WEBVTT - #132 Wrongful Conviction: False Confessions - Peter Reilly 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:03.400 Hi, This is Laura and I writer. Because of COVID nineteen, 0:00:03.640 --> 0:00:06.560 Steve and I recorded this episode from our homes, not 0:00:06.640 --> 0:00:09.760 together in the studio. We might sound a little difference, 0:00:10.039 --> 0:00:12.560 but I think the story we tell is as inspirational 0:00:12.600 --> 0:00:21.680 as always be well and stay healthy. Welcome to Wrongful Conviction, 0:00:21.840 --> 0:00:25.239 False Confessions. I'm Laura and I writer, and I'm Steve Drisen. 0:00:26.239 --> 0:00:28.400 Today we're going to tell you our last story of 0:00:28.440 --> 0:00:32.040 season one. It's about Peter Riley, one of the first 0:00:32.200 --> 0:00:37.159 modern day false confessors. In nineteen seventy three, police interrogated 0:00:37.280 --> 0:00:41.159 eighteen year old Peter until he started to believe he 0:00:41.240 --> 0:00:45.160 was guilty of murdering his own mother, but Peter's friends 0:00:45.200 --> 0:00:49.120 and neighbors believed in his innocence. Their small town campaign 0:00:49.200 --> 0:00:52.600 for Peter's freedom was eventually joined by a host of 0:00:52.680 --> 0:00:56.920 big name celebrities. Peter's story helped launch the movement against 0:00:57.000 --> 0:00:59.120 wrongful convictions and false confessions. 0:00:59.680 --> 0:01:00.440 Is buyers. 0:01:00.480 --> 0:01:02.800 The work that Steve and I do to this day. 0:01:11.520 --> 0:01:14.679 You know, the Peter Riley case was my baptism in 0:01:14.720 --> 0:01:18.600 the world of false confessions. When I learned about Peter's case, 0:01:18.640 --> 0:01:22.520 it was really the first time that I even knew 0:01:22.959 --> 0:01:27.320 that it was possible for police officers, through their tactics, 0:01:27.319 --> 0:01:30.639 to get an innocent person to confess to a crime 0:01:31.040 --> 0:01:34.040 they didn't commit, and I was fascinated by it. 0:01:34.959 --> 0:01:37.440 I know the feeling. For me. It was thirty years 0:01:37.480 --> 0:01:41.360 later when I watched those tapes of Brendan Dazzy's false confession. 0:01:41.840 --> 0:01:45.160 It's so easy to get hooked by these stories these people, 0:01:45.600 --> 0:01:49.360 and you can't walk away. 0:01:49.640 --> 0:01:53.360 Peter Riley was about five or six years older than me, 0:01:53.840 --> 0:01:57.200 but we grew up in the same era in terms 0:01:57.240 --> 0:02:00.680 of the kind of music that we liked. Peter was 0:02:00.880 --> 0:02:06.360 very into classic rock, Pink Floyd, Jethrow Toll, and Peter 0:02:06.480 --> 0:02:09.680 wore his hair long, very much in the same way 0:02:10.160 --> 0:02:14.040 that I wore my hair, so I felt a connection 0:02:14.200 --> 0:02:19.040 to Peter. I lived in a community not unlike Peter's, 0:02:19.639 --> 0:02:23.200 where people knew each other through Little League or the 0:02:23.280 --> 0:02:28.120 boy Scouts, where mothers watched out for each other's kids. 0:02:28.880 --> 0:02:32.600 And the more I learned about Peter's story, the more 0:02:32.639 --> 0:02:36.000 I began to understand that what happened to Peter very 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:39.720 easily could have happened to me. In addition to these 0:02:39.800 --> 0:02:44.280 connections that I found with Peter, This was a case 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:49.359 in a part of the country which was the birthplace 0:02:49.720 --> 0:02:54.560 of false confessions in the United States, the Salem Witch Trials. 0:02:55.040 --> 0:03:00.960 It sent me on an exploration, a lifelong exploration, to 0:03:01.040 --> 0:03:03.960 try to figure out why it is that people would 0:03:03.960 --> 0:03:06.520 confess to crimes they didn't commit. 0:03:10.520 --> 0:03:14.680 Peter's story begins in Falls Village, Connecticut, a tiny community 0:03:14.800 --> 0:03:17.640 of five hundred people that's part of a larger town 0:03:17.720 --> 0:03:20.959 called Canaan. If you've been to New England, Falls Village 0:03:21.000 --> 0:03:24.919 is pretty classic, complete with rivers, horse farms, and covered bridges. 