Yes! I'm only a short way into it, but the audio of the first interview with Brendan is available in two parts on YouTube, and it's a reasonably nice, relaxed chat, and does articulate much, much better than in the 'interrogation' video...he's chatting quite naturally with the officers in this audio. I don't yet know what he 'says' of importance in this audio recording, whether he says anything to implicate himself or SA, or whether there's something in there that leads to the more hostile format of the video 'interrogation', but I can kind of imagine from this first part that I've heard, why the officers thought they were talking to someone with a much clearer and more mature mind. I personally think that impression they may have got could have led them to a false impression of what kind of mind they were dealing with in Brendan.
Brendan Dassey and False Confessions
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Japan - Miyazawa family of 4 murdered, Setagaya, Tokyo, 30 Dec 2000 #3- Latest: Charlot123
Yes! I'm only a short way into it, but the audio of the first interview with Brendan is available in two parts on YouTube, and it's a reasonably nice, relaxed chat, and does articulate much, much better than in the 'interrogation' video...he's chatting quite naturally with the officers in this audio. I don't yet know what he 'says' of importance in this audio recording, whether he says anything to implicate himself or SA, or whether there's something in there that leads to the more hostile format of the video 'interrogation', but I can kind of imagine from this first part that I've heard, why the officers thought they were talking to someone with a much clearer and more mature mind. I personally think that impression they may have got could have led them to a false impression of what kind of mind they were dealing with in Brendan.
I can agree. Brendan COULD HAVE articulated the truth well early on. Unfortunately I think his mind is so warped now and after 11 years he might not be clear on the actual events of that night anymore.
As for Fassbender and Wiegert thinking they were dealing with a normal, average intelligence kid, I disagree. Brendan, who was in the middle of a murder investigation and family turmoil over his uncle being arrested, thought the investigators were there to talk to him because his girlfriend (who he didn't know the last name of) broke up with him. This was within minutes of the first interview and should have been a very clear indication they were dealing with a child with an intellectual disability of some sort because children in 10th grade of normal intelligence know the first and last names of their friends, especially a boyfriend or girlfriend.
Yes and no.
I'm listening to a little more of the audio now, and the articulation is somewhat hit-and-miss. He has the voice of someone who's sixteen years old, and there's not a great depth of vocabulary but it could feel to an adult that it's not that much different from talking to a rather indifferent teen who has a 'strop on' (sorry if that doesn't translate into US/International English. The problem is that this isn't a kid with a strop on, this is his highest level of interaction, and it's far, far easier for him when he's talking about things he's been personally involved in, or small passages of conversations he's overheard....outside of those things he gets very slow, lots of pauses, fractions of sentences or no answer at all. It's awkward with it being audio-only to imagine if he's just sitting there or if he might shake or nod his head at times, there's no way to know, it has to be inferred from the officer's response. The officer is finding it difficult to elicit information, but he seems to be doing a reasonable job of keeping it sounding like a friendly chat and working around these pauses and places where Brendan doesn't really know the answer... (paraphrasing) "Do you remember which day *advertiser censored* happened? Thursday? Which Thursday, this one coming up or last week? Last week, okay, that's fine." or "What were you doing that afternoon? Playing video games on the Playstation...do you remember which game? [response from Brendan, slightly bitty, but clear enough that it was a relatively new game] Oh, so when was that bought? [Brendan doesn't remember exactly] Ohh, okay that's fine."
There's nothing hostile, it sounds a little like chatting with a younger child, maybe 8 to 10 years old, but with the deeper voice of a sixteen-year old. He doesn't seem to like saying anything when he's not certain of the answer.
The problem is that people tend to make assumptions about other people based on their own brain patterns and experiences. Someone like Brendan is hard for them to comprehend and empathize with his thinking and speech patterns, especially when he goes from articulating fairly well about a video game to not being able to answer the question of when it was bought. People tend to insert themselves into someone else's personality (if that was me, I'd be lying if I acted like that). And these guys admitted that when they were interacting with him they were seeing all the interviews they'd ever done with numerous other criminals and really interpolating other people's actions/reactions/speech/motivations onto Brendan. This is what people do, they ascribe motivations based on their past experiences not on the person's past experiences.
