WEBVTT - #356 Wrongful Conviction: False Confessions - Peter Reilly 0:00:04.160 --> 0:00:06.120 Hey there, it's Laura and I writer. I am here 0:00:06.160 --> 0:00:08.000 with an update on a case we shared with you 0:00:08.119 --> 0:00:12.200 back in season one of False Confessions. The subject is 0:00:12.320 --> 0:00:16.200 Peter Riley, whose really unusual case marks the starting point 0:00:16.440 --> 0:00:19.919 of the modern movement to expose false confessions. It's a 0:00:20.000 --> 0:00:22.640 case that's had a profound impact on my own work 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:25.640 and the work of my co host Steve Drissen. Now, 0:00:25.720 --> 0:00:27.880 the case of Peter Riley is in some ways a 0:00:27.960 --> 0:00:32.320 classic false confession story. It involves a young and vulnerable suspect, 0:00:32.640 --> 0:00:37.440 questionable police tactics, and a series of investigative errors. But 0:00:37.479 --> 0:00:40.360 in other ways this case stands out is pretty odd. 0:00:40.680 --> 0:00:46.040 Perhaps most noticeably, the famous playwright Arthur Miller became Peter's champion. 0:00:46.320 --> 0:00:48.640 He raised the profile of the case and raised the 0:00:48.640 --> 0:00:52.800 funds for Peter's bail and defense. Arthur Miller wrote powerfully 0:00:52.840 --> 0:00:56.840 about the phenomenon of false confessions, invoking Galileo and even 0:00:56.840 --> 0:01:01.440 the subject of his famous play The Crucible, bring national attention. 0:01:01.160 --> 0:01:01.960 To the issue. 0:01:02.440 --> 0:01:04.640 It's in that spirit that Steve and I continue our 0:01:04.680 --> 0:01:07.720 work today, both in the course of justice and the 0:01:07.800 --> 0:01:16.479 courts of public opinion. Welcome to wrongful conviction, False Confessions. 0:01:16.760 --> 0:01:20.400 I'm Laura and I writer, and I'm Steve Tersen. Today 0:01:20.440 --> 0:01:23.280 we're going to tell you our last story of season one. 0:01:23.360 --> 0:01:26.560 It's about Peter Riley, one of the first modern day 0:01:26.600 --> 0:01:31.640 false confessors. In nineteen seventy three, police interrogated eighteen year 0:01:31.680 --> 0:01:35.640 old Peter until he started to believe he was guilty 0:01:35.959 --> 0:01:39.600 of murdering his own mother. But Peter's friends and neighbors 0:01:39.640 --> 0:01:43.520 believed in his innocence. Their small town campaign for Peter's 0:01:43.560 --> 0:01:47.560 freedom was eventually joined by a host of big name celebrities. 0:01:48.360 --> 0:01:51.920 Peter's story helped launch the movement against wrongful convictions and 0:01:52.000 --> 0:01:55.520 false confessions. It inspires the work that Steve and I 0:01:55.600 --> 0:02:05.320 do to this day. 0:02:06.360 --> 0:02:09.520 You know, the Peter Riley case was my baptism in 0:02:09.560 --> 0:02:13.440 the world of false confessions. When I learned about Peter's case, 0:02:13.480 --> 0:02:17.359 it was really the first time that I even knew 0:02:17.800 --> 0:02:22.160 that it was possible for police officers, through their tactics, 0:02:22.200 --> 0:02:25.520 to get an innocent person to confess to a crime 0:02:25.880 --> 0:02:28.920 they didn't commit. And I was fascinated by it. 0:02:29.800 --> 0:02:32.280 I know the feeling for me. It was thirty years 0:02:32.320 --> 0:02:36.200 later when I watched those takes of Brendan Dacy's false confession. 0:02:36.720 --> 0:02:40.040 It's so easy to get hooked by these stories, these people, 0:02:40.440 --> 0:02:41.520 and you can't walk away. 0:02:44.520 --> 0:02:48.200 Peter Riley was about five or six years older than me, 0:02:48.680 --> 0:02:52.079 but we grew up in the same era in terms 0:02:52.080 --> 0:02:55.519 of the kind of music that we liked. Peter was 0:02:55.720 --> 0:03:01.200 very into classic rock, Pink Floyd, Jethro Toll and Peter 0:03:01.320 --> 0:03:04.600 wore his hair long, very much in the same way 0:03:05.000 --> 0:03:08.880 that I wore my hair, so I felt a connection 0:03:09.040 --> 0:03:13.919 to Peter. I lived in a community not unlike Peter's, 0:03:14.480 --> 0:03:18.080 where people knew each other through Little League or the 0:03:18.120 --> 0:03:23.000 boy Scouts, where mothers watched out for each other's kids. 0:03:23.720 --> 0:03:27.440 And the more I learned about Peter's story, the more 0:03:27.480 --> 0:03:30.880 I began to understand that what happened to Peter very 0:03:30.960 --> 0:03:34.560 easily could have happened to me. In addition to these 0:03:34.639 --> 0:03:39.160 connections that I found with Peter, this was a case 0:03:39.320 --> 0:03:44.200 in a part of the country which was the birthplace 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:49.400 of false confessions in the United States, the Salem witch Trials. 