Expert witnesses are often instructed in cases where expert evidence is necessary to enable the court to understand specific issues, such as capacity, intent, causation etc. Videotaping allows for review of eyewitness testimony later on in the trial if the reliability of eyewitness testimony is called into question. Laura Smalarz does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment. This decision attracted intense media attention and was seen to be a controversial decision due to the nature and severity of his offences. Arizona State University provides funding as a member of The Conversation US. No comments have so far been submitted. The variables include: viewing conditions (lighting-distance-duration), distracting stimuli (weapons-loud noises) and internal states of the observer (attention-motivation-skill-prejudice). It is important to strive to continue to conduct social science research on the nature of eyewitness and the efficacy of potential reforms like the ones above in order to create effective safeguards against unreliable eyewitness testimony. circuit court, the 29-year-old was convicted of a rape that he did not commit and was sentenced to five life sentences. She was sentenced to life in prison. Sally Challens appeal demonstrated the importance of expert evidence in establishing the correct outcome for a mentally disordered offender. Another stated that the killers face was burned into [her] memory immediately.. Not only do such statements inflate eyewitnesses confidence in the accuracy of their identification, but they lead them to falsely remember having been that confident all along. Police in some California counties use some of the methods recommended by the New Jersey court and by the California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice. I believe the remaining 25 states should act swiftly to prevent additional miscarriages of justice. His subsequent return to business raised further questions about the evidence that led to his early release. But theyve hit a snag. Thus, Chester was charged with three separate felonies as a way to overwhelm him and break him down. The lineup photo from one of these lineups shows how suggestive it was: The other four men in the lineup were much older and bigger than Chester. It should be revived and approved. Today, he remains in prison. 6 Wells, Memon, Penrod, Eyewitness Evidence: Improving Its Probative Value, Psychological Science in the Public Interest, (2006). Marilyn Stowe instructed a pathologist to review the medical notes of both infants. The chance of a lifetime: Five friends ski the tallest mountain in Los Angeles, Shocking, impossible gas bills push restaurants to the brink of closures, Best coffee city in the world? Some elements include the following: First, and most important of all, because the test itself contaminates memory, only the initial memory test provides uncontaminated results. But in 57 percent of those cases, it was possible to determine what happened on the initial (uncontaminated) memory test. The psychiatrist formed an opinion of her mental state at the time of the homicide. Speak to our experts today for advice. 4 Defffenbacher, et al. In Winona, Mississippi on July 16, 1996, four people were shot and killed at Tardy furniture store. Consider, for example, the case of Gary Leiterman, who, in 2005, was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison following a cold case investigation in which his DNA was found on the clothing of a woman named Jane Mixer, who was murdered in 1969. He was sentenced to 30 months in prison. By itself, that fact only shows that contaminated memory is unreliable (just as contaminated DNA evidence is). Assistant Professor of Psychology, Arizona State University. In about 70% of these cases, misidentification by one or more eyewitnesses contributed significantly as evidence for conviction.3, Eyewitness Testimony: General Social Science Findings, Throughout history, eyewitness testimony was held up as the golden nugget of evidence. COVID origins? Neighbors told arriving firefighters that they had heard a thunderous crash at about the same time as the blaze is believed to have begun. In recent years, more and more jurisdictions have come to accept expert testimony on the reliability of eyewitness identification. In 1932, Yale University law professor Edwin M. Borchard documented nearly seventy cases of miscarriage of justice caused by eyewitness errors in his book, Convicting the Innocent. The parole board initially approved him for release. 26 The Innocence Project, DNA Exoneree Case Profiles,. The involvement of expert witnesses in famous expert witness cases often leads to changes in how expert evidence is formulated and the effect it may have on the outcome of the proceedings. So are The Conversations authors and editors. During Wednesday's interview with CNN, Amirabdollahian accused western media outlets of encouraging violent protests in his country. But. Law enforcement officers, prosecutors, attorneys, and jurors need to realize that just because a witness says so does not make it so. 25 A. G. Goldstein, J. E. Chance, and G. R. Schneller, Frequency of Eyewitness Identification in Criminal Cases: A Survey of Prosecutors, 27(1) Bulletin of the Psychonomic Society: 71, 73 (January 1989). Assessing confidence is critical because it provides direct information about the trustworthiness of the uncontaminated ID. Compared to administrators conducting double-blind lineups, these informed administrators are more likely to ask witnesses about the suspect and smile when witnesses are looking at the suspect rather than at another person in the lineup. Given the