The Susceptibility of Juveniles to False Confessions and False Guilty Pleas

Juvenile defendants are at a greater risk of wrongful conviction than adult defendants. Just as they affect adults’ decisions, numerous factors—including limited understanding of the law, perceived strength of evidence against them, value of a plea offer, advice and perceived effectiveness of attorneys, demographic characteristics, and criminal history—affect juveniles’ willingness to confess. Compared to adults, juveniles’ legal understanding, knowledge, and decision-making capabilities are particularly deficient. Even with instruction, juveniles may not understand plea-relevant materials sufficiently. Juveniles rarely make legal decisions autonomously. Misinformed parents, inadequate representation, and limited personal desire to participate in the judicial process exacerbate the risk of false confession or plea. Juveniles are especially susceptible to coerced false confessions because of the nature of modern-day police interrogation. Physical custody, presentation of false evidence, and interrogators’ minimizing the severity of their crimes or associated sentences increase the risk of false confessions and pleas. Several studies have found that willingness to confess or plead guilty decreases as age increases. However, this research only suggests that juveniles are more likely to falsely plead guilty, and more studies are necessary to reach this conclusion definitively.

“Though research has established that juveniles misjudged to be guilty are at risk for falsely confessing in the context of police interrogations, the research has also suggested that it is the combination of dispositional factors (i.e., young age) and situational factors (i.e., overly long interrogations and inappropriate interrogation techniques) that serve to increase the risk.” p. 956