0:03:49.880 --> 0:03:55.800 It sent me on an exploration, a lifelong exploration, to 0:03:55.880 --> 0:03:58.800 try to figure out why it is that people would 0:03:58.800 --> 0:04:01.360 confess to crimes they didn't commit. 0:04:05.400 --> 0:04:09.560 Peter's story begins in Falls Village, Connecticut, a tiny community 0:04:09.640 --> 0:04:12.480 of five hundred people that's part of a larger town 0:04:12.560 --> 0:04:15.800 called Canaan. If you've been to New England, Falls Village 0:04:15.840 --> 0:04:19.760 is pretty classic, complete with rivers, horse farms, and covered bridges. 0:04:20.240 --> 0:04:23.039 It's the kind of place where no one locks their doors, 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:27.360 where everyone looks out for each other. In September nineteen 0:04:27.400 --> 0:04:31.560 seventy three, leaves were turning color across Connecticut, and eighteen 0:04:31.640 --> 0:04:34.800 year old Peter Riley had just begun his senior year 0:04:34.800 --> 0:04:38.040 of high school. Peter was a skinny kid, just over 0:04:38.080 --> 0:04:41.880 one hundred pounds and an uninspired student whose real love 0:04:42.080 --> 0:04:44.880 was his rock band. He lived in Falls Village in 0:04:44.920 --> 0:04:50.640 a small cottage, just him and his mom, Barbara Gibbons. Now, 0:04:50.720 --> 0:04:53.919 for lack of a better phrase, Barbara was the town eccentric. 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:58.320 She was highly educated, well read, and well traveled. But 0:04:58.560 --> 0:05:00.880 she was also a single mother, which was a big 0:05:00.920 --> 0:05:04.520 deal in nineteen seventy three, and she was a heavy drinker. 0:05:05.120 --> 0:05:08.400 She had a reputation as someone who always spoke her mind, 0:05:08.560 --> 0:05:11.520 even if it rubbed some people the wrong way. But 0:05:11.600 --> 0:05:15.400 in Peter's eyes, his mother was someone brilliant who loved 0:05:15.440 --> 0:05:18.240 and protected him, just like he loved and stood up 0:05:18.240 --> 0:05:21.240 for her. It was the two of them against the world. 0:05:22.440 --> 0:05:25.800 On the evening of Friday, September twenty eighth, Peter attends 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:29.000 a youth group meeting at the local church. He leaves 0:05:29.000 --> 0:05:32.520 at about nine thirty pm and drives home, but when 0:05:32.520 --> 0:05:35.760 he walks in the door, his world is turned upside down. 0:05:36.520 --> 0:05:40.480 His mother is lying mostly unclothed on the bedroom floor. 0:05:41.160 --> 0:05:45.480 Her throat's been cut so deeply she's nearly decapitated, and 0:05:45.560 --> 0:05:48.400 she's been stabbed and beaten so badly that both of 0:05:48.400 --> 0:05:53.640 her thigh bones are broken. Peter freezes, His instinct warns 0:05:53.680 --> 0:05:57.159 him not to disturb the scene by touching the body. Instead, 0:05:57.200 --> 0:06:00.120 he grabs the phone and makes a series of calls 0:06:00.320 --> 0:06:05.400 to paramedics, hospitals, and doctors. A hospital worker calls the police, 0:06:05.720 --> 0:06:09.320 and the cops show up within minutes. When the police arrive, 0:06:09.480 --> 0:06:14.159 Peter's in shock. He's just discovered his mother dead. But 0:06:14.240 --> 0:06:17.559 the officers think Peter's being too calm, and they begin 0:06:17.720 --> 0:06:21.400 to suspect him. They take him into a neighbor's home 0:06:21.680 --> 0:06:26.760 and strip searcheim. They're looking for scratches, cuts, bruises, any 0:06:26.800 --> 0:06:30.400 indication that Peter had taken part in a brutal struggle, 0:06:31.040 --> 