Frontline’s doc­u­men­tary, The Confessions, inves­ti­gates the con­vic­tion of four Navy sailors for the rape and mur­der of a woman in Norfolk, Virginia in 1997. The doc­u­men­tary high­lights some of the high-pres­sure police inter­ro­ga­tion tech­niques, includ­ing the threat of the death penal­ty, sleep depri­va­tion, and intim­i­da­tion, that led each of the ​“Norfolk Four” defen­dants to con­fess, despite a lack of evi­dence link­ing them to the crime. The case rais­es sig­nif­i­cant ques­tions about the actions of state offi­cials, who relied pri­mar­i­ly on the sailors’ con­tra­dic­to­ry con­fes­sions for their con­vic­tions, and dis­re­gard­ed DNA evi­dence that point­ed to a lone assailant. The four sailors are now out of prison (one has served his sen­tence and the oth­er three were grant­ed con­di­tion­al par­dons by for­mer Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine), and the per­son who prob­a­bly com­mit­ted the mur­der has since con­fessed to the crime while serv­ing prison time for anoth­er rape. The Confession is sched­uled to air on Tuesday, November 9.

(“The Confessions,” Frontline, PBS, November 9, 2010). See Innocence and oth­er Multimedia resources.

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