The all-star team of Richard Leo, Peter Neufeld, Steve Drizin and Andew Taslitz have posted the above-titled article on SSRN. Download article here. The abstract states:
This article argues that constitutional criminal procedure rules provide insufficient safeguards against the admissibility of false confession evidence that is the product of police contamination. We propose a specific framework, as well as several possible mechanisms, for courts to review and screen the reliability of confession evidence prior to trial. We also offer specific suggestions for how pre-trial reliability assessments for confession evidence could effectively and efficiently work in practice. Finally, we respond to several possible objections to the idea of pre-trial reliability assessments, underscoring that in a variety of contexts trial judges – consistent with their traditional gatekeeping role — already routinely prevent evidence with sufficient indicia of unreliability from going to the jury.
