Eyewitness testimony

The Expert Witness How accepted Is witness deposition On the 28th of September 1 999, a building society in West corny was robbed by a man brandishing a gun. He had approached the cashier desk and pushed aside a customer and thus produced a gun. He ordered the three customers in the bank to lie on the floor. He hence(prenominal) pointed the gun in the face of the cashier and told her to fill the bag with m unriv wholeedy. In doing so, she managed to raise the silent alarm alerting the police. afterwards her compliance, the robber instructed her to in addition lie on the floor behind the desk.He warned the customers not to take to the woods before shooting his gun at the ceiling and running out. The four witnesses were then Interviewed as a throng by police at the scene of the crime. The premiere Interview revealed m either Inconsistencies In the descriptions of the culprit and in any case the chain of events. either witnesses had described a white male In his ass wit h a local anaesthetic accent. The group was split 22 on the robbers hair color, two mentation nordice and the others thought it was brown. The witnesses were then taken to the police station and interviewed separately.All four had now given statements eying the robber had blond hair. A lot less inconsistencies were found when the witnesses were interviewed for the second date. A third interview was conducted a a couple of(prenominal) weeks later to see if any more details had been telephoneed of the crime. A photo was in addition shown to the witnesses to see if they could actualize that he was the man they remembered from the robbery. Again the group were split, two thought It could be him and the other two were unsure. All four witnesses a few months after, had taken part In a line up In which they all picked out the same man as the robber In the bank.The man they Identified cancelled out to by the same man from the photo they were shown previously prior to the line-up . The man they identified was mob Taylor. mob Taylor is a 33 year old with one previous execration for robbing a cherubic shop when he was 18. He spent 18 months in prison for this crime and hasnt been in any trouble since. He became a suspect when an anonymous tip came in from a man with a local accent full-grown them Sesames name. Taylor had said he had been in Yellowhammers at the time exclusively could not supply any witnesses to confirm his alibi.The case went to trial before a Jury which was drawn from the local area. There was no forensic evidence lining Taylor to the crime scene but the prosecution argued he was a local man with previous convictions, that couldnt produce an alibi for his confirmed the man they picked out in the line-up, with one saying she was absolutely certain that Taylor was the man who held up the building society at gun point. After a 45 minute deliberation, the Jury returned a guilty verdict and sentenced Taylor to quin years in prison.To start identifying the problems with this case and detect why the conviction was unsafe one must start with the firstly officers attending(FAA). The Job of a FAA is to immediately attend to injured persons at the crime scene. They then should separate eyewitnesses from one another(prenominal) to avoid conversations between them that readiness distort their memories and to avoid the transfer of trace evidence, Jackson. Jackson(2008). However, the 4 witnesses were first interviewed as a group. During this interview ,there were inconsistency with the decision of the robbers hair color.After the witnesses has listened to each others stories, two had decided to diverseness their minds and agree his hair color was after all blond. This is a clear robber with the proof utilise in the trial, as all the witnesses were interviewed as a group. Due to social desirability and conformity they changed their retrospect of characteristics. An example of social conformity can be explained by Solomon S ashs visual Judgment experiment. Cash got 7 people to take part in each experiment but every time 6 of the participants were confederates.The confederates were instructed to all follow a strict position of instructions. In the experiment two cards were shown to the group of seven. oneness card had a vertical line and the other card had 3 lines of varying lengths. The experimenter then asked all seven to choose which line of the three matched the length of the line on the other card. The confederates were sometimes asked to all agree on certain cards that would appear to be blatantly obviously wrong. The experimenter was examination to see if the participant would change their mind in order to conform with the majority. 4% of the innocent participants went on with the group and conformed giving the incorrect answer, School(2013). In the third interview police took a photo of a suspect, James Taylor, to the witnesses and asked them if they could confirm that he was the man they rem embered from he robbery. After this the witnesses attended a line up in which Taylor was present, from this they were able to confirm that Taylor was the robber. The questioning from the police asking to confirm that Taylor was the robber, could be considered as a star(p) question.Meaning that out-of-pocket to their choice of wording, they were able to lead the witnesses to a desired answer. They were made to think that Taylor had commit the crime, even though they may not of originally thought it was him. Lofts and Palmer in 1974, conducted an experiment to prove that leading questions n an interview can have a clear effect on witnesses answers. They asked forty five participants to watch a