0:03:25.400 --> 0:03:28.200 It's the kind of place where no one locks their doors, 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:32.520 where everyone looks out for each other. In September nineteen 0:03:32.560 --> 0:03:36.720 seventy three, leaves were turning color across Connecticut. An eighteen 0:03:36.800 --> 0:03:39.920 year old Peter Riley had just begun his senior year 0:03:39.960 --> 0:03:43.200 of high school. Peter was a skinny kid, just over 0:03:43.240 --> 0:03:47.000 one hundred pounds, and an uninspired student whose real love 0:03:47.200 --> 0:03:50.000 was his rock band. He lived in Falls Village in 0:03:50.040 --> 0:03:55.800 a small cottage, just him and his mom, Barbara Gibbons. Now, 0:03:55.840 --> 0:03:59.080 for lack of a better phrase, Barbara was the town eccentric. 0:03:59.520 --> 0:04:03.480 She was highly educated, well read, and well traveled, but 0:04:03.720 --> 0:04:06.040 she was also a single mother, which was a big 0:04:06.040 --> 0:04:09.640 deal in nineteen seventy three, and she was a heavy drinker. 0:04:10.280 --> 0:04:13.560 She had a reputation as someone who always spoke her mind, 0:04:13.680 --> 0:04:16.640 even if it rubbed some people the wrong way. But 0:04:16.760 --> 0:04:20.520 in Peter's eyes, his mother was someone brilliant who loved 0:04:20.560 --> 0:04:23.359 and protected him, just like he loved and stood up 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:26.400 for her. It was the two of them against the world. 0:04:27.560 --> 0:04:30.919 On the evening of Friday, September twenty eighth, Peter attends 0:04:30.960 --> 0:04:34.119 a youth group meeting at the local church. He leaves 0:04:34.160 --> 0:04:37.640 at about nine thirty pm and drives home, but when 0:04:37.680 --> 0:04:40.920 he walks in the door, his world is turned upside down. 0:04:41.640 --> 0:04:45.640 His mother is lying mostly unclothed on the bedroom floor. 0:04:46.320 --> 0:04:50.640 Her throat's been cut so deeply she's nearly decapitated, and 0:04:50.680 --> 0:04:53.520 she's been stabbed and beaten so badly that both of 0:04:53.560 --> 0:04:58.760 her thigh bones are broken. Peter freezes, His instinct warns 0:04:58.839 --> 0:05:02.320 him not to disturb this scene by touching the body. Instead, 0:05:02.360 --> 0:05:05.160 he grabs the phone and makes a series of calls 0:05:05.480 --> 0:05:10.520 to paramedics, hospitals, and doctors. A hospital worker calls the police, 0:05:10.880 --> 0:05:14.440 and the cops show up within minutes. When the police arrive. 0:05:14.640 --> 0:05:19.320 Peter's in shock he's just discovered his mother dead, but 0:05:19.360 --> 0:05:22.719 the officers think Peter's being too calm and they begin 0:05:22.839 --> 0:05:26.559 to suspect him. They take him into a neighbor's home 0:05:26.839 --> 0:05:31.440 and strip search him. They're looking for scratches, cuts, bruises, 0:05:31.640 --> 0:05:35.520 any indication that Peter had taken part in a brutal struggle, 0:05:36.200 --> 0:05:41.360 but they find nothing. Peter's wearing jeans, a brown T shirt, 0:05:41.440 --> 0:05:45.360 and gold sneakers, and a witness from the church confirms 0:05:45.400 --> 0:05:49.040 that Peter's been wearing the same clothes all night. The 0:05:49.080 --> 0:05:53.520 police examination finds no blood anywhere on his body, clothing, 0:05:53.800 --> 0:05:58.400 or shoes, but the cops are still suspicious. They question 0:05:58.560 --> 0:06:01.760 Peter in the back seat of a squad car. Then 0:06:02.040 --> 0:06:05.359 they take him down to the station and hold him overnight. 0:06:06.920 --> 0:06:10.000 Peter doesn't sleep at all, but the next morning he 0:06:10.080 --> 0:06:13.480 has the presence of mind to ask for a polygraph. 0:06:13.920 --> 0:06:16.440 The police give him one, but they tell him that 0:06:16.520 --> 0:06:19.960 he failed the test, and when Peter's told that he failed, 0:06:20.160 --> 0:06:23.960 he begins to doubt his own memory because he believes 0:06:24.040 --> 0:06:29.080 polygraphs are infallible. Before too long, Peter begins to wonder 0:06:29.440 --> 0:06:32.839 whether he might have killed his mother but somehow doesn't 0:06:32.920 --> 0:06:39.680 remember it now, believe it or not. Police record the 0:06:39.720 --> 0:06:43.360 interrogation on an old reel to reel machine, even though 0:06:43.360 --> 0:06:46.479 they weren't legally required to do so in nineteen seventy three. 