:32.880 --> 0:02:37.160 the late eighties early nineties, Camden's been losing jobs, residents, 0:02:37.200 --> 0:02:40.560 and morale. Now, at the beginning of the summer in 0:02:40.560 --> 0:02:44.160 two thousand and six, Thomas and his family had moved 0:02:44.200 --> 0:02:47.680 into a tidy, little gray house on Waco Street. They 0:02:47.720 --> 0:02:50.560 live there, just the three of them. It's Thomas who's twelve, 0:02:51.160 --> 0:02:55.160 his eleven year old sister Kayley, and their mom, Melody Jones. 0:02:56.080 --> 0:02:58.720 Let me tell you a little about Thomas. He's one 0:02:58.800 --> 0:03:01.079 of those whiz kids. It's the kind of kid who 0:03:01.200 --> 0:03:03.959 racks up all a's in school and then comes home 0:03:03.960 --> 0:03:07.600 and dives straight into a book. He's well mannered, polite, quiet, 0:03:08.080 --> 0:03:10.600 small for his age, with these chubby cheeks that made 0:03:10.680 --> 0:03:14.000 him look even younger than his age. And at twelve, 0:03:14.160 --> 0:03:17.520 he still spoke with a lisp, this really childlike lisp 0:03:17.880 --> 0:03:22.639 that was incredibly endearing. Now, in many ways, Thomas shouldered 0:03:22.680 --> 0:03:26.280 a lot of the responsibility around the house. Melody was 0:03:26.280 --> 0:03:29.600 on Social Security disability because of mental illness, and the 0:03:29.639 --> 0:03:32.560 family got by on her monthly check and food stamps. 0:03:33.280 --> 0:03:36.200 Thomas had a sister who was eleven, Kaylee. She was 0:03:36.240 --> 0:03:40.040 as immature in some ways as Thomas was mature. She 0:03:40.120 --> 0:03:41.839 wasn't as good as he was at reading, so he'd 0:03:41.840 --> 0:03:44.120 spend a lot of time helping her learn her words 0:03:44.680 --> 0:03:47.640 and remembered. They were new on the block, which unfortunately 0:03:47.680 --> 0:03:50.480 meant that Kaylee was in for some bullying. But when 0:03:50.520 --> 0:03:54.120 other kids would pick on her, Thomas would literally launch 0:03:54.160 --> 0:03:56.600 himself at them, chubby cheeks and all. He was the 0:03:56.600 --> 0:03:59.960 big brother, it was his responsibility he felt to defend. 0:04:00.640 --> 0:04:03.280 The two of them got along well for the most part, 0:04:03.320 --> 0:04:06.400 but like all children, they had their spats, and it 0:04:06.520 --> 0:04:10.080 usually occurred when Kaylee would interrupt something that Thomas was 0:04:10.120 --> 0:04:13.640 working on or listening to, or video game he was playing, 0:04:13.800 --> 0:04:17.440 and that would frustrate him. But that happens in every family. 0:04:17.640 --> 0:04:20.080 So let's fast forward to the morning of August seventh, 0:04:20.120 --> 0:04:23.040 two thousand and six. It was Monday morning, but school 0:04:23.120 --> 0:04:25.480 was out, so the kids had stayed up really late 0:04:25.520 --> 0:04:28.400 the night before. Kayley had gone to bed at about 0:04:28.440 --> 0:04:31.080 two point thirty in the morning, and Thomas had stayed 0:04:31.120 --> 0:04:34.320 up even later than her until about five am, eating 0:04:34.400 --> 0:04:36.880 em and m's and reading a spooky children's book in 0:04:36.920 --> 0:04:37.320 his room. 0:04:37.600 --> 0:04:40.280 He fell asleep with the book still open to the 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:42.360 page that he had left it at. 0:04:42.600 --> 0:04:45.760 And then the morning comes at about eleven forty five 0:04:45.880 --> 0:04:49.599 or so, both Melody and Thomas are awake. Melody later 0:04:49.640 --> 0:04:51.560 said she went to check the mail that morning found 0:04:51.560 --> 0:04:53.920 a letter for Kaylee, who was still in her bedroom. 