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Eyewitness Identification

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New information added. Inconsistent information eliminated. 9. How Memory Does Work ... No one will standout based on the witnesses description. 36. 37 ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: Eyewitness Identification


1
Eyewitness Identification
  • Jeffrey S. Neuschatz, Ph.D.
  • Associate Professor
  • Department of Psychology
  • UA Huntsville
  • neuschaj_at_uah.edu

2
Voir Dire
  • Ph.D. Psychology, 1999, Binghamton University
  • Associate Professor at UA Huntsville
  • Over 14 Years of Research on Eyewitness Memory
  • Author of over 20 publications on psychology of
    eyewitness memory
  • Editorial Board of Law and Human Behavior
  • Expert witness in state and federal courts

3
Presentation Outline
  • Accuracy of Eyewitness Identification
  • How Memory Works
  • Assessing Identification Accuracy
  • Show-ups and Photoarray Procedures
  • Best Practices in Identification Tests
  • Role of the Expert Witness
  • Conclusions

4
Case Studies of Erroneous Conviction
  • Borchard (1932) 65 cases in 27 states and
    England main cause mistaken ID
  • Brandon Davies (1973) 70 cases of wrongful
    conviction due to inaccurate eyewitnesses
  • Huff (1977) 500 cases of erroneous conviction,
    eyewitness error in 60
  • Rattner (1988) 205 wrongfully convicted, 52 due
    to inaccurate eyewitness testimony

5
Innocence Project
  • 210 DNA Exonerations as of November, 2007
  • Eyewitness errors gt2/3
  • Eyewitness error remains the single most
    important cause of wrongful imprisonment
  • www.innocenceproject.org

6
Identification Accuracy Rates in Field Experiments
7
How Memory Does Not Work

?
8
How Memory Works
  • Storehouse vs. Correspondence
  • Information Processing
  • Encoding
  • Storage
  • Retrieval

9
How Memory Does Work
  • Fragments of information
  • Become integrated
  • Prior information
  • Expectations
  • Post event information
  • Memories not set in Concrete
  • Changes with time
  • New information added
  • Inconsistent information eliminated

10
How Memory Does Work
  • Circumstances in which memory is inaccurate
  • Encoding
  • Environment poor viewing conditions
  • State of the observer- stress, distraction
  • Storage
  • Retention Interval
  • Similar events
  • Retrieval
  • Biased tests
  • Leading questions

11
How We Know What We Know
  • Scientific Method
  • Crime Simulation Methodology
  • Perpetrator-Present and Absent Tests
  • Hundreds of Studies
  • Meta-Analyses

12
Simulation Methodology
  • Benefits
  • Control over Extraneous Factors
  • Repeated Observations
  • Knowing Right from Wrong
  • Establishing Causality
  • Drawbacks
  • Authenticity
  • Approximating Real Conditions
  • Stress
  • weapons

13
Encoding Factors The Big 5
  • Own-Race Bias (cross race identification)
  • Exposure Duration
  • Cues to Hair and Hairline
  • Appearance change
  • Extreme Stress
  • Weapon Focus

14
Own Race Bias
  • Meissner and Brigham (2001)
  • 31 separate studies
  • 91 separate experimental tests of ORB
  • 1.4 times more likely to correctly identify
    members of their own race
  • 1.56 times more likely to falsely identify
    members of other races than members of their own
    race
  • White participants demonstrated a significantly
    larger own-race bias when compared with Black
    participants but only with respect to false
    identifications

15
Own Race Bias
  • Platz and Hosch (2001)
  • Field Study
  • White, Black, Hispanic customers
  • White, Black, Hispanic convenience store clerks
  • 2-3 hours later given identification test
  • Results Own Race Bias for all races

16
Exposure Duration
  • longer and clearer viewing times lead to better
    memory and, therefore, enhanced identification
    accuracy

17
Appearance Change
  • Cutler and colleagues
  • witnesses watched videotaped crimes and later
    attempted lineup identifications.
  • perpetrator wore a cap or his head was uncovered
  • The average performance levels across the six
    studies (n 1,300 eyewitness identifications)
  • 57 correct when uncovered
  • 44 when a hat was worn

18
Importance of Hair and Hairline
19
Extreme Stress
  • Stress perception of the potential threat of
    injury or death to oneself or to another person
  • Laboratory
  • Violent versus non-violent videotaped crimes
  • Field Studies

20
Extreme Stress
  • Yerkes-Dodson Curve (inverted U)
  • Easterbrooks cue-utilization theory

21
Extreme Stress
  • Morgan et al. (2004)
  • extreme vs. mild stress
  • 530 active-duty military in survival school
  • high-stress interrogation
  • low-stress interrogation
  • correct identification rates
  • low-stress interrogation (62)
  • high stress condition (27)