clip of two cars in an accident. They were spilt into 5 groups and then they were asked the question How fast were the cars way out when they (hit/ smashed/collided/bumped/contacted) each other? A week after the participants had seen the clips, they were also asked if they saw any low-pitch ed glass, even though there was no broken glass. Lofts and Palmer had found that the verb engaged, changed the the smashed conditions reported the highest speeds, followed by bumped, hit and collided in travel order. A week after when the participants were asked if there was any broken glass at the scene, people in the smashed group predominantly said yes. This proved that a leading question encouraged the participants to remember the cars traveling at a faster speed.The question has also appeared to modify their retentiveness as they also remember seeing non-existent glass, McLeod(2010). The leading question asked by the police could be an explanation for the sudden chassis of James Taylor being the robber, even though straight after the event, two thought he ad brown hair and two thought he had blond, now they are able to recognizes some seventh cranial nerve characteristics one even saying she was absolutely certain it was James Research by Lofts and Burns in 1982 also sugge sts that heavy weapon focus can have a detrimental effect on remembrance of certain characteristics.They believe that a witness testament focus more closely on the weapon used during a crime and not the person holding it. They believe this is because a person will always focus on the thing that poses a threat or injury when its not in its usual context. For example, you wouldnt be afraid of someone brandishing a gun at a shooting range. They conducted an experiment by allocating participants to one of two conditions. One watched a violent short film of a son being shot in the head and the other watched a non-violent short film of a crime.The results were dramatic, simply 4. 3% of the subjects who watched the violent crime correctly recalled a number on a boys Jersey, this compared to 27. 9% of participants who answered correctly that had watched the non-violent version, This could be another contributing factor as to why the eyewitnesses good words may be unreliable and as to why they might not be able to reduce an accurate description of the robber, as he did brandish a gun, put it in the face of one of the witnesses and also discharged it before he left.The witnesses were also part of the crime not watching it on a video clip uniform the participants in Lofts and Burns experiment. Witnessing a real life crime is more focusingful than taking part in an experiment. To hypothesis that the description the witnesses gave to the Jury, might not be as accurate as they recall, might bare some weight, due to weapon focus and other contributing variables present at the time of the contingency. Another factor which could disprove the affidavit given by the witnesses is one called the schema and stereotype possibility.This theory suggests that we are only able to take in a certain amount of information at the scene of a crime or incident. Ata later date when we are asked to provide greater detail, we aver on past experience (schemas) and prejudices (stereoty pes) to fill in the gaps. We use expectations to reconstruct our memory. One experiment conducted by Bartlett in 1932 called War of the ghosts portrayed a great example of the way people use stereotypes and schemas. Bartlett got participants to read a native North American folk tale, then repeat the paper to another person in turn who restate it and so on.By the time the last person had repeated the story back they had shortened it by three quarters and westernizes the details for example, seal clubbing was changed to fishing. One as a stored set of knowledge about a concept which guides our behavior. These are used to motivate our memory, and sometimes to fill in gaps if we are unsure, Bartlett(1932). Bartlett suggested that we make the following adjustments in certain spit out situations He believed people tend to rationalist situations and add material to Justify parts of their story.He believes that parts of a story, particularly those difficult to understand were often left out or manipulated. When people cant make brain of a situation, they tend to rearrange the order to one which fits the stereotype of their expectations in certain events. He also believes that people add their own emotion to a story, making the chain of events differ from someone else due to their personal emotional response. The research conducted by Bartlett is another factor hat could be bad in the conviction of Taylor.The four witnesses could of used their schemas and stereotypes along with leading questioning from the police to come to the presumption that James Taylor was the robber. The above explanations are reasons why the conviction for James Taylor may not of been safe and also why the eye witness testimony may have been distorted. To show the weight an eyewitness testimony bares on a case, can be demonstrated by Elizabeth Lofts in 1974. Lofts gave participants three versions of a robbery and murder case, she then asked them to decide whether the defendant was guilty. Circumstantial evidence which was presented to the mock Jurors included the fact that the robber ran into the defendants flat block, money was found in the defendants room and tests revealed there was a slight chance the defendant had fired a gun on the day of the robbery/murder. Results revealed that with Just this information provided, only 18% of participants thought that the defendant was guilty. When