0:04:54.480 --> 0:04:57.560 Melody asks Thomas to come with her to surprise Kaylee 0:04:57.560 --> 0:05:01.880 with her letter, but they're met with a horrible Kaylee's 0:05:01.920 --> 0:05:05.560 in the bedroom. Her hands are tightly bound with a 0:05:05.600 --> 0:05:08.960 red dog leash, and her feet are loosely bound with 0:05:09.000 --> 0:05:12.000 a cloth measuring tape, the kind of thing you'd use 0:05:12.040 --> 0:05:15.000 to measure out and cut fabric. And there's a plastic 0:05:15.120 --> 0:05:18.479 bag over her head. Melody removed the bag and it 0:05:18.560 --> 0:05:23.680 was immediately clear Kayley was dead. Melody's screamed. She screams 0:05:23.720 --> 0:05:26.960 so loudly that the neighbors hear her. She becomes hysterical. 0:05:27.360 --> 0:05:30.440 Thomas has the presence of mind to call nine one one. 0:05:30.839 --> 0:05:34.560 An ambulance arrives. The neighbors are gathering outside everybody's concern, 0:05:35.440 --> 0:05:39.520 but no one's being brought out to that ambulance for treatment. Slowly, 0:05:39.600 --> 0:05:42.960 word is beginning to spread among the neighbors that kayleie 0:05:43.040 --> 0:05:45.039 Cogdal had been found dead. 0:05:45.839 --> 0:05:48.159 When police arrived at a crime scene, they look for 0:05:48.240 --> 0:05:52.359 evidence of forced entry, and they didn't see any evidence 0:05:52.400 --> 0:05:56.120 of forced entry. That means that either somebody in the 0:05:56.240 --> 0:06:00.000 home had let the murderer in, or that the murder 0:06:00.080 --> 0:06:02.640 had been committed by somebody who was in the home 0:06:02.720 --> 0:06:03.960 at the time of the crime. 0:06:04.360 --> 0:06:08.240 Kayley had not been sexually assaulted. Instead, she'd been smothered 0:06:08.279 --> 0:06:11.880 to death. The absence of any sexual attack meant that 0:06:11.920 --> 0:06:15.920 both Thomas and his mother, Melody were suspects. Now. At 0:06:15.920 --> 0:06:18.920 this point in the investigation, police had thought the time 0:06:18.960 --> 0:06:21.839 of death was about six to eight hours before the 0:06:21.880 --> 0:06:25.200 body had been discovered. Working back from eleven forty five, 0:06:25.520 --> 0:06:27.920 that would have placed the murder around three forty five 0:06:28.000 --> 0:06:29.280 to five forty five in the. 0:06:29.240 --> 0:06:32.239 Morning, and because Thomas had said that he was awake, 0:06:32.520 --> 0:06:35.640 still reading a book at the time, suspicion began to 0:06:35.680 --> 0:06:37.360 focus on him. 0:06:37.640 --> 0:06:40.760 The police bring both Melody and Thomas in for questioning 0:06:40.839 --> 0:06:43.839 later in the day, and it's melodies turn to go first. 0:06:43.880 --> 0:06:46.800 The mom Now, she's questioned at about four thirty pm 0:06:47.240 --> 0:06:50.320 for about an hour, and long story short, she denies 0:06:50.440 --> 0:06:53.279 doing anything to Kayley, and in fact spends most of 0:06:53.320 --> 0:06:57.320 that interview answering questions about Thomas. At the end of 0:06:57.360 --> 0:06:59.359 that interview, the end of the hour, she gives the 0:06:59.360 --> 0:07:04.560 police permier to question Thomas. Now, this is interesting and problematic, right, 0:07:04.600 --> 0:07:07.560 I mean, Melody's a suspect as well as Thomas, and 0:07:07.600 --> 0:07:09.880 she's the one who is giving the police consent to 0:07:09.960 --> 0:07:12.280 question her son, the other suspect. 0:07:12.400 --> 0:07:13.720 It's totally inappropriate. 