22
Weapon Focus
  • Presence of a weapon
  • Focus on weapon
  • less attention to deploy for other information
  • Loftus, Loftus, and Messo (1987)
  • tracked direction and duration of eye movements
  • watched slides of a person
  • check or a weapon
  • Weapon looked longer and more often
  • Memories significantly worse in the weapon
    condition

23
Expert Agreement
24
Storage Factors
  • Passage of Time
  • Misleading Post-event Information
  • Co-Witness Information
  • Intervening Identification Tests
  • Post Identifications Feedback

25
Misleading Post event Information
26
Co-Witness Information
  • Luus Wells (1994)
  • Experiment 1
  • Co-witness
  • (Same, Different, No)
  • Results
  • Experiment 2
  • Videotape interrogations

27
Intervening Identification Tests
  • Re-showing picture
  • Repeatedly showing the lineup
  • Mugshots

28
Post Identification Feedback
  • Wells and Bradfield (1998)
  • Procedure
  • View an event
  • Target-absent lineup
  • PIF
  • Confirming (Good, you picked the suspect)
  • Disconfirming (The suspect was actually)
  • No Feedback
  • Results
  • Certainty
  • View
  • Attention
  • Willingness to testify

29
Witness Confidence
  • Reliability
  • confidence accuracy correlation .40 in the best
    circumstances
  • Malleability
  • Non-memorial Factor
  • Re-telling, postevent information, Feedback
  • Influence on Jurors

30
Reasons for Positive Identifications of Suspects
  • Correct Recognition ?
  • Guessing ?
  • Deduction ?
  • Process of elimination
  • Investigator Influence ?

31
Show-ups v. Photoarrays
  • Correct Recognition ?
  • Guessing ?
  • Deduction ?
  • Investigator Influence ?

32
Photoarray Factors
  • Instructions to the Eyewitness
  • Composing the Photoarray
  • Presenting the Photoarray
  • Eliminating Investigator Bias

33
Instructions to the Eyewitness
  • Whats wrong with this instruction?
  • Circle the number of the person who robbed you

34
Research on InstructionsSteblay, 1997, Law and
Human Behavior22 tests, 2588 witnesses
35
Composing the Photoarray
  • Having fillers is not enough
  • Suspect should not stand out
  • Match-to-Suspect Strategy
  • Ex. Eyewitness description
  • Tall, thin male, dark hair. moustache
  • Lineup members
  • Some short
  • Some light hair
  • Some clean shaven

36
Composing the Photoarray
  • Having Filler is not enough
  • Suspect should not stand out
  • Match-to-Suspect Strategy
  • Innocent suspect who matches the description of
    the offender will stand out
  • Match-to-Perpetrator Description Strategy
  • No one will standout based on the witnesses
    description

37
(No Transcript)
38
Presenting the Photoarray
  • Simultaneous
  • Relative judgment
  • Correct Recognition ?
  • Guessing ?
  • Deduction ?
  • Sequential
  • Absolute Judgment
  • Correct Recognition ?

39
Simultaneous Presentation
40
Sequential Presentation
41
Sequential Presentation
42
Sequential Presentation
43
Simultaneous vs. Sequential PresentationSteblay,
2001 30 tests, 4145 witnesses
44
Investigator Bias
  • Double-Blind
  • Multiple Lineup administrations
  • Garrioch Brimacombe, 2001
  • influence can occur even if the lineup
    administrator and the witness both indicate that
    there was no influence

45
Identification Procedure Reforms Completed or In
Progress
  • State of New Jersey
  • State of North Carolina
  • State of Illinois
  • State of Virginia
  • Suffolk County, MA (Boston)
  • Hennepin County, MN (Minneapolis)
  • Santa Clara County, CA
  • King County, WA (Seattle)
  • Suffolk County, MA
  • American Bar Association

46
NJ and NC Recommendations
  • Proper Admonitions
  • 6-8 Photos Minimum
  • Fillers Should Fit Description of Perpetrator not
    the appearance
  • Double-Blind
  • Sequential Presentation
  • No Post-Identification Feedback
  • Confidence Assessed Immediately

47
Benefits of Implementation
  • Less misidentification of innocent
  • Keep investigation on guilty
  • Misidentification guilty still at large
  • Assist jurors and judges
  • Mistaken identification still possible but not
    for procedural errors

48
Role of the Expert
  • Can not determine accuracy
  • Report on state of the science
  • Factors that increase eyewitness accuracy
  • Factors that decrease eyewitness accuracy

49
Implications for Practice
  • Assess Accuracy ?
  • Expose Relevant Eyewitness Factors ?
  • Expose Substandard Practices ?
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