0:06:47.400 --> 0:06:51.359 On tape, they egg Peter on and suggest that he 0:06:51.480 --> 0:06:55.440 might have amnesia. They tell him sometimes when people commit 0:06:55.520 --> 0:07:00.200 these crimes, the memories are so traumatic that people repress them, 0:07:00.640 --> 0:07:05.120 and Peter Riley starts believing that he might be a murderer. 0:07:05.760 --> 0:07:08.640 I believe I didn't now, he tells the police. But 0:07:08.760 --> 0:07:09.760 I don't remember. 0:07:10.520 --> 0:07:14.440 Peter says, over and over again, we got to keep digging, digging, 0:07:14.680 --> 0:07:18.600 digging to get this information out of me. Because he 0:07:18.760 --> 0:07:21.080 wants to know what this information is. 0:07:21.920 --> 0:07:25.200 He asks the police for truth serum, and at another 0:07:25.240 --> 0:07:28.360 point he even says, can you pound this out of me? 0:07:29.200 --> 0:07:32.440 The police praise Peter for being willing to admit he 0:07:32.560 --> 0:07:35.400 might be guilty. They tell him, we're not here to 0:07:35.400 --> 0:07:38.880 punish you. Maybe you'll go to a mental hospital for 0:07:38.920 --> 0:07:45.080 three months. Peter begins to feel like he's bonding with 0:07:45.080 --> 0:07:48.680 his interrogators, like they're all working together to fill in 0:07:48.720 --> 0:07:53.320 the blanks in his memory, and eventually their teamwork succeeds. 0:07:54.240 --> 0:07:57.320 Peter had a straight razor at home, a small blade 0:07:57.320 --> 0:08:01.600 that he used to make model airplanes. After hours of questioning, 0:08:01.920 --> 0:08:05.000 he eventually says that he could have used that razor 0:08:05.200 --> 0:08:08.320 to attack his mom. He adds that he could have 0:08:08.360 --> 0:08:11.880 broken her legs by jumping on them. In other words, 0:08:12.160 --> 0:08:15.880 he gives what we now call a persuaded false confession. 0:08:16.400 --> 0:08:20.200 These are a special subspecies of false confessions that are 0:08:20.400 --> 0:08:25.200 relatively rare, and what happens in these cases is the 0:08:25.280 --> 0:08:30.920 police interrogation tactics themselves cause a suspect to begin to 0:08:31.160 --> 0:08:37.080 doubt their own memory, and the suspect is persuaded that 0:08:37.120 --> 0:08:40.360 he or she must have committed the crime but can't 0:08:40.400 --> 0:08:46.720 remember it, and the interrogation becomes an exercise in reconstructing 0:08:47.520 --> 0:08:53.160 the suspect's memories of the crime. But the memories aren't real, 0:08:53.480 --> 0:08:55.000 they're confabulations. 0:08:55.679 --> 0:09:00.920 Peter's confabulated story isn't realistic. A small no razor wasn't 0:09:01.000 --> 0:09:04.520 capable of inflicting deep wounds like those on Barbara's neck, 0:09:05.120 --> 0:09:08.120 and Peter was one hundred and ten pound weekly there's 0:09:08.160 --> 0:09:10.880 no way he could have broken his mother's thigh bones 0:09:11.280 --> 0:09:15.240 just by jumping on them. But police ignore those problems. 0:09:15.760 --> 0:09:21.280 After all, they've got a confession. By the end of 0:09:21.320 --> 0:09:25.760 the interrogation, Peter starts realizing that he has no family left. 0:09:26.280 --> 0:09:30.480 You're talking about someone who has just lost the only 0:09:30.559 --> 0:09:34.200 family member in his life. Peter never knew his father. 0:09:34.800 --> 0:09:39.040 His mother has now been murdered. They live alone in 0:09:39.120 --> 0:09:43.880 this small cottage, and he's thinking that he's gotten nowhere. 0:09:43.400 --> 0:09:47.679 To go, And so Peter asks his interrogator, is there 0:09:47.760 --> 0:09:51.079 any chance that you might take me in? I wouldn't 0:09:51.080 --> 0:09:54.120 want to impose, he adds, I'll do work around the house. 0:09:54.720 --> 0:09:57.199 I really would love to live with a family. 0:09:57.559 --> 0:10:02.319 I've never seen that before. Just a a complete dependence 0:10:03.000 --> 0:10:08.240 on one's interrogator and a complete sort of loss of 0:10:08.400 --> 0:10:14.000 understanding of the fact that this person is his adversary. 