0:07:13.880 --> 0:07:16.960 But the police relied on that consent that they'd gotten 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:20.600 from Melody, from Thomas's mom, plowed ahead with questioning Thomas 0:07:20.680 --> 0:07:25.040 all by himself, no lawyer, no parent, no nothing, starting 0:07:25.040 --> 0:07:26.920 at about five thirty PM. 0:07:26.960 --> 0:07:29.840 So Thomas, a twelve year old boy who had never 0:07:29.920 --> 0:07:33.520 had any contact with law enforcement, is left to fend 0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:37.440 for himself against seasoned homicide detectives. 0:07:37.720 --> 0:07:41.040 All of the beginning of Thomas's interrogation is captured on videotape, 0:07:41.080 --> 0:07:43.920 And when you watch this tape, you see a small 0:07:43.960 --> 0:07:47.240 boy sitting in a chair at a table in a 0:07:47.280 --> 0:07:50.680 small room with no windows, no clock. Thomas is about 0:07:50.680 --> 0:07:54.640 to undergo about five hours of questioning at age twelve, 0:07:54.920 --> 0:07:58.040 by himself. Now, the first segment of this tape runs 0:07:58.080 --> 0:08:01.000 from about five thirty in the afternoon to sixty five, 0:08:01.760 --> 0:08:03.239 and it's hard to watch. 0:08:03.360 --> 0:08:08.480 It's brutal. It literally gutted me and caused me to cry. 0:08:08.160 --> 0:08:10.880 Exactly I mean. At first, Thomas keeps his cool. You 0:08:10.880 --> 0:08:13.360 can see the honor Roll student in him, trying to 0:08:13.360 --> 0:08:16.560 be the big man who helps the police. He calls 0:08:16.600 --> 0:08:20.440 his interrogators sir. He answers them quickly and politely. The 0:08:20.480 --> 0:08:23.160 only way you can tell he's nervous is by the 0:08:23.160 --> 0:08:26.800 way he's wringing his hands over and over again, almost 0:08:26.840 --> 0:08:31.200 non stop. But it gets awful, and it gets awful quickly. 0:08:31.800 --> 0:08:34.959 The police start out by telling Thomas that he has 0:08:35.040 --> 0:08:41.240 to choose between incriminating himself and incriminating his own mother. 0:08:42.080 --> 0:08:45.240 In the bottom line on me is nobody broke in 0:08:45.280 --> 0:08:48.319 that house last night. There's no indication of any break here. 0:08:49.880 --> 0:08:54.160 So your sister died and there was only two people 0:08:54.160 --> 0:08:58.680 in the house that could have killed him. Okay, that's 0:08:58.720 --> 0:08:59.640 the only way he can. 0:08:59.600 --> 0:09:05.160 Make boy, understand you or your mother. That's the only 0:09:05.200 --> 0:09:07.440 way it can be, boy, There ain't no other way. 0:09:08.600 --> 0:09:14.080 And again, did your mother kill her? Not that I 0:09:14.160 --> 0:09:16.760 know of. They say, why would you kill your sister? 0:09:17.360 --> 0:09:20.720 And he says, I wouldn't, but they've continued to press 0:09:21.160 --> 0:09:24.160 you had to have killed her, because if your mother didn't, 0:09:24.520 --> 0:09:27.160 that just leaves you that she had. 0:09:27.440 --> 0:09:30.520 If your mother didn't, I just leave she. Thomas begins 0:09:30.559 --> 0:09:34.400 to cry, actually wail, and the sound of his high 0:09:34.480 --> 0:09:38.559 pitch wailing is what caused me the greatest distressed because 0:09:38.600 --> 0:09:41.920 it sounded almost like the way an animal would sound, 0:09:42.160 --> 0:09:45.120 a baby animal if their foot were caught in a 0:09:45.160 --> 0:10:09.600 bear trap or an animal trot. One of the detectives 0:10:09.600 --> 0:10:15.760 says to him, why are you crying, Thomas, And Thomas says, 0:10:16.360 --> 0:10:36.520 because you're accusing me of something I didn't do. He 0:10:36.640 --> 0:10:40.480 had the presence of mind to articulate exactly what he 0:10:40.520 --> 0:10:40.960 was feeling. 