Accusations of coerced confessions in Melissa Lucio case shine spotlight on tactic

Melissa Lucio, who was convicted of the murder of her 2-year-old daughter in 2008, was sentenced to death and was the first woman of Hispanic descent on death row in Texas. But after lawmakers, family members and supporters called into question the evidence that led to her conviction, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals stayed her execution in April, giving her legal team a chance to present new evidence they say proves her innocence to the district court in Cameron County.

Many experts have called her confession wrongfully coerced by police. The American Psychological Association penned a resolution calling into question the tactics used to bring about such confessions in not just Lucio’s case but countless other cases in which innocent people may have been wrongfully convicted.

But Allison D. Redlich, a professor in the Department of Criminology, Law, and Society at George Mason University, says that because law enforcement across the country is fragmented and mostly uncollaborative, it is nearly impossible to pin down just how many people are affected by coerced confessions. Redlich, who has co-authored the case law book “Wrongful Convictions: Law, Social Science, and Policy,” spoke to Texas Standard about such confessions.

https://www.texasstandard.org/stories/melissa-lucio-case-spotlights-coerced-confession-tactic/