Just so we don't get too far off the subject of this thread...
Let me re-frame the question. In this particular "what-if" scenario, we're talking about a freely offered confession not coerced or forced in any way.
Moreover, I'm not talking about a misplaced expression of guilt from someone who believed they didn't do enough to keep JB safe like "I'm responsible" or "it's my fault," like HOTYH suggests. No, I'm talking a definitive statement like "I did it" or "I killed her because..." THAT's what I'm talking about.
On that, allow me to add that some of you have expressed the idea that you would believe a confession because it would account for certain things. I have great respect for that notion and I would even say that my scenario would involve explanations for certain phenomena. But my main point is that a confession matching the above criteria would not NEED to explain every single thing, and that I would be perfectly content to leave a few things alone.
Now, before that statement causes any aspersions to be cast upon my motives, mindset or methods, allow me to explain myself. I have YET to find a single case, confession or not, where every single thing can be accounted for. That was my whole point: to my way of thinking, a confession from an R would obviate the need to explain everything.
Let me elaborate further: to hear the Rs tell it, there was a double standard in the investigation. Well, there was, but not the way they mean it! The double standard comes from the fact that we KNOW that the Rs were in the house that night, whereas you have to establish a nexus of evidence to show that someone else was. For that reason, a confession by the Rs automatically requires less explanation than that of an intruder. An intruder WOULD have to account for literally everything, but an R would NOT.
Agreed.