When you get a person with a 'delicate' demeanor and you start vocalizing these ascribed motivations to them, they're often not able to fight, they just accept them. ["You're stupid! Why did you do that thing?" "Because I'm stupid."] So in many ways the individual feeds back these ascribed motivations instead of attempting to explain what's really going on in their head when the other person has already made up their mind, and wouldn't have a hope of understanding anyway.
But I don't think the officers were trying to coerce answers, I think they genuinely couldn't understand why he would stop articulating and not give them the answers they wanted [unless they pushed hard on him]. Sure, this is 'wrong', and definitely not the right way to question a person like Brendan (it could have the same effect on people who are older and with much higher IQ and no learning difficulty, especially if they've experienced this kind of emotional bullying at some point in their life) but I don't think they were doing it on purpose...they just wanted the answers and it was their job to get the answers that made a rational narrative of what happened to the victim of a horrific murder.
I'm listening to a little more of the audio now, and the articulation is somewhat hit-and-miss. He has the voice of someone who's sixteen years old, and there's not a great depth of vocabulary but it could feel to an adult that it's not that much different from talking to a rather indifferent teen who has a 'strop on' (sorry if that doesn't translate into US/International English. The problem is that this isn't a kid with a strop on, this is his highest level of interaction, and it's far, far easier for him when he's talking about things he's been personally involved in, or small passages of conversations he's overheard....outside of those things he gets very slow, lots of pauses, fractions of sentences or no answer at all. It's awkward with it being audio-only to imagine if he's just sitting there or if he might shake or nod his head at times, there's no way to know, it has to be inferred from the officer's response. The officer is finding it difficult to elicit information, but he seems to be doing a reasonable job of keeping it sounding like a friendly chat and working around these pauses and places where Brendan doesn't really know the answer... (paraphrasing) "Do you remember which day *advertiser censored* happened? Thursday? Which Thursday, this one coming up or last week? Last week, okay, that's fine." or "What were you doing that afternoon? Playing video games on the Playstation...do you remember which game? [response from Brendan, slightly bitty, but clear enough that it was a relatively new game] Oh, so when was that bought? [Brendan doesn't remember exactly] Ohh, okay that's fine."
There's nothing hostile, it sounds a little like chatting with a younger child, maybe 8 to 10 years old, but with the deeper voice of a sixteen-year old. He doesn't seem to like saying anything when he's not certain of the answer.
The problem is that people tend to make assumptions about other people based on their own brain patterns and experiences. Someone like Brendan is hard for them to comprehend and empathize with his thinking and speech patterns, especially when he goes from articulating fairly well about a video game to not being able to answer the question of when it was bought. People tend to insert themselves into someone else's personality (if that was me, I'd be lying if I acted like that). And these guys admitted that when they were interacting with him they were seeing all the interviews they'd ever done with numerous other criminals and really interpolating other people's actions/reactions/speech/motivations onto Brendan. This is what people do, they ascribe motivations based on their past experiences not on the person's past experiences.
When you get a person with a 'delicate' demeanor and you start vocalizing these ascribed motivations to them, they're often not able to fight, they just accept them. ["You're stupid! Why did you do that thing?" "Because I'm stupid."] So in many ways the individual feeds back these ascribed motivations instead of attempting to explain what's really going on in their head when the other person has already made up their mind, and wouldn't have a hope of understanding anyway.
But I don't think the officers were trying to coerce answers, I think they genuinely couldn't understand why he would stop articulating and not give them the answers they wanted [unless they pushed hard on him]. Sure, this is 'wrong', and definitely not the right way to question a person like Brendan (it could have the same effect on people who are older and with much higher IQ and no learning difficulty, especially if they've experienced this kind of emotional bullying at some point in their life) but I don't think they were doing it on purpose...they just wanted the answers and it was their job to get the answers that made a rational narrative of what happened to the victim of a horrific murder.
