The Innocence Project, using DNA evidence, has gone back to past cases and exonerated innocent people when they were wrongly convicted. There may be many reasons that several people are wrongly convicted every year. However, there are 6 reasons deemed as the most important regarding wrongful convictions. These reasons are eyewitness misidentification, unvalidated or improper forensic science, false confessions or admissions, government misconduct, informants or snitches, and bad lawyering (understand the causes). Eyewitness misidentification is the most common cause of wrongful convictions in the United States, having a factor in almost 75% of wrongful convictions overturned by DNA testing (understand the causes). Some common causes of misidentification include knowledge of a different potential suspect, making a selection because the eyewitness thought the subject looked somewhat similar to the actual suspect, or the eyewitness was placed in poor conditions to make an identification (understand the causes). Two important variables that affect this decision are estimator variables, which cannot be controlled by the criminal justice system such as race or presence of weapons, and system variables, which can be controlled the criminal justice system, like fillers in a lineup or the instructions given to an eyewitness (understand the causes). Along with eyewitness identification, unreliable forensic science has been the cause of around 50% of wrongful convictions overturned by DNA testing (understand the causes). There are three factors that lead to unreliable or improper forensic science. They are the absence of scientific standards, improper forensic testimony, and forensic misconduct (understand the causes). The absence ... ... middle of paper ... ...dent by trial that Matthews was the victim (Travis Hayes). A confidence statement signed at the initial procedure would have shown that the eyewitness had the same misgivings about the description of the suspect matching Matthews that his lawyers had during the trial. Any of these reforms, if they had been done during Hayes’s and Matthews’s cases, could have prevented their wrongful convictions concerning the murder. Between interrogation reform and eyewitness reform, any change in the direction of validating what actually occurred or making sure information was presented in an unbiased manner would have shown great differences in what happened to these two men. These two individuals, wrongly convicted due to two of the six main faults in the process, are now part of 16 exonerated cases from the Innocence project that involved two people accused of a single crime.
Debated as one of the most misrepresented cases in American legal history, Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald still fights for innocence. Contrary to infallible evidence, prosecution intentionally withheld crucial information aiding MacDonald’s alibi. Such ratification included proof of an outside attack that would have played a major role in Jeffrey’s case.
The jury in trying to let the defendant go considered if there were any circumstances that would provide say as a self-defense claim to justify this horrific crime of murder of two people named Mr. Stephan Swan and Mr. Mathew Butler. Throughout the guilt/innocent phase, the jury believes not to have heard convincing evidence the victims were a threat to the defendant nor a sign the defendant was in fear for his life before he took the victims’ lives.
...lice or lawyers used their integrity. The police skirted around the law and use evidence that the witnesses said was not correct. They had a description of the suspect that did not match Bloodsworth but, they went after him as well. They also used eyewitness testimony that could have been contaminated.
For example, when the victims want to remember something, or someone, strongly and with high confidence, the witness can still be wrong. The eyewitness is given all the photos of the suspects laid out to identify the person they remember committing the crime. Also the eyewitness is asked to identify each photo whether is the culprit or not. Prosecutors should look over the cases before relying on eyewitness. Prosecutors should not depend on eyewitness testimony because that will lead to wrongful convictions. The wrongful convictions span the criminal justice system from investigation and arrest to prosecution and trail(Ferrero). False conviction makes the justice system stronger and arresting innocent is wrong. And picking out person similar to the murder. Not catching the real suspect might cause the public risky. Public safety be in risk."Wrongful conviction is gravest violation of personal liberty and also poses severe public safety risks, as the real perpetrator could remain on the street," an innocence Project news release said. The real suspect might kill many people or if the eyewitness might be in risk. If the victim is still life might be kill again. Lying about someone is not good thing might have miserable life in their future.
To demonstrate the issues that come about in eyewitness testimony, this paper will take a moment to examine R. v. Steven Murray Truscott. Truscott was being charged for the rape and murder of Lynne Harper. This case was fairly confusing as there were many eyewitnesses both for and against Truscott. Truscott claimed that Harper had asked him to give her a bike ride to the intersection of Country Road and Highway 8, where he dropped her off and left. On his way back he claimed to have stopped at a nearby bridge where he could see the intersection, and watched as Harper entered a grey car with a yellow license plate. Three separate witnesses actually claimed that they did in fact see Truscott around the road and bridge at the times he claimed
(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).
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
Wrongful convictions are a growing trend amongst the Criminal Justice system. Justice can never be served completely to the extent of the victim but starting off with a proper conviction is a start. Eyewitness misidentification is one of the main causes for wrongful convictions. We should focus more on identifying victims through reforms and procedures that could help narrow down the perpetrator. Without these solutions there are bound to be consequences. These consequences are posttraumatic stress and the inability to cope to normal society. We need to follow these steps in order to lower the rate of wrongful conviction. I truly believe wrongful conviction can be prevented.
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.
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
National Research Council. The Evaluation of Forensic DNA Evidence. Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1996.
Nelson, Kally J., et al. “Change Blindness Can Cause Mistaken Eyewitness Identification.” Legal and Criminological Psychology 16.1 (2011): 62-74. Wiley Online Library. The British Psychological Society, 17 Jan. 2011. Web. 27 Oct. 2011.
Criminal Law declares what conduct is illegal and proscribes a penalty. Although, we rely on our court system to administer justice, sometimes the innocent are convicted (Risinger). Most people would not be able to imagine a person who is convicted of a crime as innocent, sometimes that is the case. Imagine what a variance that is: an innocent criminal. In an article by Radley Balko he asks the question, “How many more are innocent?” In his article, he questions America’s 250th DNA exoneration and states that it raises questions about how often we send the wrong person to prison. The other issue that follows is the means of appealing the court’s decision and who they can turn to for help.
Other causes of wrongful convictions. Besides eyewitness misidentification and false testimony, there are two other major causes of wrongful convictions: improper science and informants. The problem with scientific evidence is that it is not always reliable; even scientific techniques that have been subjected to more empirically rigorous testing can be faulty if presented in the wrong way.
Advances in Science and Genetic Research have significantly impacted the criminal justice system. With the development of programs aimed at utilizing biological or genetic samples collected from potential suspects of a crime, investigators are able to compare the samples against samples collected from the crime scene. One of the most widely-known programs, the Combined Deoxyribonucleic Acid Index System (CODIS), was developed as a law enforcement resource to compare new samples of Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA) against the registered DNA samples of “convicted offenders, unsolved crime scene evidence, and missing persons across local, State, and national databases” (Office of Justice Programs, 2011). Scientific and government research identifies the program’s efficacy is a result of the increasing number of criminal case closures from cross-referencing suspect DNA samples against samples in the DNA database. Alternately, there is equal concern for the efficiency and effectiveness of utilizing the CODIS program in criminal investigations, based on the overwhelming backlog of collected and unregistered samples.