0:10:41.040 --> 0:10:43.560 Is unbelievable from a twelve year old little and a 0:10:43.559 --> 0:10:45.280 twelve year old who had just gone through this this 0:10:45.400 --> 0:10:47.360 level of trauma. I mean to be that self aware. 0:10:47.360 --> 0:10:50.200 I'm crying because you're accusing me of something I didn't do. 0:10:50.360 --> 0:10:53.640 And the detective he's not yelling, he's not screaming, but 0:10:53.720 --> 0:11:00.200 he's pressing the point it had to be you, boy. 0:11:01.000 --> 0:11:04.000 So Thomas right is a smart kid. He's an Honoraal student, 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:07.040 and you can see his mind starts spinning. He's trying 0:11:07.080 --> 0:11:10.640 to figure a way out of this horrific situation, and 0:11:10.679 --> 0:11:13.280 he asks the officers, is there any way I can 0:11:13.360 --> 0:11:15.319 prove to you that I didn't do this? 0:11:15.760 --> 0:11:20.800 In no way want to okay, personally okay, A moment 0:11:21.640 --> 0:11:22.600 he woke me up. 0:11:22.640 --> 0:11:26.320 Ahead my lap, and his idea for proving his own 0:11:26.360 --> 0:11:30.719 innocence is this heartbreakingly childlike idea. He fell asleep that 0:11:30.880 --> 0:11:32.800 night at five am with a book in his lap, 0:11:33.520 --> 0:11:35.959 and he tells the officers that if he had woken 0:11:36.080 --> 0:11:39.520 up and killed his sister, the book would have fallen 0:11:39.600 --> 0:11:41.760 off his lap and be on the floor of his bedroom. 0:11:41.800 --> 0:11:43.400 And he says, go back and look in my bedroom. 0:11:43.640 --> 0:11:46.439 You'll see that there's no book on the floor, which 0:11:46.520 --> 0:11:49.920 proves I didn't do this. The officers reject this theory, right, 0:11:50.200 --> 0:11:53.760 and instead they tell Thomas he had no choice but 0:11:53.920 --> 0:11:57.360 to confess. You're going to have to tell us everything. 0:11:58.440 --> 0:12:01.839 Thomas keeps denying his guilt as the pressure is turned 0:12:01.920 --> 0:12:05.880 up dozens of times over and over. He tells him 0:12:05.880 --> 0:12:07.920 he didn't kill his sister, and of course it's the 0:12:08.040 --> 0:12:11.440 officer's job to cut through those denials to make him 0:12:11.480 --> 0:12:14.360 believe the case against him is rock solid to bring 0:12:14.480 --> 0:12:17.040 him down to that point of hopelessness. So they lie 0:12:17.440 --> 0:12:20.880 to twelve year old Thomas. They lie, They say to him, 0:12:20.920 --> 0:12:25.079 their investigation is going to find his fingerprints on the 0:12:25.200 --> 0:12:29.040 plastic bag that was over Kaylee's head, and his fingerprints 0:12:29.240 --> 0:12:31.839 are going to be at a certain angle that somehow 0:12:31.960 --> 0:12:35.560 indicates that he had held the bag over his sister's head. 0:12:35.840 --> 0:12:39.760 And then they offer inducements to get him to confess. Thomas, 0:12:39.800 --> 0:12:42.880 you're twelve years old. If you confess, we're here to 0:12:43.040 --> 0:12:45.640 help you and your mother, You've got to be flat 0:12:45.720 --> 0:12:48.559 honest with us so that we can help you. You're 0:12:48.559 --> 0:12:51.120 going to need some help to get rid of this guilt. 0:12:51.240 --> 0:12:52.400 We're here to help you and your. 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:55.360 Mother, Okay, But you've got to be flat honest with 0:12:55.520 --> 0:12:59.280 us so we can help you. Okay. Return. 0:13:00.040 --> 0:13:04.199 Oh, it's the help theme again versus punishment. We're here 0:13:04.280 --> 0:13:06.480 to help you, that's what we want to do, Temas. 