Eyewitness Misidentification
Under state law, perjury is defined as knowingly giving a false statement before a court of law, after taking an oath. However, what happens when an eyewitness unknowingly presents false information during trial? By law, this is legal and according to the Innocence Project, 73% of overturned convictions due to DNA testing were based on false eyewitness accounts. False eyewitness accounts are caused by a variety of effects related to memory distortion/manipulation; one of the most common being the misidentification effect. Nevertheless, there are precautionary measures that can be taken in order to preserve eyewitness memory and improve eyewitness identification all together.
With attention to discussing the solutions
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For starters, misidentification is caused by a vague sense of familiarity that creates source confusion. Source confusion can be considered as misattributing where a source of memory came from. For example, let’s say a local news channel showed footage of the county fair on television and you happened to be watching the coverage. Later that month, you recall going to the fair, riding on the Ferris wheel while munching on some cotton candy. Despite your confidence of attending the event, and your vivid recollection of it, you never actually attended the fair. Instead, what you claimed had happened was really just the coverage of the fair that you previously saw on TV. In regards to real-life situations, there are hundreds of cases where misidentification has led to wrongful convictions, only to be exonerated by DNA testing several years later. In a Ted Talk lead by psychologist Elizabeth Loftus, she mentions Steve Titus, one of many victims of the misidentification effect. One night, while he was driving, he was pulled over by a police …show more content…
When presented with a lineup, a witness automatically assumes that the offender is in the lineup, similar to when taking a test. As humans, when we are presented with a question and a list of possible answers, we automatically assume that one of them is the correct one. It never occurs to us that they could all be wrong, unless one answer says “none of the above”. If the victim had been told that it could be “none of the above” she would’ve taken her time, examined each possible answer, crossed off the ones she knew were wrong, and would have come to realize that none of the men in the lineup was her actual rapist. This guideline goes hand in hand with cautioning against guessing because it ensures the witness’ accuracy. After all, why guess if there may not even be an answer? In effect, the victim would have never chosen Steve Titus, because even though he may have been the “closest” answer, she still would’ve been wrong since the culprit was never present in the lineup, therefor there was no need for her to pick any answer despite how close it was. Aside from cautioning a witness against guessing and informing them that the offender may or may not be present in the lineup, measures can also be taken to improve the quality of the lineup
In the magic of the mind author Dr. Elizabeth loftus explains how a witness’s perception of an accident or crime is not always correct because people's memories are often imperfect. “Are we aware of our minds distortions of our past experiences? In most cases, the answer is no.” our minds can change the way we remember what we have seen or heard without realizing it uncertain witnesses “often identify the person who best matches recollection
... the stress and depression they may be facing after viewing a crime. When an eyewitness is facing depressing they tend to have high stress levels and to tend to get damaged brain cells these are some of the factors that can cause such disruption and therefore source error can occur. Another issue that may interfere with an eyewitness' memory is retroactive interference. This usually occurs when new information is processed that obstructs the retrieval of old information. [Retroactive Interference Defined, 2014]. The most common source of interference that can occur after the event of a crime is the reporting of the crime. Police investigations include leading questioning that is often suggestive, which can cause confusing to the eyewitness. The processing of new information may disrupt or entirely replace old information. [Rawlings, Maren Skouteris, Helen, 2004.]
This paper will consider eye witness testimony and its place in convicting accused criminals. Psychology online (2013) defines “eye witness testimony” as a statement from a person who has witnessed a crime, and is capable of communicating what they have seen, to a court of law under oath. Eye witness testimonies are used to convict accused criminals due to the first hand nature of the eye witnesses’ observations. There are however many faults within this system of identification. Characteristics of the crime is the first issue that will be discussed in this paper, and the flaws that have been identified. The second issue to be discussed will be the stress impact and the inability to correctly identify the accused in a violent or weapon focused crime. The third issue to be discussed is inter racial identification and the problems faced when this becomes a prominent issue. The fourth issue will be time lapse, meaning, the time between the crime and the eye witness making a statement and how the memory can be misconstrued in this time frame. To follow this will be the issue of how much trust jurors-who have no legal training-put on to the eye witness testimony, which may be faltered. This paper references the works of primarily Wells and Olsen (2003) and Rodin (1987) and Schmechel et al. (2006) it will be argued that eye witness testimony is not always accurate, due to many features; inter racial identification, characteristics of the crime, response latency, and line up procedures therefore this paper will confirm that eyewitness testimonies should not be utilised in the criminal ju...