0:06:36.200 but they find nothing. Peter's wearing jeans, a brown T shirt, 0:06:36.279 --> 0:06:40.200 and gold sneakers, and a witness from the church confirms 0:06:40.240 --> 0:06:43.880 that Peter's been wearing the same clothes all night. The 0:06:43.920 --> 0:06:48.400 police examination finds no blood anywhere on his body, clothing, 0:06:48.640 --> 0:06:53.280 or shoes, but the cops are still suspicious. They question 0:06:53.440 --> 0:06:56.640 Peter in the back seat of a squad car. Then 0:06:56.920 --> 0:06:59.440 they take him down to the station and hold him 0:06:59.640 --> 0:07:04.359 over an Peter doesn't sleep at all, but the next 0:07:04.400 --> 0:07:07.159 morning he has the presence of mind to ask for 0:07:07.240 --> 0:07:10.840 a polygraph. The police give him one, but they tell 0:07:10.920 --> 0:07:14.160 him that he failed the test, and when Peter's told 0:07:14.160 --> 0:07:17.560 that he failed, he begins to doubt his own memory 0:07:18.000 --> 0:07:22.800 because he believes polygraphs are infallible. Before too long, Peter 0:07:23.000 --> 0:07:26.080 begins to wonder whether he might have killed his mother 0:07:26.480 --> 0:07:33.320 but somehow doesn't remember it now, believe it or not, 0:07:33.440 --> 0:07:37.560 police record the interrogation on an old reel to reel machine, 0:07:37.840 --> 0:07:40.320 even though they weren't legally required to do so in 0:07:40.400 --> 0:07:45.120 nineteen seventy three. On tape, they egg Peter on and 0:07:45.240 --> 0:07:49.520 suggest that he might have amnesia they tell him sometimes 0:07:49.560 --> 0:07:53.040 when people commit these crimes, the memories are so traumatic 0:07:53.320 --> 0:07:58.360 that people repress them, and Peter Riley starts believing that 0:07:58.440 --> 0:08:01.800 he might be a murderer. I believe I did it now, 0:08:01.880 --> 0:08:04.600 he tells the police. But I don't remember. 0:08:05.400 --> 0:08:09.320 Peter says, over and over again, we got to keep digging, digging, 0:08:09.520 --> 0:08:13.440 digging to get this information out of me. Because he 0:08:13.600 --> 0:08:16.080 wants to know what this information. 0:08:15.800 --> 0:08:19.720 Is, he asks the police for truth serum, and at 0:08:19.760 --> 0:08:22.960 another point he even says, can you pound this out 0:08:23.000 --> 0:08:26.480 of me? The police praise Peter for being willing to 0:08:26.560 --> 0:08:29.800 admit he might be guilty. They tell him, we're not 0:08:29.880 --> 0:08:32.880 here to punish you. Maybe you'll go to a mental 0:08:32.920 --> 0:08:39.160 hospital for three months. Peter begins to feel like he's 0:08:39.240 --> 0:08:43.200 bonding with his interrogators, like they're all working together to 0:08:43.240 --> 0:08:46.600 fill in the blanks in his memory, and eventually their 0:08:46.679 --> 0:08:51.280 teamwork succeeds. Peter had a straight razor at home, a 0:08:51.320 --> 0:08:55.079 small blade that he used to make model airplanes. After 0:08:55.280 --> 0:08:58.679 hours of questioning, he eventually says that he could have 0:08:58.800 --> 0:09:02.520 used that razor to attack his mom. He adds that 0:09:02.600 --> 0:09:05.439 he could have broken her legs by jumping on them. 0:09:06.000 --> 0:09:09.000 In other words, he gives what we now call a 0:09:09.040 --> 0:09:10.760 persuaded false confession. 0:09:11.240 --> 0:09:15.040 These are a special subspecies of false confessions that are 0:09:15.280 --> 0:09:20.040 relatively rare, And what happens in these cases is the 0:09:20.120 --> 0:09:25.760 police interrogation tactics themselves cause a suspect to begin to 0:09:26.040 --> 0:09:31.880 doubt their own memory, and the suspect is persuaded that 0:09:32.000 --> 0:09:35.200 he or she must have committed the crime but can't 0:09:35.240 --> 0:09:41.559 remember it, and the interrogation becomes an exercise in reconstructing 0:09:42.360 --> 0:09:48.000 the suspect's memories of the crime. But the memories aren't real, 0:09:48.320 --> 0:09:49.840 they're confabulations. 