json decodes text false code example
Example 1: php json_decode
$personJSON = '{"name":"Johny Carson","title":"CTO"}';
$person = json_decode($personJSON);
echo $person->name; // Johny Carson
Example 2: php json decoding as string incorrectly
//"[{\"name\": \"bill\", \"score\": 0.7948127388954163}, {\"name\": \"john\", \"score\": 0.782698392868042}]";
//for json in above format try this
$r=json_decode(stripcslashes(trim($response,'"')));