prevalence and impact eyewitness testimony can have within a criminal case, it is important to take steps to make it a more reliable practice. But a closer examination of those witnesses testimonies reveals a few disconcerting factors: the earliest testimony from a witness came a month after the murders, and other testimony came nine, twelve months later. He did it and was fortunate not to be sentenced to death in that era. Alex Murdaugh's defense attorneys will deliver their closing arguments in his murder trial on Thursday as they seek to raise reasonable doubt about whether he killed his wife and son in 2021. According to the prosecution on the day of the murder, at around 7 am, Flowers walked from his home on the West side of town all the way to a sewing factory parking lot on the East side of town, crossing Highway 51, one of the towns largest streets, while doing so. In one of the earliest studies of this misinformation effect run by Elizabeth Loftus, subjects were shown a slideshow of a red car passing a stop sign and hitting a pedestrian. This allows jurors to make more informed decisions while evaluating particular eyewitness testimony. Opinion: Why does Mexicos president want to dismantle the democratic system that elected him? Published: 00:56 EST, 2 March 2023 | Updated: 01:01 EST, 2 March 2023. First, another DNA profileone belonging to John Ruelas, who was just a four-year-old preschooler at the time of the murderwas found on a blood spot taken from the victims left hand. They are child killers.'. His offences led to him being named the black cab rapist by the UK press. This helps to safeguard against overly eager police officers who might implicitly encourage eyewitnesses (with tone of voice, body language, etc.) In addition to implementing double-blind lineup procedures, its essential that lineup administrators document eyewitnesses confidence immediately following an identification. Even though no connection between Leiterman and Ruelas was ever established, the prosecution theorized that all three must have been together after midnight at the murder scene in 1969, with the preschooler bleeding on the victim for some unknown reason while Leiterman killed her. After . Renowned Expert witnesses include doctors, psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, and other professionals who are instructed to give expert opinions in legal proceedings. It is not uncommon for the Parole Board to instruct expert evidence from psychiatrists and psychologists. Noxious fumes wafted into their classrooms, causing some to need hospital treatment after complaining of headaches, heart palpitations, lethargy and being unable to move. Using eyewitnesses to identify a suspect as the perpetrator to the crime is a form of direct testimonial evidence that is used for forensic purposes. Additional Reading: Truth, Lies and Police Lineups, The Crime Report, May 5, 2021. In the sad case of the 1960 Starved Rock murders, there were EIGHT confessions by Chester Weger made to different people at different times, including a re-enactment of the crime at the scene covered by more than a dozen reporters/photographers. Despite the frequency of use, we have been confronted as a country with many incredible failures of eyewitness testimony such as misidentifications that led to convictions and sentences of people who were later discovered innocent.1 Science has played no small role: post-conviction DNA profiling made possible by the development of the polymerase chain reaction, which enables amplification of crime-scene DNA to quantities sufficient for forensic analysis have meant that DNA identification is becoming increasingly used even in cases where it was previously not viable: those where we have smaller samples.2 As of now, almost 350 people, many serving long prison sentences, have been exonerated because their own DNA was discovered to be incompatible with evidence long ago collected from the crime scene. Expert evidence may be important in determining the right outcome. 14 Manson, 432 U.S. 98, 12526 (Marshall, J., dissenting). My Blog cases where eyewitnesses were right. There, the prosecution claims that Flowers killed the people inside Tardys, stole money from the stole, and then went back home, stopping to buy chips and beer at a convenience store on Highway 51 on the way. Officers of the law should be instructed by their superiors about the potential inaccuracies and dangers of witness testimony. or debate this issue live on our message boards. Another way is through the misinformation effect, where something occurs between the event and the reporting of the event to muddy or confuse the witness. 15 Perry v. New Hampshire, 565 U.S. 228, 248 (2012). Overall, an issue plaguing both courts and law enforcement is the lack of standard procedures to safeguard defendants against unreliable eyewitness testimony. As an experimental psychologist who conducts research on eyewitness identification, Ive seen hundreds of examples of highly confident yet mistaken eyewitnesses both in the laboratory and in actual court cases. Recently, up to 400 female pupils from around 30 schools were subjected to poisoning attacks in what is believed to be an attempt to stop them getting an education. Eyewitness misidentifications are known to have played a role in 70 percent of the 349 wrongful convictions that have been overturned based on DNA evidence (so far). Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Advertise to our national and international criminal justice audience at The Crime Report and support our mission. Mr. Compiled by Ann Njarara, Bree Peilen, Daniel Neuman, Emory Cook, Linda Lin, and Perrin Lowrey, Introduction Because she had already servednine years and four months of her initial life sentence, she was released following the change of conviction. 