0:09:50.520 --> 0:09:56.360 Peter's confabulated story isn't realistic. A small razor wasn't capable 0:09:56.440 --> 0:10:00.160 of inflicting deep wounds like those on Barbara's neck, and 0:10:00.200 --> 0:10:03.120 Peter was one hundred and ten pound weekly there's no 0:10:03.240 --> 0:10:06.240 way he could have broken his mother's thigh bones just 0:10:06.280 --> 0:10:11.240 by jumping on them. But police ignore those problems. After all, 0:10:11.520 --> 0:10:16.880 they've got a confession. By the end of the interrogation, 0:10:17.000 --> 0:10:20.640 Peter starts realizing that he has no family left. 0:10:21.120 --> 0:10:25.319 You're talking about someone who has just lost the only 0:10:25.440 --> 0:10:29.040 family member in his life. Peter never knew his father. 0:10:29.679 --> 0:10:33.920 His mother has now been murdered, they live alone in 0:10:34.000 --> 0:10:38.200 this small cottage, and he's thinking that he's gotten nowhere 0:10:38.240 --> 0:10:39.720 to go, and. 0:10:39.600 --> 0:10:43.520 So Peter asks his interrogator, is there any chance that 0:10:43.559 --> 0:10:46.640 you might take me in? I wouldn't want to impose, 0:10:46.679 --> 0:10:50.040 he adds, I'll do work around the house. I really 0:10:50.080 --> 0:10:52.040 would love to live with a family. 0:10:52.400 --> 0:10:58.680 I've never seen that before. Just a complete dependence on 0:10:58.679 --> 0:11:04.000 one's interrogator and a complete sort of loss of understanding 0:11:04.120 --> 0:11:08.880 of the fact that this person is his adversary. 0:11:09.080 --> 0:11:11.920 It's hard to imagine anything more purely fucked up. 0:11:12.000 --> 0:11:15.040 It's the most disturbing thing about this interrogation. 0:11:15.920 --> 0:11:18.400 But Peter doesn't get to go live with the cops, 0:11:18.600 --> 0:11:22.840 even though he's done everything they asked. Instead, he's arrested 0:11:23.040 --> 0:11:26.520 and booked into jail. Once Peter is away from his 0:11:26.600 --> 0:11:32.480 interrogator's influence, he immediately realizes he didn't actually kill anyone, 0:11:32.840 --> 0:11:36.800 and he recants his confession, but it's too late. On 0:11:36.840 --> 0:11:41.360 September twenty ninth, nineteen seventy three, Peter Riley is charged 0:11:41.559 --> 0:11:54.480 with the murder of his own mother. Barbara's murder and 0:11:54.600 --> 0:11:59.200 Peter's arrest shook falls village to its core. Everyone was 0:11:59.200 --> 0:12:02.520 following this track, including one residence who would go on 0:12:02.600 --> 0:12:05.320 to become an important figure in Peter's story. 0:12:06.120 --> 0:12:10.280 My name is Donald Connery. Well, one thing I can 0:12:10.360 --> 0:12:13.720 claim for some distinction is that I probably am the 0:12:13.800 --> 0:12:18.760 only foreign correspondent who ever made a complete career shift 0:12:19.080 --> 0:12:26.040 overnight from reporting international affairs to investigating the criminal justice system. 0:12:26.400 --> 0:12:31.240 Don Connery was an esteemed journalist, and the last thing 0:12:31.320 --> 0:12:35.400 on his mind was the subject of false confessions. But 0:12:35.559 --> 0:12:40.199 this murder was big news in this small town, and 0:12:40.240 --> 0:12:43.600 you couldn't help but be drawn into it. He began 0:12:43.800 --> 0:12:47.920 to start looking into the case himself and later wrote 0:12:47.960 --> 0:12:53.640 a book about the case that was an absolutely essential 0:12:55.160 --> 0:12:57.760 text about what happened to Peter Riley. 0:12:58.160 --> 0:13:02.040 Don Connery's in his nineties. But in nineteen seventy three, 0:13:02.240 --> 0:13:05.120 he had just moved to Falls village with his wife 0:13:05.200 --> 0:13:06.440 and kids, and I. 0:13:06.360 --> 0:13:10.720 Thought, this was a terrible event which will play out 0:13:10.800 --> 0:13:13.360 and will have nothing to do with me, except that 0:13:13.520 --> 0:13:18.199 the accused eighteen year old was a friend and classmate 0:13:18.320 --> 0:13:21.440 of my children who went to the regional high school, 0:13:22.400 --> 0:13:25.000 and Peter was someone they talked about or knew about. 