Thanks! I am torn between wanting to go out and buy some A4 (foolscap) lined paper and a folder and really start taking in depth notes of this and thinking, well the Innocence Project has already done all of this, with people who have legal expertise, and they couldn't even get an appellate court to call for a re-trial ... This is a huge job, probably at least six months to two years for one person working part-time on it ... and at the end of the day, I wouldn't achieve anything practical.
It sucks. Add on to that that this is just one or two guys (Brendan is really the one that bothers me, but I also feel there were so many problems in SA's case that there should be a re-trial) and how many other people have gone through similar police investigations and wound up as convicted of crimes they did not commit? It absolutely sucks. The guilty need to be found, convicted, punished....but the innocent deserve justice, too, and there is no justice for the victim if you convict the wrong person.
From the quality of posts I've seen on this board, and on the Reddit threads, too, there are thousands of people feeling the same way I am feeling. More people than that are highly disturbed for the same reasons and signing petitions and talking about this series with their friends. It's so frustrating....it MUST lead to something...and if it doesn't, that's just heaping injustice upon injustice.
This is part of the changes that the modern world is bringing with it. Improvements in forensics and detection techniques, improvements in psychological evaluations, and the ability for us, the public, to learn about these cases. I don't think the so-called justice system has fully caught up with all of these changes, it's being very conservative and reactive...now I agree with being conservative in justice, that's part of the reason why you don't convict when you have reasonable doubt, or why even good evidence can be thrown out of court because of improper collection. I've read that there are major problems with DNA analyses that aren't being declared openly to juries, and probably the lawyers, attorneys and judges aren't aware of these problems themselves. I think it's time for some very big changes in the justice system to significantly increase how 'just' it is for everyone involved. I think the appellate courts need to be given more funding to go through a lot of older cases, because innocent people shouldn't languish in prison for 18 years like SA did and only get out -- eventually -- on a lucky confluence of circumstances.
http://www.convolutedbrian.com/dassey_confessions_links.html
Video interviews.
Plus I would recommend reading the transcripts of each interview from first to last. I know the investigators sounded sweet as pie and weren't smacking him around to get him to say what they needed to hear. Good cop, bad cop is a common phrase. In this case it was good cop, better cop... "We want to help you... We will stand up for you... We will tell everyone you were honest and helpful... We don't think your uncle did this on purpose... He probably didn't mean to... We just want to help."
And, in the end, it doesn't matter how polite, sweet or well-intentioned they were with him. The interview (any interview) is designed to elicit truthful information. All the interviews with Brendan only elicited information they had already told him.
missy1974
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http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/p...en-drizin-and-laura-nirider-making-a-murderer
interview with Steven Drizin and Laura Nirider. They were both in the documentary, and I think they represent BD, not sure if they still do? I'm still listening.
Biography
Steven Drizin is a Clinical Professor of Law at Northwestern Law School where he has been on the faculty since 1991. He is also the Assistant Dean of the Bluhm Legal Clinic. He served as the Legal Director of the Clinic's renowned Center on Wrongful Convictions from March 2005 to September 2013. At the Center, Professor Drizin's research interests involve the study of false confessions and his policy work focuses on supporting efforts around the country to require law enforcement agencies to electronically record custodial interrogations.
Biography
Laura Nirider is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Law and Project Director of the Center on Wrongful Convictions of Youth (CWCY) at Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago. Nirider represents individuals who were wrongfully convicted of crimes when they were children or teenagers. In connection with that work, she has represented several defendants in high-profile cases involving juvenile false confessions, including members of the West Memphis Three and Dixmoor Five.
interview with Steven Drizin and Laura Nirider. They were both in the documentary, and I think they represent BD, not sure if they still do? I'm still listening.
Biography
Steven Drizin is a Clinical Professor of Law at Northwestern Law School where he has been on the faculty since 1991. He is also the Assistant Dean of the Bluhm Legal Clinic. He served as the Legal Director of the Clinic's renowned Center on Wrongful Convictions from March 2005 to September 2013. At the Center, Professor Drizin's research interests involve the study of false confessions and his policy work focuses on supporting efforts around the country to require law enforcement agencies to electronically record custodial interrogations.