0:10:14.240 --> 0:10:17.079 It's hard to imagine anything more purely fucked up. 0:10:17.160 --> 0:10:20.200 It's the most disturbing thing about this interrogation. 0:10:21.040 --> 0:10:23.560 But Peter doesn't get to go live with the cops, 0:10:23.760 --> 0:10:27.960 even though he's done everything they asked. Instead, he's arrested 0:10:28.160 --> 0:10:31.680 and booked into jail. Once Peter is away from his 0:10:31.720 --> 0:10:37.600 interrogator's influence, he immediately realizes he didn't actually kill anyone. 0:10:38.000 --> 0:10:41.960 And he recants his confession, but it's too late. On 0:10:42.000 --> 0:10:46.520 September twenty ninth, nineteen seventy three, Peter Riley is charged 0:10:46.679 --> 0:10:58.600 with the murder of his own mother. Barbara's murder and 0:10:58.640 --> 0:11:03.240 Peter's arrest shook False Village to its core. Everyone was 0:11:03.280 --> 0:11:06.560 following this tragedy, including one residence who would go on 0:11:06.679 --> 0:11:09.400 to become an important figure in Peter's story. 0:11:10.200 --> 0:11:14.319 My name is Donald Connery. Well, one thing I can 0:11:14.440 --> 0:11:17.800 claim for some distinction is that I probably am the 0:11:17.840 --> 0:11:22.839 only foreign correspondent who ever made a complete career shift 0:11:23.120 --> 0:11:30.120 overnight from reporting international affairs to investigating the criminal justice system. 0:11:30.440 --> 0:11:35.320 Don Connery was an esteemed journalist, and the last thing 0:11:35.360 --> 0:11:39.440 on his mind was the subject of false confessions. But 0:11:39.600 --> 0:11:44.240 this murder was big news in this small town, and 0:11:44.320 --> 0:11:47.640 you couldn't help but be drawn into it. He began 0:11:47.840 --> 0:11:51.959 to start looking into the case himself, and later wrote 0:11:52.040 --> 0:11:57.679 a book about the case that was an absolutely essential 0:11:59.200 --> 0:12:01.800 text about what happened to Peter Riley. 0:12:02.200 --> 0:12:05.840 Don Connery's in his nineties now, but in nineteen seventy 0:12:05.880 --> 0:12:08.880 three he had just moved to Falls Village with his 0:12:08.920 --> 0:12:10.439 wife and kids, and I. 0:12:10.400 --> 0:12:14.760 Thought, this is a terrible event which will play out 0:12:14.840 --> 0:12:17.400 and will have nothing to do with me, except that 0:12:17.600 --> 0:12:22.240 the accused eighteen year old was a friend and classmate 0:12:22.400 --> 0:12:25.520 of my children who went to the regional high school, 0:12:26.440 --> 0:12:29.040 and Peter was someone they talked about and knew about. 0:12:29.400 --> 0:12:34.600 Now, something extraordinary happens after Peter's arrest is announced. Remember, 0:12:34.840 --> 0:12:38.439 people in this tiny town know Peter Riley and they 0:12:38.600 --> 0:12:38.960 like him. 0:12:39.320 --> 0:12:43.599 This was in the age before social media, where communities 0:12:43.600 --> 0:12:47.280 were much more connected in a sense. They met each 0:12:47.320 --> 0:12:55.599 other through clubs, extracurricular activities at schools, church groups, boy Scouts, 0:12:56.160 --> 0:13:00.000 and the entire community knew who Peter was. From these 0:13:00.200 --> 0:13:05.319 various essential parts of the social fabric of Falls village. 0:13:05.400 --> 0:13:09.920 Peter's arrest leads to a groundswell of support. Everyone starts 0:13:09.960 --> 0:13:11.479 defending his innocence. 0:13:14.400 --> 0:13:18.960 After reading the initial stories, my younger children, Carol and 0:13:19.080 --> 0:13:22.320 Julie kept saying Peter couldn't possibly have done this. 0:13:22.720 --> 0:13:25.760 The mothers of his high school classmates form a group 0:13:26.120 --> 0:13:29.720 called Canaan Mothers, and they hold bake sales to raise 0:13:29.760 --> 0:13:32.439 money so that Peter can get released on bond before 0:13:32.480 --> 0:13:37.199 his trial. Some families even put their houses up as security. 0:13:37.760 --> 0:13:42.240 It was incredible. Mothers supporting the accused mother killer. 