0:13:25.360 --> 0:13:30.560 Now, something extraordinary happens after Peter's arrest is announced. Remember, 0:13:30.800 --> 0:13:34.360 people in this tiny town know Peter Riley and they 0:13:34.559 --> 0:13:34.920 like him. 0:13:35.280 --> 0:13:39.520 This was in the age before social media, where communities 0:13:39.559 --> 0:13:43.240 were much more connected in a sense. They met each 0:13:43.280 --> 0:13:51.520 other through clubs, extracurricular activities at schools, church groups, boy Scouts, 0:13:52.080 --> 0:13:55.960 and the entire community knew who Peter was. From these 0:13:56.160 --> 0:14:01.160 various essential parts of the social fabric of Falls village. 0:14:01.320 --> 0:14:05.840 Peter's arrest leads to a groundswell of support. Everyone starts 0:14:05.880 --> 0:14:07.439 defending his innocence. 0:14:10.360 --> 0:14:14.880 After reading the initial stories. My younger children, Carol and 0:14:15.000 --> 0:14:18.280 Julie kept saying Peter couldn't possibly have done this. 0:14:18.679 --> 0:14:21.680 The mothers of his high school classmates form a group 0:14:22.040 --> 0:14:25.640 called Canaan Mothers, and they hold bake sales to raise 0:14:25.680 --> 0:14:28.400 money so that Peter can get released on bond before 0:14:28.400 --> 0:14:33.120 his trial. Some families even put their houses up as security. 0:14:33.720 --> 0:14:38.200 It was incredible mothers supporting the accused mother killer. 0:14:40.360 --> 0:14:44.520 They wanted to do everything in their power to help him. 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:47.920 My kids said, and other neighbors said, you know, we 0:14:48.000 --> 0:14:51.120 don't think this is possible. There's no reason to think 0:14:51.160 --> 0:14:55.200 that he had any cause to harm his mother. And 0:14:55.240 --> 0:14:58.400 the word was in the community that yes, Peter. It 0:14:58.480 --> 0:15:02.000 confessed that nobody could under then why he would admit 0:15:02.080 --> 0:15:05.560 to something he didn't do, but their protests caught the 0:15:05.600 --> 0:15:06.840 attention of the media. 0:15:07.360 --> 0:15:10.720 A reporter named Joan Bartel hears about how the town 0:15:10.800 --> 0:15:15.120 of Falls Village is rallying behind an accused murderer. She 0:15:15.280 --> 0:15:19.600 listens to Peter's interrogation tapes and writes an explosive article 0:15:19.800 --> 0:15:24.080 in a magazine called New Times. The article questions Peter's 0:15:24.080 --> 0:15:28.240 guilt and includes many excerpts from his interrogation, exposing the 0:15:28.280 --> 0:15:33.600 CoP's manipulation of Peter. People around the state are horrified 0:15:33.920 --> 0:15:36.680 to read about a teenage boy made to believe that 0:15:36.760 --> 0:15:40.760 he killed his own mother. Donations flow in to the 0:15:40.800 --> 0:15:44.760 Canaan mothers, and soon enough money is raised for Peter 0:15:44.960 --> 0:15:50.040 to post bond fifty thousand dollars. He's released and moves 0:15:50.080 --> 0:15:53.360 in with one of his friend's families. Peter Riley is 0:15:53.520 --> 0:15:56.200 welcomed back into the Falls Village community. 0:15:56.640 --> 0:15:59.800 This so called killer went straight back to high school 0:15:59.840 --> 0:16:02.920 to complete his senior year, and it didn't seem to 0:16:02.960 --> 0:16:06.160 worry parents or teachers of the principal, who in fact 0:16:06.240 --> 0:16:07.280 supported him. 0:16:07.480 --> 0:16:11.280 One of the things that attracted reporters to this case, 0:16:11.320 --> 0:16:16.440 including Don Connery was the idea that in order for 0:16:16.480 --> 0:16:20.400 these people to embrace Peter, they had to understand or 0:16:20.400 --> 0:16:24.240 at least believe that this confession was false. And here 0:16:24.280 --> 0:16:29.240 they are taking this suspected, confessed murderer into their own 0:16:29.280 --> 0:16:33.200 homes or being willing to do so, and to raise 0:16:33.280 --> 0:16:36.040 money for him, and to advocate for him and to 0:16:36.120 --> 0:16:39.800 fight for him. That's remarkable. 0:16:40.240 --> 0:16:43.920 Peter Riley was free on bond, but prosecutors were moving 0:16:43.920 --> 0:16:45.440 forward with his trial anyway. 0:16:45.800 --> 0:16:49.760 The community was confident that the trial in nineteen seventy 0:16:49.760 --> 0:16:53.360 four would quickly lead to an acquittal. He would be 0:16:53.400 --> 0:16:54.160 found innocent. 