0:13:06.640 --> 0:13:09.360 And it's at this point during the interrogation that the 0:13:09.480 --> 0:13:13.280 officers introduce their theory of the crime. In other words, 0:13:13.320 --> 0:13:16.079 they start telling Thomas what it is they want him 0:13:16.160 --> 0:13:19.920 to say. Could it have been an accident? They asked Thomas, 0:13:20.120 --> 0:13:22.400 even though the crime is scene obviously indicates that what 0:13:22.480 --> 0:13:26.040 happened to Kayley was was clearly no accident, and Thomas, 0:13:26.160 --> 0:13:29.199 who's crying and scared out of his mind, says, this 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:35.640 possibility and I don't, well, it's a possibility. It could 0:13:35.679 --> 0:13:38.480 have been an accident. And I don't remember it. 0:13:39.559 --> 0:13:40.600 Do you remember tomorrow? 0:13:40.920 --> 0:13:42.880 You knows. 0:13:42.920 --> 0:13:44.760 This goes on, Okay, it goes on for more than 0:13:44.800 --> 0:13:47.880 an hour, and by the end it culminates in this 0:13:48.240 --> 0:13:52.400 horrible ten minute segment where Thomas is left alone. The 0:13:52.480 --> 0:13:54.880 officers step out of the room, but the camera is 0:13:54.920 --> 0:13:58.199 still running, and he starts rocking back and forth in 0:13:58.280 --> 0:14:03.520 his seat and muttering to himself. It's like halfway distinguishable gibberish. 0:14:05.040 --> 0:14:08.800 Nobody came, so I didn't do it? 0:14:11.640 --> 0:14:20.480 Why she wanted to do it? Why mom wouldn't do this. 0:14:21.320 --> 0:14:25.720 She loves her daughter, doesn't she? She loves me. I 0:14:25.880 --> 0:14:28.040 didn't do it, that's the bottom line. But they don't 0:14:28.080 --> 0:14:31.280 believe me. Help. I'm scared. 0:14:39.560 --> 0:14:43.560 We've seen cases where people are reduced to a place 0:14:43.600 --> 0:14:46.720 where they're crawled up in a fetal position on the 0:14:46.840 --> 0:14:51.600 floor from these tactics, and they're working their magic on Thomas. 0:14:51.760 --> 0:14:55.480 I mean it's so hard to watch. This is psychological torture, 0:14:55.960 --> 0:14:58.960 and this moment, the emotional breakdown of Thomas, this is 0:14:59.040 --> 0:15:04.680 the moment when police decide to turn off the video camera. 0:15:06.080 --> 0:15:11.720 There's no excuse for that. I think what they began 0:15:11.840 --> 0:15:14.960 to realize was that this was awful what they were 0:15:15.040 --> 0:15:18.520 recording on tape, and Thomas had reached a place where 0:15:18.600 --> 0:15:21.640 he was having a breakdown and he still would not 0:15:22.040 --> 0:15:25.800 confess to this crime. So they needed some time to 0:15:25.920 --> 0:15:29.680 try to work on him outside of the interrogation room 0:15:29.840 --> 0:15:30.160 with the. 0:15:30.240 --> 0:15:33.400 Camera off exactly, and outside of this camera which was 0:15:33.560 --> 0:15:37.240 recording this trail of emotional destruction that would turn off 0:15:37.360 --> 0:15:56.960 any judge, any jury, any listener in America. So they 0:15:57.000 --> 0:15:59.080 turned off the camera for what they later called a 0:15:59.160 --> 0:16:02.280 break questioning r a break that ended up lasting about 0:16:02.360 --> 0:16:06.600 three and a half hours. Now, it's perfectly legal for 0:16:06.680 --> 0:16:08.840 them to turn off the camera, right That's the thing 0:16:08.960 --> 0:16:12.520 there was, and in fact, there still is no law 0:16:13.040 --> 0:16:17.200 in Arkansas requiring interrogations to be recorded in full. 0:16:17.720 --> 0:16:20.520 We need to have the truth, the whole truth, and 0:16:20.760 --> 0:16:24.680 nothing but the truth of what happens in the interrogation room. 0:16:24.880 --> 0:16:28.960 We can't allow law enforcement officers to have the discretion 0:16:29.440 --> 0:16:31.320 on when depressed the stop button. 