I want to share a perspective that I don’t think has been fully discussed here yet. After reading both the TribLive article and the full Omnibus Motion, I’m honestly not convinced that the statements attributed to Nicole should be taken at face value. At the very least, I think this interrogation has a lot of the same features that have shown up again and again in well-documented false confession cases. A few things that really stood out to me:
1. The interrogation was extremely long
We’re not talking about a 1–2 hour interview. According to the motion, she was in police custody for around 13 hours. Almost all proven false confessions come after long, drawn-out interrogations, especially when the person is exhausted, scared, or mentally vulnerable. After 6 hours, reliability drops off a cliff. At 13 hours? It’s a huge red flag.
2. She invoked her rights, and questioning continued
This is important. The motion says she asked to stop and asked for a lawyer. That alone can taint everything that comes afterward. When someone is deprived of their rights and still questioned, the odds of a reliable, voluntary confession go down dramatically.
3. The “we have cameras” claim looks like a bluff
The article treats this as if police had damning surveillance. But according to the motion, the “cameras” were baby monitors. Police are allowed to lie during interrogations, and they often do. False confession cases are full of “we have evidence you don’t know about” tactics.
4. The emotional collapse matters
The motion describes crying, distress, isolation, cold temperatures, long gaps with no human contact, panic, etc. This is the textbook psychological environment where false confessions happen. Most people imagine they’d be strong under pressure. But every major false confession case involves someone who thought the same — until they broke down.
5. The most extreme statements came only at the end. This is almost exactly the pattern seen in cases like:
- Melissa Calusinski
- Brendan Dassey
- the Central Park 5
The early hours involve denials or confusion. The dramatic, self-incriminating material shows up after exhaustion, fear, and hopelessness take over. This is not my opinion — this is a documented pattern in forensic psychology.
6. The “childhood harming kids” narrative is a big red flag
A lot of people took this part of the article very literally. But dramatic, emotional “origin story” admissions often show up in false confessions because the person is:
- overwhelmed
- trying to give interrogators something
- accepting suggested narratives
- losing their grip under fatigue
These kinds of statements almost never emerge in the first hour. They emerge at hour 10, 11, 12 — just like here.
7. The Brooke Skylar Richardson comparison is key
That was a case I followed closely, and it has some striking similarities:
- young woman
- vulnerable mental state
- long interrogation
- misleading claims by investigators
- statements that snowballed into a so-called “confession”
- a public convinced she was a monster
- later evidence showing the confession was wrong
The public narrative was completely different from what experts later agreed on. Her supposed “confession” didn’t hold up in court at all. I’m not saying this case is identical — but the parallels are hard to ignore.
8. Confessions alone are not reliable evidence
People forget that about 20–25% of exonerations involve false confessions. And many of those confessions were as detailed and emotional as this one sounds. Human beings can be pushed into saying things that don’t reflect reality — it’s uncomfortable to accept, but it’s true