0:16:54.480 --> 0:16:58.800 But on April twelfth, nineteen seventy four, Good Friday, Peter 0:16:58.960 --> 0:17:01.800 Riley was convicted of killing his own mother. 0:17:02.240 --> 0:17:07.400 It was a bombshell when the jury decided almost entirely 0:17:07.440 --> 0:17:10.919 in the basis of the confession, so called confession, that 0:17:11.000 --> 0:17:14.760 he was guilty, and he was sentenced to six to 0:17:14.840 --> 0:17:18.600 sixteen years from manslaughter and driven off at high speed 0:17:18.680 --> 0:17:21.040 to the high security penitentiary. 0:17:22.480 --> 0:17:25.640 Even though he'd just been convicted of murder, Peter only 0:17:25.680 --> 0:17:29.879 spent a few hours in prison. Amazingly, a court ruled 0:17:29.880 --> 0:17:33.040 that he could stay free during his appeal. As long 0:17:33.080 --> 0:17:36.600 as he posted an additional bond ten thousand more dollars. 0:17:37.160 --> 0:17:40.399 His village raised the extra money and Peter was freed. 0:17:41.200 --> 0:17:44.120 But now Peter needed to pay for an appeal, and 0:17:44.160 --> 0:17:46.840 that would cost more than the Canaan mothers could raise, 0:17:47.560 --> 0:17:51.840 so that reporter from New Times, Joan Bartel, sent the 0:17:51.960 --> 0:17:55.719 article she wrote about Peter's case to another Connecticut resident, 0:17:56.200 --> 0:17:58.320 the famous playwright Arthur Miller. 0:17:58.840 --> 0:18:04.400 Arthur Miller was my favorite playwright. I remember reading all 0:18:04.480 --> 0:18:08.359 of his plays in high school in the nineteen seventies 0:18:08.920 --> 0:18:12.720 Death of the Salesman all my sons. I liked him 0:18:12.840 --> 0:18:17.479 not only because his plays moved me. I liked him 0:18:17.520 --> 0:18:22.679 because he was a public figure that cared deeply about justice. 0:18:23.480 --> 0:18:25.960 He was a playwright with a conscience. 0:18:26.359 --> 0:18:31.080 The Crucible, probably Miller's greatest play, had been motivated in 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:34.680 part by the false accusations that went on in Salem 0:18:34.680 --> 0:18:39.199 and Massachusetts three hundred years ago, when twenty one people 0:18:39.240 --> 0:18:44.159 were falsely accused of satanic activities and either hung or 0:18:44.160 --> 0:18:48.479 in one case of being crushed to death executed. And 0:18:48.560 --> 0:18:53.119 Miller also personally had faced the House of American Activities 0:18:53.160 --> 0:18:58.160 Committee accused of being a communist or worse. So he 0:18:58.240 --> 0:19:01.399 had every reason to that this is something that he 0:19:01.440 --> 0:19:04.600 should put right, and he invested a great deal of 0:19:04.640 --> 0:19:05.800 his time to do that. 0:19:06.320 --> 0:19:09.919 Arthur Miller read Jones article. He was appalled by the 0:19:09.960 --> 0:19:13.280 tragedy of Peter's confession, and he began to take a 0:19:13.359 --> 0:19:18.080 leading role in Peter's fight for vindication. Miller recruited other 0:19:18.280 --> 0:19:23.200 a list celebrities to donate money to Peter's defense, Jack Nicholson, 0:19:23.440 --> 0:19:28.840 Dustin Hoffman, Art Garfunkel, Candice Bergen, William Steyren, Mike Nichols, 0:19:29.160 --> 0:19:33.520 even Elizabeth Taylor. Pretty Soon a powerful coalition of voices 0:19:33.640 --> 0:19:34.560 was gathering steam. 0:19:34.960 --> 0:19:39.760 Overnight. There was a remarkable amount of energy behind the 0:19:39.840 --> 0:19:43.200 effort to free Peter as soon as possible from what everyone, 0:19:43.560 --> 0:19:46.840 at least in Litchfield County saw as a wrongful conviction. 