STORY: "Making A Murderer' attorney weighs in on Chris Tapp case," by reporter Natalie Shaver, published by Local News 8, on February 1, 2016.
PHOTO CAPTION: "Millions of Americans following the popular Netflix documentary series "Making a Murderer," and one of the attorneys who appeared in the show is weighing in on 1996 murder of Angie Dodge."
GIST: "Steve Drizin wrote a report on the why he thinks the tactics interrogators used on Chris Tapp, who was convicted of Dodge's murder, were coercive. "This is the most contaminated and one of the most coerced confessions I have seen in almost 20 years of doing this work," he said. That's including his work with the Brenden Dassey case, which is part of 'Making A Murderer." The series raises questions about the evidence used to convict Steven Avery and Brenden Dassey in the murder of Teresa Halbach. For example, it suggests Dassey's confession may have been coerced. "The help theme. We'll go to bat for you, we're in your corner, if you just involve yourself a little bit in the crime," Drizin said. "You'll be OK." It was something he saw in Dassey's and Tapp's cases "Almost the exact same words. You can transpose sentences from Brendan's interrogations and put them right in Chris Tapp's interrogation," he said. "Brendan's is actually less coercive than Chris' in many ways." He said that's for a few reasons: Dassey's interrogation only lasted hours, while Tapp's was over a period of nine days. Drizin also said there werre far fewer direct threats and promises of leniency made. "They tortured him [Tapp] psychologically," he said. "They cannot threaten inevitable consequences," retired judge Mike Heavey said. "They can't say, 'You're going to get the death penalty. You're going to get the gas chamber.'" Heavey is a cofounder of the group Judges for Justice. He works for free studying cases that he thinks are wrongful convictions. Judges for Justice (http://judgesforjustice.org/ ) released this video ( https://youtube.com/watch?v=KfgbjZ4Y5og) explaining why Tapp's interrogation and polygraph were coercive."
The entire story can be found at:
http://www.localnews8.com/news/making-a-murderer-attorney-weighs-in-on-chris-tapp-case/37761908
PUBLISHER'S NOTE:
Dear Reader. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog. We are following this case.
I have added a search box for content in this blog which now encompasses several thousand posts. The search box is located near the bottom of the screen just above the list of links. I am confident that this powerful search tool provided by "Blogger" will help our readers and myself get more out of the site.
The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at:
http://www.thestar.com/topic/