0:16:34.040 --> 0:16:36.720 Later, when the state was prosecuting this case, it said 0:16:36.760 --> 0:16:38.720 that all that happened during this break was that the 0:16:38.760 --> 0:16:43.040 deputy prosecutor sat with Thomas while he had something to eat, right, 0:16:43.600 --> 0:16:46.680 And during that break, while he was eating, the prosecutor 0:16:46.800 --> 0:16:51.080 said that Thomas just spontaneously decided to blurt out a 0:16:51.200 --> 0:16:54.360 confession to killing his sister. Right, not being questioned, not 0:16:54.480 --> 0:16:57.200 being pressured, not being manipulated, not being lied to. He 0:16:57.400 --> 0:16:59.840 just blurts it out in the middle of eating this hamburger. 0:17:00.040 --> 0:17:03.120 And this is a common refrain that we hear from 0:17:03.280 --> 0:17:08.920 law enforcement officers, the spontaneous confession. And why is it common? Well, 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:12.480 if someone blurts out at confession without any prompting or 0:17:12.600 --> 0:17:16.359 persuasion by the police, police officers don't need to read 0:17:16.760 --> 0:17:18.040 them their miranda rights. 0:17:18.400 --> 0:17:21.280 It's not until ten twenty pm that officers turn the 0:17:21.359 --> 0:17:24.680 video camera back on. We're back now in the same 0:17:24.760 --> 0:17:28.320 interrogation room with Thomas sitting in the same seat as 0:17:28.400 --> 0:17:31.800 in the earlier session. But what we now see and 0:17:32.000 --> 0:17:35.720 hear is a very different Thomas Coddle. 0:17:36.520 --> 0:17:41.480 Right, Cole H, I am to actually feel good and 0:17:41.520 --> 0:17:45.320 good and you know, it's like a completely different person 0:17:45.440 --> 0:17:48.840 in that interrogation room. He is calm, he is cool, 0:17:49.200 --> 0:17:52.600 he is collected. He seems to be eager to want 0:17:52.640 --> 0:17:56.360 to help police officers. And it's as if someone presses 0:17:56.760 --> 0:17:59.680 the play button and he starts telling a story that 0:18:00.359 --> 0:18:03.440 involves and implicates him in his sister's death. 0:18:03.640 --> 0:18:07.399 Exactly. He's almost cheerful while he's reciting the story, one 0:18:07.440 --> 0:18:11.240 that sounds really rehearsed and practiced. He tells a story 0:18:11.280 --> 0:18:13.920 in which Kaylee had been in her bed, apparently sleeping, 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:18.440 and Thomas had tied her hands and feet to slower down. 0:18:18.600 --> 0:18:21.359 He says when she got out of bed, he didn't 0:18:21.400 --> 0:18:24.280 mean to hurt her, and then he described putting a 0:18:24.359 --> 0:18:27.840 plastic bag over her head, leaving the room, then going 0:18:28.000 --> 0:18:31.520 back and loosening it so that air could get in there. 0:18:32.720 --> 0:18:36.320 But even this story, right, this confession to being involved 0:18:36.359 --> 0:18:39.200 in the death of his sister, it develops inconsistencies. The 0:18:39.280 --> 0:18:42.800 police have him go through it a second time, and 0:18:42.920 --> 0:18:45.640 this time they have him take out the part where 0:18:45.680 --> 0:18:48.639 it was an accident. On the second go round, Thomas 0:18:48.640 --> 0:18:52.280 said he put two bags on Kaylee's head because the 0:18:52.400 --> 0:18:55.040 first one had a hole in it, and he said 0:18:55.080 --> 0:18:58.560 he held the bags there until she started twitching. In 0:18:58.680 --> 0:19:01.359 this account, he says he tied her up after she 0:19:01.560 --> 0:19:02.080 was smothered. 