0:19:47.240 --> 0:19:49.919 The first thing Peter needed was a lawyer to handle 0:19:49.960 --> 0:19:55.120 his appeal. Arthur Miller recruited Roy Daily, a former federal prosecutor, 0:19:55.640 --> 0:19:59.560 and as Roy started preparing Peter's appeal, Miller worked to 0:19:59.680 --> 0:20:03.200 raise the public profile of the case. The New York 0:20:03.280 --> 0:20:06.480 Times featured a two part series about Peter on the 0:20:06.480 --> 0:20:12.160 front page. Not long afterwards, sixty Minutes covered the story too. Meanwhile, 0:20:12.200 --> 0:20:16.119 Peter's legal team pressed his case in court. Eventually a 0:20:16.160 --> 0:20:18.879 hearing was held to determine whether to grant him a 0:20:18.920 --> 0:20:23.840 new trial. Arthur Miller personally recruited some world renowned experts 0:20:23.880 --> 0:20:28.040 to testify. At that hearing, a forensic pathologist testified that 0:20:28.080 --> 0:20:30.919 if Peter had actually killed his mom, it would have 0:20:30.920 --> 0:20:33.840 been impossible for him to clean all the blood off 0:20:33.880 --> 0:20:37.760 his body and clothing before the police arrived. The pathologist 0:20:37.880 --> 0:20:41.080 also testified that there's no way one hundred and ten 0:20:41.160 --> 0:20:44.960 pound kid could break a woman's thigh bones by jumping 0:20:45.000 --> 0:20:49.359 on them, and a psychologist testified that Peter was suggestible 0:20:49.480 --> 0:20:53.360 and easily manipulated by authority figures. In other words, he 0:20:53.440 --> 0:20:59.639 was highly vulnerable to giving a false confession. This hearing 0:20:59.640 --> 0:21:04.600 took down both the medical evidence against Peter and his confession, and. 0:21:04.480 --> 0:21:08.000 It led to a verdict by George Speziale that a 0:21:08.119 --> 0:21:11.320 bus carriage of justice had happened in his own courtroom, 0:21:11.920 --> 0:21:14.639 and he said that Peter deserved a new trial. 0:21:15.560 --> 0:21:18.879 It was March twenty fifth, nineteen seventy six, a little 0:21:18.920 --> 0:21:21.680 more than two and a half years after Peter lost 0:21:21.720 --> 0:21:34.840 his mom. Peter was granted a new trial, but the 0:21:34.880 --> 0:21:39.040 prosecutor who'd convicted him was up in arms. He believed 0:21:39.080 --> 0:21:42.080 Peter was guilty and vowed to take him to trial again, 0:21:42.680 --> 0:21:44.280 but that didn't end up happening. 0:21:44.680 --> 0:21:47.560 He delayed to a point where he dropped dead on 0:21:47.640 --> 0:21:48.439 a golf course. 0:21:48.840 --> 0:21:51.560 The prosecutor passed away of a heart attack at age 0:21:51.600 --> 0:21:55.680 fifty four, so a new prosecutor, a young man named 0:21:55.680 --> 0:21:59.080 Dennis Santour, takes over, and as he digs into the 0:21:59.119 --> 0:22:02.040 case files, he finds a piece of evidence that had 0:22:02.119 --> 0:22:07.560 never been disclosed to Peter's defense team. A police officer 0:22:07.640 --> 0:22:11.920 and his wife had reported seeing Peter in downtown Canaan 0:22:12.040 --> 0:22:14.440 the night of the murder as he was driving home 0:22:14.440 --> 0:22:17.679 from his church youth group. They'd seen him only a 0:22:17.720 --> 0:22:21.679 few minutes before Peter arrived home, found his mother's body, 0:22:21.960 --> 0:22:26.159 and started calling for help. It was an air tight alibi. 0:22:26.600 --> 0:22:29.760 Those few minutes didn't give Peter enough time to drive 0:22:29.800 --> 0:22:33.080 home and kill his mother before making those phone calls. 0:22:33.359 --> 0:22:37.840 Well, this was a so called exculpatory evidence which should 0:22:37.840 --> 0:22:40.159 have been turned over to the state and then to 0:22:40.240 --> 0:22:44.320 the courts, and once it was revealed, it took only 0:22:44.400 --> 0:22:47.840 weeks before Peter Riley was fully exonerated. 0:22:48.200 --> 0:22:52.000 The state of Connecticut formally dropped all charges on November 0:22:52.040 --> 0:22:57.240 twenty fourth, nineteen seventy six. Peter Riley's name was officially cleared. 0:23:00.760 --> 0:23:05.120 After Peter's exoneration, the state police never found Barbara's real 0:23:05.200 --> 0:23:08.680 killer and continued to insist that Peter was guilty. 0:23:09.280 --> 0:23:13.520 The case went into the legal annals as a classic 0:23:13.600 --> 0:23:18.000 false confession tragedy, and it was a prime example of 0:23:18.040 --> 0:23:21.800 these systems on willingness to admit error in most of 0:23:21.840 --> 0:23:23.600 these controversial cases. 0:23:24.080 --> 0:23:27.480 Don Connery eventually wrote a book about the case, Guilty 0:23:27.680 --> 0:23:31.320 until Proven Innocent, and he continued writing about cases of 0:23:31.359 --> 0:23:32.119 wrongful conviction. 