0:13:44.400 --> 0:13:48.560 They wanted to do everything in their power to help him. 0:13:48.880 --> 0:13:51.960 My kids said, and other neighbors said, you know, we 0:13:52.040 --> 0:13:55.200 don't think this is possible. There's no reason to think 0:13:55.240 --> 0:13:59.200 that he had any cause to harm his mother. And 0:13:59.280 --> 0:14:02.440 the word was in the community that yes, Peter. It 0:14:02.520 --> 0:14:06.200 confessed that nobody could understand why he would admit to 0:14:06.280 --> 0:14:10.079 something he didn't do, but their protests caught the attention 0:14:10.240 --> 0:14:10.880 of the media. 0:14:11.400 --> 0:14:14.800 A reporter named Joan Bartel hears about how the town 0:14:14.880 --> 0:14:19.160 of Falls Village is rallying behind an accused murderer. She 0:14:19.320 --> 0:14:23.680 listens to Peter's interrogation tapes and writes an explosive article 0:14:23.840 --> 0:14:28.120 in a magazine called New Times. The article questions Peter's 0:14:28.120 --> 0:14:32.280 guilt and includes many excerpts from his interrogation, exposing the 0:14:32.320 --> 0:14:37.640 CoP's manipulation of Peter. People around the state are horrified 0:14:38.000 --> 0:14:40.720 to read about a teenage boy made to believe that 0:14:40.800 --> 0:14:44.800 he killed his own mother. Donations flow in to the 0:14:44.880 --> 0:14:48.800 Canaan mothers, and soon enough money is raised for Peter 0:14:49.040 --> 0:14:54.120 to post bond fifty thousand dollars. He's released and moves 0:14:54.120 --> 0:14:57.400 in with one of his friend's families. Peter Riley is 0:14:57.560 --> 0:15:00.240 welcomed back into the Falls Village community. 0:15:00.680 --> 0:15:03.920 This so called killer went straight back to high school 0:15:03.960 --> 0:15:06.960 to complete his senior year, and it didn't seem to 0:15:07.000 --> 0:15:10.240 worry parents or teachers of the principal, who in fact 0:15:10.280 --> 0:15:11.360 supported him. 0:15:11.520 --> 0:15:15.320 One of the things that attracted reporters to this case, 0:15:15.360 --> 0:15:20.480 including Don Connery, was the idea that in order for 0:15:20.520 --> 0:15:24.440 these people to embrace Peter, they had to understand or 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:28.320 at least believe, that this confession was false. And here 0:15:28.360 --> 0:15:33.280 they are taking this suspected, confessed murderer into their own 0:15:33.320 --> 0:15:37.240 homes or being willing to do so, and to raise 0:15:37.320 --> 0:15:40.080 money for him, and to advocate for him and to 0:15:40.200 --> 0:15:43.840 fight for him. That's remarkable. 0:15:44.280 --> 0:15:47.960 Peter Riley was free on bond, but prosecutors were moving 0:15:48.000 --> 0:15:49.480 forward with his trial anyway. 0:15:49.840 --> 0:15:53.800 The community was confident that the trial in nineteen seventy 0:15:53.840 --> 0:15:58.200 four would quickly lead to adequittal. He would be found innocent. 0:15:58.520 --> 0:16:02.880 But on April twelfth, eighteen seventy four, Good Friday, Peter 0:16:03.040 --> 0:16:05.840 Riley was convicted of killing his own mother. 0:16:06.280 --> 0:16:11.440 It was a bombshell when the jury decided almost entirely 0:16:11.480 --> 0:16:14.960 in the basis of the confession, so called confession that 0:16:15.040 --> 0:16:18.800 he was guilty, and he was sentenced to six to 0:16:18.880 --> 0:16:22.640 sixteen years for manslaughter and driven off at high speed 0:16:22.720 --> 0:16:25.080 to the high security penitentiary. 0:16:26.520 --> 0:16:29.720 Even though he'd just been convicted of murder, Peter only 0:16:29.720 --> 0:16:33.920 spent a few hours in prison. Amazingly, a court ruled 0:16:33.960 --> 0:16:37.120 that he could stay free during his appeal as long 0:16:37.160 --> 0:16:40.680 as he posted an additional bond ten thousand more dollars. 0:16:41.200 --> 0:16:44.480 His village raised the extra money and Peter was freed. 0:16:45.280 --> 0:16:48.160 But now Peter needed to pay for an appeal, and 0:16:48.240 --> 0:16:50.880 that would cost more than the Canaan mothers could raise. 0:16:51.640 --> 0:16:55.880 So that reporter from New Times, Joan Bartel, sent the 0:16:56.000 --> 0:16:59.760 article she wrote about Peter's case to another Connecticut resident, 0:17:00.240 --> 0:17:02.360 the famous playwright Arthur Miller. 