0:19:02.359 --> 0:19:04.879 You shit bags and one more bags? 0:19:05.280 --> 0:19:07.520 Why did you used to because the other one had 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:10.119 a hole in it? Okay, so she's charged. 0:19:10.880 --> 0:19:13.960 You've gone. You've got these things to tie. 0:19:13.840 --> 0:19:17.480 Her wrists and to tie her legs, and you. 0:19:17.560 --> 0:19:19.440 Do that for fear that she's gonna wake up and 0:19:19.560 --> 0:19:20.520 come hurt you. 0:19:21.000 --> 0:19:24.680 That's what you're telling us. Then what do you do? 0:19:25.640 --> 0:19:29.440 And I turn onto TV as I said, leave home 0:19:30.480 --> 0:19:33.160 and go back to me, and then I false lea. 0:19:34.240 --> 0:19:38.120 And it's this story, this concession, that leads to Thomas's 0:19:38.200 --> 0:19:42.480 arrest and being charged in juvenile court with his own 0:19:42.840 --> 0:19:43.920 sister's murder. 0:19:44.400 --> 0:19:47.119 But it's still not quite the end of the story, 0:19:47.359 --> 0:19:51.840 because as soon as Thomas gives this strangely calm confession, 0:19:52.080 --> 0:19:54.040 the police bring in his mother, Melody. 0:19:54.200 --> 0:19:56.920 They're probably hoping that Thomas is gonna confess to his 0:19:57.000 --> 0:19:58.840 mom and then they'll have another piece of evidence that 0:19:58.880 --> 0:20:02.480 they can use against Tom. But what does Thomas say, Well, 0:20:03.040 --> 0:20:07.560 he leans over and he whispers to his mother something 0:20:07.640 --> 0:20:10.200 that he's obviously trying to say without the camera picking 0:20:10.280 --> 0:20:13.840 it up. Thomas whispers to his mom not to worry, 0:20:14.720 --> 0:20:17.760 just go along with it. He didn't really do it 0:20:18.480 --> 0:20:22.159 and they won't find his fingerprints on the bag. The 0:20:22.280 --> 0:20:24.880 interrogators want to know what he whispered to his mother, 0:20:25.280 --> 0:20:27.360 so they ask her when they have her alone again, 0:20:27.920 --> 0:20:29.040 what did he whisper to you? 0:20:30.040 --> 0:20:34.800 Did he go along with what he said because he said. 0:20:34.680 --> 0:20:38.160 He didn't do it and that y'all wouldn't find his fingerprints? 0:20:39.920 --> 0:20:45.240 What does he mean? Thomas knows his fingerprints aren't on 0:20:45.320 --> 0:20:47.919 the bags that were found over his sister's head because 0:20:48.000 --> 0:20:51.480 he never touched those bags. He believes that the absence 0:20:51.520 --> 0:20:54.480 of his fingerprints will prove his confession false and set 0:20:54.560 --> 0:20:59.359 him free. And then he appears to think that, having 0:20:59.480 --> 0:21:03.000 done as he was told, after having confessed to the 0:21:03.080 --> 0:21:05.959 murder of his own sister, he's going to walk out 0:21:06.000 --> 0:21:09.720 of that room and go to his cousin's house. Instead, 0:21:10.520 --> 0:21:14.240 police come back in place Thomas under arrest and charge 0:21:14.280 --> 0:21:15.600 him with the murder of his own sister. 