109, 10910 (2006). Knowledge awaits. Police officers should avoid leading questioning while interviewing potential eyewitnesses, since eyewitnesses might be eager to say what they think will help the investigation, rather than the unblemished version of their memory. Miller was placed in a lineup and one of the parking lot attendants positively identified Miller; the other parking lot attendant tentatively identified him. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. A letter by UN Watch - a Geneva-based organization monitoring activities of the UN - urged all 193 members to leave the meeting. The NRC found that police officers and detectives are frequently uninformed of what the best practices concerning gathering eyewitness testimony are. Standardized instructions regarding best practices should be given, including such tips as the importance of minimizing contact between witnesses at the scene, and how gathering eyewitness testimony as early as possible tends to increase its accuracy. Type above and press Enter to search. The prosecution then claims that Flowers then walked again from his house to Tardy Furniture to commit the murder, passing an auto body shop and a drycleaner on the way, as well as Highway 51. They were then asked a leading question about how fast the car was going when it passed the yield sign. This opinion differed from the opinions formed by the other professionals, who concluded that John Worboys should remain in prison. Expert witness evidence is not needed in all legal proceedings but it plays an important part in many cases. Years later, in 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court highlighted the danger of erroneous eyewitness identification in United States v. Wade, stating, The vagaries of eyewitness identification are well-known; the annals of criminal law are rife with instances of mistaken identification.23 The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) estimates that U.S. law enforcement made 12,196,959 arrests in 2012. Last updated: 27 February 2023. A witness may mistakenly identify a criminal suspect. However, there has yet to be research showing what ideal instructions would look like, as each case involving eyewitness testimony varies from each other. Finally, almost a year later, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals declared Grant actually innocent on May 19, 2021. After his conviction at Croydon Crown Court, several more women made allegations of sexual assault against him. Why are we still having these debates? The testimony of an eyewitness could make up for many shortcomings in a case, such as the lack of any actual physical evidence. Continue reading with a Scientific American subscription. The ability of a person who witnesses a crime to later pick the perpetrator out of a lineup is atrociousright? 10 Manson v. Brathwaite, 432 U.S. 98, 114 (1977). Letters to the Editor: Yes, L.A. drivers are getting worse. But there is more to the story. 'And that's why peaceful protests ended up becoming violent - because of the foreign intervention. Her defence had argued that the children had died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), but expert witness, Sir Professor Roy Meadow, told the court that the probability of two children from an affluent family suffering SIDS was 1 in 73 million. Thanks to the work of the Innocence Project of Texas, new DNA testing on biological material collected from underneath the victims fingernails cleared Grant and implicated another man, Jermarico Carter, who police said confessed to the killing. Medicolegal court reports are requested where expert witness evidence is required. Women in Iran have all the necessary required freedoms within the framework of the law, he claims, but says our interview is a confrontation: This is not the way to conduct an interview. pic.twitter.com/XKkC5uWYyj, Iranian foreign minister Hossein Amirabdollahian smiled as he chastised CNN host Christiane Amanpour, telling her 'this is not the way to conduct an interview', CNN host Amanpour laid into the Iranian foreign minister over his country's record on women's rights. Wegers attorneys, Celeste Stack and I, continue to seek to prove Chesters innocence and are seeking to review and analyze the physical evidence and are working to be able to conduct forensic testing on some of that evidence. To do this, proper testing protocols that reduce chances of contamination need to be followed. A new version of that legislation, AB 308, is pending in the state Senate, though passage in this session is unlikely. Some courts have held it as an abuse of discretion for a trial judge to bar the defense from admitting expert testimony on eyewitness identification. Why not be the first to send us your thoughts, the time between the crime and the identification procedure. (Sometimes there is an issue of racial bias connected with eyewitness misidentification, but this was not a factor as the parking lot attendants were also African American.). There, the prosecution claims that Flowers stole Doyle Simpsons gun from the glove compartment of Doyles unlocked car and then walked back to his home on the West side of town. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? The psychiatrist found that she had an adjustment disorder at the time she killed her husband, enabling her solicitors to challenge her conviction for murder. , May 5, 2021 01:01 EST, 2 March 2023 attracted intense media attention and seen... 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