0:17:02.880 --> 0:17:08.480 Arthur Miller was my favorite playwright. I remember reading all 0:17:08.560 --> 0:17:12.400 of his plays in high school in the nineteen seventies 0:17:13.000 --> 0:17:16.760 Death of a Salesman all my sons. I liked him 0:17:16.880 --> 0:17:21.560 not only because his plays moved me. I liked him 0:17:21.600 --> 0:17:26.720 because he was a public figure that cared deeply about justice. 0:17:27.520 --> 0:17:30.000 He was a playwright with a conscience. 0:17:30.400 --> 0:17:35.119 The Crucible, probably Miller's greatest play, had been motivated in 0:17:35.200 --> 0:17:38.720 part by the false accusations that went on in Salem 0:17:38.720 --> 0:17:43.240 and Massachusetts three hundred years ago, when twenty one people 0:17:43.280 --> 0:17:48.199 were falsely accused of satanic activities and either hung or 0:17:48.200 --> 0:17:52.520 in one case of being crushed to death executed. And 0:17:52.600 --> 0:17:57.159 Miller also personally had faced the House of American Activities 0:17:57.200 --> 0:18:02.159 Committee accused of being a communist or worse, so he 0:18:02.320 --> 0:18:05.359 had every reason to feel that this is something that 0:18:05.400 --> 0:18:08.520 he should put right, and he invested a great deal 0:18:08.560 --> 0:18:09.840 of his time to do that. 0:18:10.400 --> 0:18:13.959 Arthur Miller read Jones article. He was appalled by the 0:18:14.000 --> 0:18:17.320 tragedy of Peter's confession, and he began to take a 0:18:17.440 --> 0:18:22.160 leading role in Peter's fight for vindication. Miller recruited other 0:18:22.359 --> 0:18:27.240 a list celebrities to donate money to Peter's defense, Jack Nicholson, 0:18:27.480 --> 0:18:32.840 Dustin Hoffman, Art Garfunkel, Candice Bergen, William Steren, Mike Nichols, 0:18:33.200 --> 0:18:37.560 even Elizabeth Taylor. Pretty soon a powerful coalition of voices 0:18:37.680 --> 0:18:38.600 was gathering steam. 0:18:39.000 --> 0:18:43.800 Overnight. There was a remarkable amount of energy behind the 0:18:43.880 --> 0:18:47.240 effort to free Peter as soon as possible from what everyone, 0:18:47.600 --> 0:18:50.880 at least in Litchfield County saw as a wrongful conviction. 0:18:51.280 --> 0:18:53.960 The first thing Peter needed was a lawyer to handle 0:18:54.000 --> 0:18:59.160 his appeal. Arthur Miller recruited Roy Daly, a former federal prosecutor, 0:18:59.680 --> 0:19:03.439 and his If Roy started preparing Peter's appeal, Miller worked 0:19:03.520 --> 0:19:06.879 to raise the public profile of the case. The New 0:19:07.000 --> 0:19:10.359 York Times featured a two part series about Peter on 0:19:10.440 --> 0:19:14.320 the front page. Not long afterwards, Sixty Minutes covered the 0:19:14.359 --> 0:19:18.800 story too. Meanwhile, Peter's legal team pressed his case in court. 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:22.560 Eventually a hearing was held to determine whether to grant 0:19:22.600 --> 0:19:26.840 him a new trial. Arthur Miller personally recruited some world 0:19:26.880 --> 0:19:31.280 renowned experts to testify. At that hearing, a forensic pathologist 0:19:31.480 --> 0:19:34.600 testified that if Peter had actually killed his mom, it 0:19:34.680 --> 0:19:37.280 would have been impossible for him to clean all the 0:19:37.280 --> 0:19:40.360 blood off his body and clothing before the police arrived. 0:19:41.080 --> 0:19:44.639 The pathologist also testified that there's no way one hundred 0:19:44.680 --> 0:19:48.200 and ten pound kid could break a woman's thigh bones 0:19:48.359 --> 0:19:52.280 by jumping on them, and a psychologist testified that Peter 0:19:52.560 --> 0:19:57.200 was suggestible and easily manipulated by authority figures. In other words, 0:19:57.280 --> 0:20:00.520 he was highly vulnerable to giving a false ca confession. 0:20:03.240 --> 0:20:06.320 This hearing took down both the medical evidence against Peter 0:20:06.720 --> 0:20:08.639 and his confession and. 0:20:08.520 --> 0:20:12.080 It led to a verdict by George Speziale that a 0:20:12.160 --> 0:20:16.120 buscarriage of justice had happened in his own courtroom, and 0:20:16.200 --> 0:20:18.719 he said that Peter deserved a new trial. 