How Reliable is Eyewitness Identification?
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Over the past decade there have been considerable articles and studies on the poor reliability of eyewitness identifications
Record numbers of DNA exonerations have forced our criminal justice system to question eyewitness reliability. With exonerations now approaching 200 per year, the top contributing factors to wrongful convictions are eyewitness misidentifications and false confessions
Now consider Mark and Donna Hobbs claimed at trial to somehow have crystal clear identification of John Boyd Frazier:
- from a distance of over 20 feet
- for only a few seconds
- at night
- 2 weeks later (The photo lineup was shown 2 weeks after the June 9th incident.)
Factoring in all the above with the current scientific knowledge of the unreliability of eyewitnesses, it’s impossible for the Hobbs’ to be absolutely certain who they saw on the beach, at night, for a few seconds, at over 20 feet away, 2 weeks previous. It should be noted that Mark and Donna Hobbs were paid $10,000 reward money apiece, $20,000 total, by the Poole family after their ‘identification’ but prior to trial. We believe this payment before trial was inappropriate, unethical and purposefully unlawful (witness tampering) interference to cement their cooperation for the trial by the Poole family. This was just one of many times the Poole family would interfere to improperly influence witnesses and the police investigation.
We believe Mark and Donna Hobbs’ eyewitness identification of John Boyd Frazier as the man they saw on the beach the night of the robbery and shooting, to be unreliable at best and perjurious testimony at worst (influenced by witness tampering by the Pooles, and by police and prosecution coercion). During Frazier’s retrial, this eyewitness testimony was the key factor for his conviction.
In case after case, DNA has proven that eyewitness identification is frequently inaccurate. In the wrongful convictions where eyewitness misidentification played a role, the circumstances varied substantially.
Jennifer was a 22-year-old college student in Burlington, North Carolina. A man broke into her home, held a knife to her throat, and raped her. During the attack, Jennifer kept her eyes open. She studied her assailant’s face and body, trying to memorize every mark, every scar, his height, his weight, the color of his eyes, anything that would help her identify the man and put him away. When she went down to the police station that same day, she picked Ronald Cotton from a photo. Later, she picked him out of a lineup.
“I believe that people who express with such confidence that they will never forget that face, I believe that they believe that. So I don’t think that they are lying. A lie is when you say something that’s not true on purpose. I think they’re mistaken and now I think it’s far more common than people let on that there are mistaken,” Campbell said. So, even though you say it’s a face you’ll never forget – you may have forgotten within seconds of seeing it.
“It’s the single greatest cause of the conviction of the innocent,” says attorney Barry Scheck, founder of The Innocence Project. For years, the image of a witness bravely pointing out the perpetrator has been a mainstay of courtroom drama, and eyewitness accounts have been considered the gold standard of evidence. Research, though, has raised questions about the reliability of such testimony.
“This was a prosecution that stood or fell by eyewitness identification alone,” said Lord Gill, the lord justice-clerk at Mills’s appeal. “That is a form of proof that has been shown to be, in some cases, a dangerous basis for a prosecution.”
A growing body of evidence points to serious problems with eyewitness identification procedures. In fact, mistaken eyewitness testimony is the single biggest contributor to wrongful convictions.
Where a prosecution depends on eyewitness identification, the risk of a miscarriage of justice due to mistaken recognition is well-known. Worldwide, the statistics are alarming.
A bill creating a uniform procedure for law enforcement agencies when it comes to conducting eyewitness interviews is on its way to the House floor. In hopes of reducing wrongful prosecutions, Rep. Gayle Harrell (R-Stuart) says her bill seeks to improve Florida’s system of eyewitness identification.