also presented with an eyewitness testimony, the guilty verdict dramatically changed to 72%. This demonstrates the powerful effect of an eyewitness testimony.More strikingly, when the participants were informed that the eyewitness was short- sighted, he was not wearing his glasses at the time of the offence, and he could not have seen the robbers face from where he was standing, 68% still gave a guilty verdict, Stewart(2013). This demonstrates the shocking strengths that an eyewitness testimony bares on each case. Upon evaluation of this case, it would seem that the conviction to s end a message to other electromotive force criminals, may have been in haste. The problem with this case not only lies with unreliable eyewitness testimonys but the conduct shown by the police wrought.From group interviews, leading questions and photographs to prompting from the prosecution lawyers prior to the trial. The conviction of James Taylor in this case, seems to be more about making an example of someone in order to set a precedent for others thinking of committing a similar crime, rather than on a case which is base purely on facts and forensic evidence, in which this case had none. Remembering A Study in experimental and Social Psychology. Cambridge Cambridge University Press A,R. Jacksonville(2008)Forensic science. Second Edition. Pearson education emitted, Essex England.Eyewitness TestimonyIn the legal profession, eyewitness testimony (EWT) is generally defined as the number of an event provided by an individual or individuals who have witnessed it.Such an account c ould contain the identity or identities of the people who were involved in the event, a narration of how the incident, itself, occurred, and a exact description of the scene before, during, and after the event took place. In criminal cases in the United States, the general aspiration is for juries to grant EWT a rather high level of reliability, especially in the process of identifying the perpetrator/s of a criminal act (McLeod).Unfortunately for jurists, research has been consistent in demonstrate that EWT is not as reliable as generally perceived. As a matter of fact, in Problems and Materials on Trial Advocacy pen by A. Leo Levin and Harold Cramer, the authors stated thatEyewitness testimony is, at best, evidence of what the witness believes to have occurred. It may or may not tell what actually happened. The familiar problems of perception, of gauging time, speed, height, weight, of accurate identification of persons accused of crime all contribute to making honest testimon y something less than completely believable (Cline).This view is shared by many legal practitioners. The prevailing view not only among defense lawyers but also among prosecutors is that in spite of the sincerity of eyewitnesses, EWT could not always be credible. They are convinced that when somebody professes to have witnessed an incident or a crime, for that matter, such a statement should not be taken by reliance because it is very possible that what he or she remembers seeing may not have actually happened.This line of merchandise is generally based on the fact that not all eyewitnesses possess the same degree of competence. A competent eyewitness should have the following qualities sufficient powers of perception ability to remember and describe what he or she remembers seeing and the willingness to tell only the truth (Cline).In theory, an eyewitness testimony could be discredited in a court of law if it could be established that an eyewitness is not competent by showing tha t his or her memory and perception are impaired, he or she has certain biases or prejudices against the accused, or that he or she is a reputed liar. Unfortunately, records show that even eyewitness accounts from highly competent witnesses have nonetheless caused the conviction of many innocent people. These are cases which involve competent eyewitnesses giving eyewitness accounts which are not credible but appear convincing to jurors (Cline).Since eyewitness account is highly dependent upon the memory of an individual, his or her recall of events is greatly affected by age, health, personal bias and expectations, viewing conditions, perception problems, later discussions with other witnesses, and stress (Cline).In other words, EWT should be appraised on a case-to-case basis, taking into consideration the personal attributes of the eyewitness and the conditions prevailing at the time of the event such as weather condition, time of day, distance of the witness from the incident, and illumination. Stress is another factor which affects a persons memory. For instance, an eyewitness who has been so horrified by a kill often fails to recall vital aspects of the incident. In such cases, it is said that the memory of the witness fails him or her, giving credence to the school of thought which maintains that mans memory is actually imperfect (Cline).Elizabeth Loftus belongs to this school of thought. In fact, in her book Memory Surprising New Insights into How We Remember and Why We Forget, she wrote that we often do not see things accurately in the first place. But even if we take in a sanely accurate picture of some experience, it does not necessarily stay perfectly intact in memoryWith the passage of time, with proper motivation, with the introduction of special kinds of interfering facts, the memory traces seem sometimes to change or become transformed (Cline). In other words, memory is not only imperfect but could also be manipulated or managed. This is only o ne of many observations raised by scholars and researchers about the reliability of eyewitness testimony.