0:20:19.600 --> 0:20:22.960 It was March twenty fifth, nineteen seventy six, a little 0:20:22.960 --> 0:20:25.760 more than two and a half years after Peter lost 0:20:25.760 --> 0:20:37.959 his mom. Peter was granted a new trial, but the 0:20:38.000 --> 0:20:42.160 prosecutor who'd convicted him was up in arms. He believed 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:45.160 Peter was guilty and vowed to take him to trial again, 0:20:45.760 --> 0:20:47.360 but that didn't end up happening. 0:20:47.800 --> 0:20:50.679 He delayed to a point where he dropped dead on 0:20:50.720 --> 0:20:51.560 a golf course. 0:20:51.920 --> 0:20:54.680 The prosecutor passed away of a heart attack at age 0:20:54.680 --> 0:20:58.760 fifty four. So a new prosecutor, a young man named 0:20:58.760 --> 0:21:02.960 Dennis Santour over and as he digs into the case files, 0:21:03.160 --> 0:21:05.720 he finds a piece of evidence that had never been 0:21:05.720 --> 0:21:11.000 disclosed to Peter's defense team. A police officer and his 0:21:11.119 --> 0:21:15.480 wife had reported seeing Peter in downtown Canaan the night 0:21:15.520 --> 0:21:17.840 of the murder as he was driving home from his 0:21:17.960 --> 0:21:21.600 church youth group. They'd seen him only a few minutes 0:21:21.640 --> 0:21:25.640 before Peter arrived home, found his mother's body and started 0:21:25.680 --> 0:21:29.920 calling for help. It was an air tight alibi. Those 0:21:30.000 --> 0:21:33.200 few minutes didn't give Peter enough time to drive home 0:21:33.560 --> 0:21:36.199 and kill his mother before making those phone calls. 0:21:36.480 --> 0:21:40.960 Well, this was a so called exculpatory evidence which should 0:21:40.960 --> 0:21:43.840 have been turned over to the state and to the courts, 0:21:44.640 --> 0:21:48.280 and once it was revealed, it took only weeks before 0:21:48.320 --> 0:21:50.959 Peter Riley was fully exonerated. 0:21:51.320 --> 0:21:55.120 The state of Connecticut formally dropped all charges on November 0:21:55.160 --> 0:21:59.600 twenty fourth, nineteen seventy six. Peter Riley's name was officially 0:21:59.720 --> 0:22:07.960 c after Peter's exoneration. The state police never found Barbara's 0:22:08.000 --> 0:22:11.800 real killer and continued to insist that Peter was guilty. 0:22:12.359 --> 0:22:16.640 The case went into the legal annals as a classic 0:22:16.720 --> 0:22:21.120 false confession tragedy, and it was a prime example of 0:22:21.160 --> 0:22:24.919 these systems on willingness to admit error in most of 0:22:24.960 --> 0:22:26.720 these controversial cases. 0:22:27.200 --> 0:22:30.560 Don Connery eventually wrote a book about the case, Guilty 0:22:30.760 --> 0:22:34.439 until Proven Innocent, and he continued writing about cases of 0:22:34.440 --> 0:22:35.200 wrongful conviction. 0:22:35.960 --> 0:22:39.880 After the Peter Riley case, don Conry became his own 0:22:40.000 --> 0:22:45.800 one man journalistic innocence project. He began taking cases in 0:22:45.880 --> 0:22:51.320 Connecticut and investigating them and writing about them, and he 0:22:51.400 --> 0:22:56.119 also began taking false confession cases from outside of Connecticut 0:22:56.200 --> 0:22:56.600 as well. 0:22:57.200 --> 0:23:01.800 Meanwhile, to add insult to injury, Connecticut police actually stopped 0:23:01.880 --> 0:23:07.280 recording interrogations after Peter's case. Peter's interrogation tapes had made 0:23:07.280 --> 0:23:10.119 them look bad, and they didn't want to look bad again. 0:23:10.800 --> 0:23:15.200 It wasn't until twenty thirteen that Connecticut adopted a law 0:23:15.400 --> 0:23:19.720 requiring interrogations to be recorded, and who testified before the 0:23:19.760 --> 0:23:23.920 state legislature in support of that bill Peter Riley. 