The Most Intense Police Interrogations In Netflix True Crime

[Narrator] Hands up, who's been
watching Criminal

season two, the cat and mouse drama

that takes place entirely in police

interrogation rooms with investigators

locked in a psychological battle of wits

with suspects?

[Woman] Do you want to say it, or shall I?

[Dramatic music]

[Woman] We don't believe you.

[Narrator] The very nature of
interrogations is

intrinsically dramatic, full of

deception, tension, and injustice.

And while we love Criminal,

nothing hits quite like the real thing.

So here from Netflix's catalogue of

true crime shows and documentaries

are some real life interrogations

we just can't stop thinking about.

A warning before we dive in:

This video explores some of the
darkest aspects

of these cases, including murder
and sexual violence.

Making a Murderer was one of the first

true crime series to really
get people talking,

and years later, it remains
truly compelling

and deeply shocking.

The series focuses on Steven Avery,

a Wisconsin man who was

convicted of sexual assault in 1985

and spent 18 years in prison.

In 2003, DNA evidence secured his release,

but Avery believed the police had
a vendetta against him,

and the stakes got higher when he launched

a lawsuit seeking damages.

[Kim Ducat] They weren't going to

hand that man $36 million.

They weren't going to be made

a laughingstock, that's for sure.

[Narrator] Two years later, photographer
Teresa Halbach

disappeared. Her last assignment
had been to

take pictures of a vehicle
belonging to Avery,

which put him firmly under suspicion.

He was found guilty of murder,

but as the series explores,

there are questions over
much of the evidence

that put him there. The most
shocking moment, though,

involves Avery's nephew, Brendan Dassey,

who was charged with being an accessory

to the crime. With little evidence

to support the state's case,

everything depended on a confession,

and they got it.

Dassey was ultimately convicted

and handed a life sentence.

In the three and a half hour interrogation

without his lawyer present,

Dassey spilled everything
they asked him to.

The trouble was, some of what
he said didn't

line up with the case against Avery,

and some of it barely made sense at all.

In the interrogation, a mumbling
Dassey seems

more worried about making his mother happy

than about how confessing
might affect him.

[Interrogator] Did you cut her hair off?

[Dassey] Yeah.

[Interrogator] Where did that happen?

[Dassey] In the bedroom.

[Interrogator] What did you cut the
hair off with?

[Dassey] The knife.

[Interrogator] The knife you guys found
in the garage?

That doesn't make sense, it's impossible.

You took her out to the garage and that's

when you got the knife.

[Narrator] In 2016, a judge overturned

Dassey's conviction on the grounds

that the confession had been coerced.

But legal wrangling means he remains

in prison to this day.

True crime show, The Confession Tapes,

is all about miscarriages of justice,

and how police have used interrogations

to convict the innocent.

It looks at several cases
across the series,

but one of the most haunting is that

of Wesley Meyers. Meyers didn't just

confess once to the 1997 murder of his

girlfriend, Teresa Haught, he
confessed three times

and even made a public apology
to her family.

[Meyers] I want to apologize to the family

for what I've done.

[Narrator] Meyers was duly found guilty.

The only problem? Confession aside,

the evidence really didn't seem to
point to him

being the one who committed the crime.

And while the police were pursuing him,

they were ignoring plausible
leads on another

suspect. But it's when you watch the

interrogation itself that alarm

bells really start to go off.

Over many hours of questioning,

the police railroad a compliant Meyers

into believing he's got no choice

other than to cooperate with them

and the story they've constructed,

even telling him they have
physical evidence

against him that proved to be nonexistent.

[Police] We both know, Wesley,
and let's

be honest with each other,

the people that generally get you the

most pissed off in all the world

are the people you love.

[Narrator] All this was being secretly

recorded, so Meyers didn't know

his words could be used against him.

In 2012, a judge ruled that Meyers'

constitutional rights had been violated

and ordered a retrial. He pled guilty

to a lesser charge and was

released based on time already served.

Meyers remains bitter about the
legal process.

[Meyers] They have hardened me.

[Narrator] Henry Lee Lucas was
America's most

prolific and notorious serial killer.

A drifter, with no home territory,

he claimed responsibility for

over 600 murders, starting with his own

mother, although the number

eventually settled around a
more believable

200. Unlike most known serial killers,

he had no established MO.

He said once that he used
anything but poison

on his victims. How did police

catch this slippery shapeshifting

operator? Because he confessed,

and confessed,

and confessed, and confessed.

[Lucas] Well after that I cut her

up into little pieces.

[Narrator] After Lucas was

arrested in 1983 on suspicion

of committing a double murder,

he began claiming responsibility for
more and more crimes.

Police came from all over the country

to clear up old cases by pinning
them on Lucas.

But in exchange for these confessions,

Lucas was receiving special privileges,

like cigarettes and milkshakes.

He was also getting attention from law

enforcement, praise from the police

whose intrays he was helping to empty,

and a feeling of purpose for the

first time in a life that had been

chaotic and cruel.

[Lucas] I've tried to show law
enforcement,

I've tried to teach 'em.

[Narrator] He had basically become a

celebrity, and every confession

only helped to grow his fame

and importance.

In this series, The Confession Killer,

you can see just how unreliable
this process was.

It's not just one interrogation
that stands

so much as the sheer mass of them,

which all show a cheerful Lucas

enjoying his chats with investigators.

Did he commit any of the crimes

attributed to him? Later in life,

after his wilder claims had come apart

under scrutiny, he was telling a
different story.

[Lucas] My mother, back in 1960,

that is the only murder I've ever
committed,

and I'm not positive I committed that.

[Narrator] The kind of 'ah-ha!' moments

that feature in fictional interrogations

rarely happen in real life, but sometimes,

real life gets close. Before 2012,

Steubenville, Ohio, was a normal
small town

with a typical American passion for

its high school football team.

After 2012, the word Steubenville meant

something very different. It
became a byword

for toxic masculinity and victim blaming

after a harrowing rape case became

a source of international outrage.

Documentary Roll, Red Roll,

tells the story of the investigation,
the prosecution,

and the public reaction, and
shines a light on the

misogyny and entitlement that contributed

to the crime. At a party that August,

a teenage girl, she's not named because of

laws to protect victims of
sexual violence,

was sexually assaulted by
multiple male students,

many with connection to the football team.

There wasn't any question that she
could have consented.

Witnesses confirmed that she was so drunk

that she had to be propped up,

and her assailants had bragged

about what they did to her in
graphic terms

on social media. But for
investigators, part

of the problem was establishing

exactly who had played what
part in the crime.

Over a series of interrogations,

they pieced the night together,

and in one dramatic scene,

they finally get one boy to describe how

a gang rape had been planned.

[Investigator] You said you're a
football player.

Fucking man up.

[Boy] I think they were talking about

training her. I...

[Investigator] Why do you believe they
were talking

about training her? What makes

you believe that?

[Boy] Because that's what
they were talking

about earlier in the night, like

when we were first leaving.

[Investigator] They were talking
about this

in the car?

[Boy] Yeah, like, going to Jake's house.

[Narrator] As a result of the
investigation,

two high school football players,

Ma'lik Richmond and Trent Mays,

were convicted of the rape of a minor,

while several adults, including a school

superintendent, were indicted
for obstructing

the course of justice. You can watch

all of these incredible interrogations

and Criminal season two on Netflix now.

Like this video if you enjoyed it,

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[Music]