0:21:20.359 --> 0:21:23.919 So let's talk a little bit about Thomas's confession. One 0:21:23.960 --> 0:21:27.119 of the best ways to measure the reliability of a 0:21:27.200 --> 0:21:30.000 confession is to look at the evidence that corroborates it, 0:21:30.119 --> 0:21:34.639 and in Thomas's case, there was no corroboration linking Thomas 0:21:34.760 --> 0:21:39.040 to this crime. They took that cloth measuring tape and 0:21:39.119 --> 0:21:42.280 they sent it to the lab for DNA testing. Thomas's 0:21:42.359 --> 0:21:46.840 DNA wasn't on that cloth measuring tape. Instead, another male's 0:21:47.000 --> 0:21:49.719 DNA was on that tape. And the story didn't account 0:21:49.760 --> 0:21:53.439 for other findings that the medical examiner had made. Caylee 0:21:53.520 --> 0:21:56.760 had bruising on her forehead, suggesting that there was some 0:21:57.000 --> 0:21:59.520 beating or some kind of a struggle before she had 0:21:59.560 --> 0:22:03.520 been killed, and Thomas's confession said nothing about a beating 0:22:03.920 --> 0:22:04.560 or a struggle. 0:22:04.680 --> 0:22:08.080 There's such a lack of corroboration of Thomas's story and 0:22:08.160 --> 0:22:11.720 the psychological tactics that were used to extract this story, 0:22:11.800 --> 0:22:17.200 including fact feeding, including threats and promises. This confession bears 0:22:17.320 --> 0:22:19.760 so many red flags. But let's talk for a minute though, 0:22:19.960 --> 0:22:22.159 about that three and a half hour period when the 0:22:22.280 --> 0:22:24.800 video camera was turned off. I mean, you look at 0:22:24.840 --> 0:22:27.159 this and it just stinks to high heaven when they 0:22:27.200 --> 0:22:29.879 press that stop button and then somehow Lo and Behold 0:22:29.960 --> 0:22:33.359 come back with a confession and a completely different child. 0:22:34.000 --> 0:22:37.880 What happened during that time. How did Thomas turn from 0:22:37.920 --> 0:22:43.720 this panicked child having an emotional breakdown to a cool, calm, confident, 0:22:44.280 --> 0:22:45.480 confessed murderer. 0:22:46.240 --> 0:22:50.480 To hear it from Thomas, this was no spontaneous outburst 0:22:50.840 --> 0:22:54.159 suggesting that he was guilty the whole time. This was 0:22:54.400 --> 0:22:58.760 part of an interrogation process that actually was ramped up 0:22:59.119 --> 0:23:00.800 during that three and a half hour period. 0:23:01.000 --> 0:23:04.879 Thomas has said that the interrogation continued after he had 0:23:04.880 --> 0:23:07.280 that emotional breakdown and was taken out of the room 0:23:07.680 --> 0:23:10.879 that off camera, the police had continued telling him that 0:23:10.960 --> 0:23:12.880 it was either going to be you or your mother, 0:23:13.280 --> 0:23:15.720 and that he needed to stand up and be a 0:23:15.800 --> 0:23:18.640 man and admit what he did and if he did 0:23:18.760 --> 0:23:21.320 then he'd be able to go home. Right That's why 0:23:21.400 --> 0:23:23.240 he later thought he was going to be able to 0:23:23.320 --> 0:23:25.879 go back to his cousin's house after confessing to the 0:23:25.960 --> 0:23:29.080 murder of his own sister. And Thomas also told his 0:23:29.200 --> 0:23:32.359 court appointed psychologist that they told him that if he 0:23:32.480 --> 0:23:36.919 didn't confess, he a twelve year old, would be charged 0:23:37.119 --> 0:23:40.800 as an adult and could get the death penalty. 0:23:40.800 --> 0:23:43.399 Or his mother could get the death penalty if he 0:23:43.520 --> 0:23:46.760 didn't confess, because there are only two people who could 0:23:46.760 --> 0:23:50.120 have been guilty of this crime, Thomas or his mother. 0:23:50.480 --> 0:23:52.800 So we have these two different stories of what happened 0:23:53.119 --> 0:23:55.879 during this three and a half hour period. Off camera, 0:23:56.040 --> 0:23:59.280 the prosecutor says Thomas is eating and he spontaneously confesses. 0:23:59.640 --> 0:24:03.480 But to Thomas has a story of continuing pressure, continuing manipulation, 0:24:03.640 --> 0:24:06.200