0:23:32.840 --> 0:23:36.800 After the Peter Riley case, don Conry became his own 0:23:36.880 --> 0:23:42.720 one man journalistic innocence project. He began taking cases in 0:23:42.760 --> 0:23:48.200 Connecticut and investigating them and writing about them, and he 0:23:48.280 --> 0:23:53.080 also began taking false confession cases from outside of Connecticut 0:23:53.080 --> 0:23:53.520 as well. 0:23:54.080 --> 0:23:58.680 Meanwhile, to add insult to injury, Connecticut police actually stopped 0:23:58.760 --> 0:24:04.120 recording interrogation after Peter's case. Peter's interrogation tapes had made 0:24:04.200 --> 0:24:07.000 them look bad, and they didn't want to look bad again. 0:24:07.720 --> 0:24:12.119 It wasn't until twenty thirteen that Connecticut adopted a law 0:24:12.280 --> 0:24:16.639 requiring interrogations to be recorded, and who testified before the 0:24:16.640 --> 0:24:20.840 state legislature in support of that bill Peter Riley. 0:24:21.040 --> 0:24:27.000 Peter said, Look, we shouldn't let law enforcement officers get 0:24:27.040 --> 0:24:31.639 away with not recording interrogations, because what it does is 0:24:31.680 --> 0:24:36.640 it makes it impossible for people like me to explain 0:24:37.119 --> 0:24:40.960 to a jury or to the general public how it 0:24:41.080 --> 0:24:44.800 is that I was made to confess to killing my 0:24:44.920 --> 0:24:48.960 own mother. Peter was a powerful advocate for recording, and 0:24:49.800 --> 0:24:53.320 his testimony was critical on getting the bill passed in 0:24:53.359 --> 0:24:54.360 twenty thirteen. 0:24:54.760 --> 0:24:58.840 Most importantly, Peter Riley's case woke the world up to 0:24:58.920 --> 0:25:03.200 the problem of false confessions. This injustice was a rallying 0:25:03.280 --> 0:25:08.320 cry for so many people, including Steve and me. Peter's 0:25:08.359 --> 0:25:13.880 story epitomizes the profound humanity in so many wrongful conviction cases, 0:25:14.320 --> 0:25:17.600 from the tragedy of the crime, to the ugliness of 0:25:17.680 --> 0:25:22.159 false accusation, to the defendant's struggle and perseverance, to the 0:25:22.200 --> 0:25:25.880 good people like Arthur Miller and the Canaan mothers who 0:25:25.920 --> 0:25:30.200 fight for the truth no matter what. In nineteen ninety five, 0:25:30.280 --> 0:25:35.240 the very first conference about False Confessions took place in Hartford, Connecticut. 0:25:35.920 --> 0:25:40.000 Don Connery organized it, and the people who'd helped exonerate 0:25:40.119 --> 0:25:44.880 Peter Riley spoke. Since then, hundreds of confessions had been 0:25:44.920 --> 0:25:49.120 proven false around the country and were just getting started. 0:25:49.760 --> 0:25:53.840 At the Hartford conference, Arthur Miller said at one point 0:25:54.040 --> 0:25:57.800 that the record of mankind is full of confessions of 0:25:57.840 --> 0:26:00.119 events that either never happened. 0:26:00.160 --> 0:26:02.720 Or to which the accused had little or no connection. 0:26:03.720 --> 0:26:07.440 After all, even Galileo confessed that the sun and all 0:26:07.480 --> 0:26:11.760 the stars revolved around the motionless earth. Rather than face 0:26:11.840 --> 0:26:15.760 the wrath of the Church, which for centuries had taught 0:26:16.080 --> 0:26:20.800 the opposite. Confronted with great power against which one has 0:26:20.840 --> 0:26:24.960 only a fragile defense, confession can begin to look like 0:26:25.040 --> 0:26:29.360 the door to freedom. Confession can very readily turn into 0:26:29.359 --> 0:26:32.520 a kind of coin with which to buy one's way 0:26:32.560 --> 0:26:37.280 out of a frightening and painful situation. How then I 0:26:37.320 --> 0:26:40.600 will eat to indict the criminal? Is there a good 0:26:40.680 --> 0:26:45.439 substitute for confession as the mainstay of a prosecution case? 0:26:46.320 --> 0:26:48.840 For starters, I would suggest evidence. 0:26:51.440 --> 0:26:55.119 Wise words. We're not there yet, mister Miller. We're not 0:26:55.160 --> 0:26:57.840 there yet, but we're getting closer every day. 0:26:59.080 --> 0:27:03.720 Hello Peter Howard, and High State do them pretty good. 0:27:04.040 --> 0:27:07.160 It's really great to talk to you. What's your life 0:27:07.480 --> 0:27:08.480