Biography
Laura Nirider is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Law and Project Director of the Center on Wrongful Convictions of Youth (CWCY) at Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago. Nirider represents individuals who were wrongfully convicted of crimes when they were children or teenagers. In connection with that work, she has represented several defendants in high-profile cases involving juvenile false confessions, including members of the West Memphis Three and Dixmoor Five.
missy1974
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in the above interview..... Drizin makes a good point.... how does a 16 yr old boy clean up any evidence of a brutal murder like that.... most 16 yr old boys can't make a peanut butter sandwich without making a mess! I agree LOL
angelainwi
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The beginning of this panel has some great info on false confessions and the techniques used...
http://mediaservices.law.ttu.edu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=5dacdee0-d3fa-4bea-9f5e-e74ea5dd3cd1
http://mediaservices.law.ttu.edu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=5dacdee0-d3fa-4bea-9f5e-e74ea5dd3cd1
LifeCitizen
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Listening now. But as a mother of a 17 yr old boy, I agree too! Thanks for sharing Missy.
ETA, this is worth a listen for anyone that thinks BD didn't make a false confession.
Justiceseeker35
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Found something a little eye opening. Steven Avery settles the lawsuit for 400 k in Feb, 06 then hires Buting and Strang who supposedly MCSO were afraid of. Then just a couple weeks later they go after BD till they get not only a witness but also a false confession. No one seems to think this was retaliation? With the public defender he didn't have a chance. That dude wouldn't have argued police framing or evidence tampering. But Strang was definitely going that approach.
missy1974
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Interesting justiceseeker. I was wondering what happened in February... I started thinking about it after I did that quick timeline of kratz and his ridiculous news conference, the one he had zero "proof" to back up his story. I just haven't had the time the last few days. So thanks for pointing that out 
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Brendan Dassey's November 6, 2005 interview, in the squad car.
Notice how much it differs from later interviews.
Eta ~ I see now that Missy posted this on his documents thread over a month ago. Thanks, Missy!
[video=youtube;9zePg5OfvyU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zePg5OfvyU[/video]
Notice how much it differs from later interviews.
Eta ~ I see now that Missy posted this on his documents thread over a month ago. Thanks, Missy!
dexter75
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In a perfect world...I would hope so =)
However, the way this entire case has played out, from beginning until now? Originally I would have said " not a chance!!" Now that KZ is on it, I just hope she has a few things that blow this case wide open =)
However, the way this entire case has played out, from beginning until now? Originally I would have said " not a chance!!" Now that KZ is on it, I just hope she has a few things that blow this case wide open =)
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Yeah, I have yet to get through the other interviews. After listening to this, I can see why he wasn't saying much in the other interviews. Their tactics are totally appalling.
missy1974
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the Nov 6th interview IIRC, was in Crivitz.... and it was O'Neill. It wasn't even Wiegert/Fassbender yet. This is when they pulled over Brendan and I think Blaine, they were driving SA's car to the store.
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Another thing I noticed is that he had just turned 16 (in October).
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Interestingly, if you read Blaine Dassey's interview, you'll see what he said was identical to what Brendan said until the LEOs went after Brendan, claiming he really saw Teresa and that he knew what happened to her.
dexter75
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This just blows my mind...
missy1974
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http://www.stevenaverycase.org/wp-c...endants-Memo-on-Brendan-Dassey-Statements.pdf
Thought I should post this in here.... this is SA's lawyers breakdown of BD's confessions and the inconsistencies. They filed this memo, if I'm understanding correctly, as a pre-emptive strike in case the prosecution used the 'confession' in the sentencing hearing.
It's very interesting, but also very long lol
ETA: it's not as long as I thought... it has the interview transcripts attached, so it appears much longer
Thought I should post this in here.... this is SA's lawyers breakdown of BD's confessions and the inconsistencies. They filed this memo, if I'm understanding correctly, as a pre-emptive strike in case the prosecution used the 'confession' in the sentencing hearing.
It's very interesting, but also very long lol
ETA: it's not as long as I thought... it has the interview transcripts attached, so it appears much longer