What Psychological Research Has Told Us about the Accuracy of Eyewitness Testimony L and P = Loftus and Palmer Pps = Participants EWT = Eyewitness testimony Despite the considerable importance juror’s place on EWT, psychological research has shown that EWT tends to be unreliable. This unreliability can be explained in terms of the reconstructive nature of memory (schema theory).
Eyewitness misidentification cost innocent people to end up in prison. Eyewitness misidentification is the single greatest cause of wrongful convictions in the United States, having played a role in more than 70% of original convictions later overturned by new DNA evidence(Dunn). This explains eyewitness misidentification is not a reliable solution to prison the suspect and deal with other solution. The suspect is effected because the suspect goes through terrible life for crime they did not commit and false witness hunts
(Kennedy & Haygood, 1992; Williams & Loftus, 1994), which is worrying considering the growing and substantial body of evidence from laboratory studies, field studies, and the criminal justice system supporting the conclusion that eyewitnesses frequently make mistakes (Cutler & Penrod, 1995; Huff, 1987; Huff, Rattner, & Sagarin, 1986; Innocence Project, 2009; Wells, Small, Penrod, Malpass, Fulero, & Brimacombe, 1998). According to a number of studies, eyewitness misidentifications are the most common cause of wrongful convictions (Huff, Rattner, & Sagarin, 1986; Wells et al., 1998; Yarmey, 2003) and, through the use of forensic DNA testing, have been found to account for more convictions of innocent individuals than all other factors combined (Innocence Project, 2009; Wells, Memon, & Penrod, 2006).
During the identification and prosecution of a suspect, eyewitnesses are the most important. Eyewitness testimony needs to be reliable as it can have serious implications to the perceived guilt or innocence of a defendant. Unfortunately, the reliability of eyewitness testimony is questionable because there is a high number of eyewitness misidentification. Rattner (1988) studied 205 cases and concluded that eyewitness misidentification was the factor most often associated with wrongful conviction (52%). Eyewitness testimony can be affected by many factors. A substantial literature demonstrates own group biases in eyewitness testimony. For example, the own-race bias, in which people are better at recognizing faces of their own race versus another
There has been considerable debate worldwide, regarding the accuracy of eyewitness testimony in the criminal justice system. Particularly, arguments have surrounded wrongful convictions that have resulted from incorrect eyewitness evidence (Areh, 2011; Howitt, 2012; Nelson, Laney, Bowman-Fowler, Knowles, Davis & Loftus, 2011). The purpose of this essay is to consider psychological research about the accuracy of eyewitness testimony and its placement in the criminal justice system. Firstly, this essay will define how eyewitnesses and their testimonies are used within the criminal justice system and the current debate surrounding its usage. Secondly, the impact of post-identification feedback will be used to show the affect on the confidence of a witness. Thirdly, studies around gender related differences will show how a witnesses gender can affect memory recall and accuracy. Fourthly, empirical studies will be used to highlight how a psychological experience called change blindness can cause mistakes in eyewitness identification. Finally, the effect of cross-examination will be used to explore the impact on eyewitness accuracy. It will be argued, that eyewitness testimony is not accurate and highly subjective, therefore, the criminal justice system must reduce the impact that eyewitness testimony is allowed to have. Developing better policies and procedures to avoid wrongful convictions by misled judges and jury members can do this.
