Could Heuermann's Confession Get Thrown Out?

**Tony Brueski** (0:01)
This is Hidden Killers Live with Tony Brueski and Robin Drake.

**Robin Drake** (0:08)
Still in the same case, we're still talking about the Heuermann case and the family sessions. The therapist who heard Rex Heuermann confess to eight murders and help facilitate those family meetings is now a defendant herself. The Peacock documentary put those raw sessions on camera. Now the woman at the center of them faces prison time for practicing without a license. Eric Faddis walks us through whether this creates any legal openings for Heuermann, potential challenges to the plea, or fallout for Assa and Victoria's public statements.
So with that, kind of diving back in on this, Heuermann confessed to his ex-wife and daughter during sessions involving Winter. If she wasn't legally qualified to be there, could that confession of those family statements be attacked in a future proceeding? We kind of covered this in the last segment, but let's do another little deep dive on that and any other nuances you've thought of.

**Eric Faddis** (0:53)
I see Heuermann's attorneys looking at this and saying, he pled guilty in large part because he gave a confession. At that juncture, he knew, man, it's lights out, it's over, I've told people this stuff. There might be some kind of privilege or protections, but I'm worried this is going to get out.
They're going to subpoena my wife and my daughter, and this is going to be a huge problem for my family. That's the reason I'm going to go ahead and plead guilty.
If that reason is then taken out from under them because that confession was elicited in a fraudulent and deceptive fashion, does that undercut the motivations behind entering a plea? And does that change in those circumstances and motivations underlying that plea entitle a defendant to say, hey, I wouldn't have done this otherwise. I wouldn't have pled guilty if this confession wasn't wrung out of me in some sort of conned fashion by this conned woman. That could be an argument we see on appeal. I'm not sure how successful it will be, but that would be a creative avenue. Yeah.

**Robin Drake** (2:14)
I'm also curious, Eric. Now that she wasn't licensed during all these sessions, does HIPAA still kick in for her? In other words, is there any privileged information anymore from any of these conversations? In other words, can all these things be opened up now to scrutiny because she wasn't a practicing clinician? I mean, it's really interesting, is it? Or can he claim some sort of thing against her for that?

**Eric Faddis** (2:41)
You know, Robin, let's say that, let's say Todd goes to somebody whom he believes is an attorney, and Todd confesses to all the horrible stuff he's done over his life.

**Robin Drake** (2:54)
Bad Todd.

**Eric Faddis** (2:55)
I'm kidding.
He wouldn't have anything to confess. He's a saint. But let's hypothetically say he did. And then it turns out the person to whom he was speaking is just some Joe Schmo off the street. It's not an attorney. So typically when you confide in an attorney, when you give secrets to an attorney, that's protected. There's confidentiality and there's a privilege, meaning the attorney can't testify against you. But if that individual is not an actual attorney, does that privilege apply? Does that confidentiality apply? You know, the policy reasons behind that privilege would indicate yes. The policy reasons are we want folks to be able to confide in these professionals for their own, sometimes their own legal protection, sometimes for their own recovery from whatever issues they're contending with.
And that person would have the same expectations regardless of whether the individual to whom they were confiding was an actual licensed whatever. But with the law, let's see it that way. I haven't seen such a case come up. I wouldn't be surprised though if it did come up, if a judge said, hey, we're giving you the privilege and the confidentiality anyway, because you expected that this person was legit. They weren't, that's not your fault, bro.

**Robin Drake** (4:06)
So no lemon law like buyer beware of the unlicensed clinician that made her way in.

**Eric Faddis** (4:12)
Yeah, I don't think, I don't think it's like, you have to confirm the credentials and their active status of a person in whom you're confiding before that privilege and confidentiality protections can apply. I don't think that that burden is on the individual going to some professional for help.

**Robin Drake** (4:32)
So, that burden of providing credentials and verifying credentials, that falls on the jail? I mean, who's that fall on?

**Eric Faddis** (4:41)
Yeah, it falls in part on the state, and they have determined that no such credentials existed according to them. And so, they brought criminal charges. In terms of allowing the visits, allowing these things to happen, I'm not sure that the burden squarely falls upon anyone. I think it's just sort of a fluid situation in which there might be shifting responsibility among multiple parties to varying degrees.