0:23:24.119 --> 0:23:30.120 Peter said, Look, we shouldn't let law enforcement officers get 0:23:30.160 --> 0:23:34.680 away with not recording interrogations, because what it does is 0:23:34.800 --> 0:23:39.760 it makes it impossible for people like me to explain 0:23:40.240 --> 0:23:44.000 to a jury or to the general public how it 0:23:44.160 --> 0:23:47.919 is that I was made to confess to killing my 0:23:48.000 --> 0:23:52.080 own mother. Peter was a powerful advocate for recording and 0:23:52.920 --> 0:23:56.439 his testimony was critical on getting the bill passed in 0:23:56.480 --> 0:23:57.480 twenty thirteen. 0:23:57.840 --> 0:24:01.919 Most importantly, Peter Riley's case woke the world up to 0:24:02.000 --> 0:24:06.320 the problem of false confessions. This injustice was a rallying 0:24:06.359 --> 0:24:11.400 cry for so many people, including Steve and me. Peter's 0:24:11.440 --> 0:24:17.000 story epitomizes the profound humanity in so many wrongful conviction cases. 0:24:17.400 --> 0:24:20.679 From the tragedy of the crime, to the ugliness of 0:24:20.760 --> 0:24:25.280 false accusation, to the defendant's struggle and perseverance, to the 0:24:25.320 --> 0:24:28.960 good people like Arthur Miller and the Canaan mothers who 0:24:29.000 --> 0:24:33.280 fight for the truth no matter what. In nineteen ninety five, 0:24:33.400 --> 0:24:38.360 the very first conference about false confessions took place in Hartford, Connecticut. 0:24:39.000 --> 0:24:43.120 Don Connery organized it, and the people who'd helped exonerate 0:24:43.200 --> 0:24:47.960 Peter Riley spoke. Since then, hundreds of confessions had been 0:24:48.000 --> 0:24:52.240 proven false around the country and were just getting started. 0:24:52.880 --> 0:24:56.920 At the Hartford conference, Arthur Miller said at one point 0:24:57.160 --> 0:25:00.879 that the record of mankind is full of confessions of 0:25:00.960 --> 0:25:03.280 events that happened. 0:25:03.240 --> 0:25:05.840 Or to which the accused had little or no connection. 0:25:06.800 --> 0:25:10.520 After all, even Galileo confessed that the sun and all 0:25:10.600 --> 0:25:14.840 the stars revolved around the motionless Earth. Rather than face 0:25:14.960 --> 0:25:18.840 the wrath of the Church, which for centuries had taught 0:25:19.200 --> 0:25:23.880 the opposite. Confronted with great power against which one has 0:25:23.920 --> 0:25:28.000 only a fragile defense, confession can begin to look like 0:25:28.119 --> 0:25:32.480 the door to freedom. Confession can very readily turn into 0:25:32.480 --> 0:25:35.640 a kind of coin with which to buy one's way 0:25:35.640 --> 0:25:40.359 out of a frightening and painful situation. How then, I 0:25:40.400 --> 0:25:43.720 will eat to indict the criminal. Is there a good 0:25:43.800 --> 0:25:48.520 substitute for confession as the mainstay of a prosecution case? 0:25:49.400 --> 0:25:52.000 For starters, I would suggest evidence. 0:25:54.520 --> 0:25:58.239 Wise words. We're not there yet, mister Miller. We're not 0:25:58.280 --> 0:26:00.960 there yet, but we're getting closed every day. 0:26:02.200 --> 0:26:06.800 Hello, Peter Howard and High State. Doing pretty good. 0:26:07.160 --> 0:26:08.280 It's really great to talk to you. 0:26:09.640 --> 0:26:13.120 What's your life like these days? While I'm sixty five, 0:26:13.160 --> 0:26:16.119 so I'm retired at this point, which just means I 0:26:16.160 --> 0:26:18.320 come up with a whole lot of work for myself 0:26:18.359 --> 0:26:23.520 that I'll get paid for it. I'm still an avid musician. 0:26:23.520 --> 0:26:26.400 I play every day. It's been something I've done since 0:26:26.480 --> 0:26:28.399 I saw the Beatles on that all of them, so 0:26:28.440 --> 0:26:30.320 it's been a long time. I just play a lot 0:26:30.359 --> 0:26:33.439 of music. I do what's positive for me these days, 0:26:33.560 --> 0:26:37.600 and that's pretty much it. What's your favorite song to play? 0:26:38.280 --> 0:26:42.720 I don't know anything by the Alma Brothers. 0:26:44.400 --> 0:26:47.639 You know, Steve and I are two lawyers who have 0:26:47.720 --> 0:26:50.960 the honor of standing up in courts and fighting for 0:26:51.040 --> 0:26:54.359 people we believe in, but we're also trying to change 0:26:54.359 --> 0:26:55.000 the world here. 0:26:55.600 --> 0:26:59.320 From the very beginning of my study of false confessions, 0:26:59.840 --> 0:27:04.560 I have gone out into the world and tried to 0:27:04.600 --> 0:27:06.840