The justice system depends on eyewitness evidence to convict offenders. Eyewitness is a difficult task to achieve in the justice system. According to Wise, Dauphinais, & Safer (2007), in 2002 one million offenders were convicted as felons in America. Out of those one million offenders, 5000 of them were innocent in 2002 (Dauphinais, 2007). The Ohio Criminal Justice survey states that 1 out of 200 felony criminal cases is a wrongful conviction (Dauphinais et al., 2007). According to Dauphinais et al., (2007), Dripps said that eyewitness error is a huge factor in cases of wrong convictions. A study conducted in 1987 indicated that in roughly 80,000 criminal cases, eyewitness error was the only sole evidence against the defendant
In the court of law, eyewitnesses are expected to present evidence based upon information they acquired visually. However, due to memory processing, presenting this information accurately is not always possible. This paper will discuss the reliability of eyewitness testimony, its use in a relevant court case, and how the reasonable person standard relates to eyewitness testimony.
Memory has several flaws which affect reliability a person only remembers what they wish to remember we have short term memory and long term most is only remembered for a roughly 15 to 20 seconds or brain store things differently in different places. Remembering a face that is not as clear as one actually viewed, the human mind has a tendency for memories to be constructed so that missing information is supplied from our past or outside sources TV is a big one that makes faulty memories of human beings. Newspaper something we read could be triggered at the time. Other witnesses the person may have heard talking or describing could alter the mind. The human mind uses other from memories to interpret information and can distort the memory of the situation in memory. Even colors are remembered as brighter than they truly are. Maybe eyewitness can get right do you think? How about the criminal procedures they cannot be wrong or could
Another factor associated with wrongful convictions is eyewitness misidentification. The Innocence Project identifies eyewitness misidentification as the single most important factor leading to wrongful convictions. Eyewitness misidentification is often an error due to witnesses being under high pressure, witnesses focusing on the weapon more than the offender, and police procedures when receiving an identification statement from a victim. A study
Eyewitness identification and testimony play a huge role in the criminal justice system today, but skepticism of eyewitnesses has been growing. Forensic evidence has been used to undermine the reliability of eyewitness testimony, and the leading cause of false convictions in the United States is due to misidentifications by eyewitnesses. The role of eyewitness testimony in producing false confessions and the factors that contribute to the unreliability of these eyewitness testimonies are sending innocent people to prison, and changes are being made in order to reform these faulty identification procedures.
This is exactly what happened to the wife of Bennett Barbour, when Bennett was 22-years-old he was accused of the rape of two women that were sexually assaulted at gunpoint on February 7, 1978. The victims described their attacker as a man who was 5’6” tall and 145 pounds. Within a week one of the victims picked Bennett out of a photo array and two live lineups. All three times the victim chose Bennett. At the time, Bennett was 115 pounds and he had suffered from a brittle-bone disease and had a pin in his elbow which would have made it difficult for him to commit the rape. There were hair and semen found at the scene that didn’t belong to Bennett, which proved his innocence, yet he was still arrested for the crime. Unfortunately, the eyewitness testimony trumped all the evidence that supported the fact that he was not the attacker. Regardless of all the evidence and the alibi he had provided he was convicted of the crime and sentenced to 10 years in prisons. However, Bennett served 35 years in prison and was not released from prison until May 24, 2012, when he was cleared of the rape.
Eyewitness testimony is especially vulnerable to error when the question is misleading or when there’s a difference in ethnicity. However, using an eyewitness as a source of evidence can be risky and is rarely 100% accurate. This can be proven by the theory of the possibility of false memory formation and the question of whether or not a memory can lie. For instance, a group of students saw the face of a young man with straight hair, then heard a description of the face supposedly written by another witness, one that wrongly mentioned light, curly hair. When they reconstructed the face using a kit of facial features, a third of their reconstructions contained the misleading detail, whereas only 5 percent contained it when curly hair was not mentioned (Page 359). This situation shows how misleading information from other sources can be profoundly altered.