vincentML
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quote:
ORIGINAL: LadyEllen
Eye witness testimony, especially as it regards strangers is totally flawed. It has been demonstrated to be so time and time again, most recently in an Open University/BBC broadcast last month where a bunch of people were subjected to a number of surprise scenarios over a period and then put through the normal police interviews and follow ups.
The group witnessed the same incidents, at the same time, together. Not one account of what happened agreed with any of the others and not one person was able to satisfactorily identify the perpetrators nor their parts in the incidents. In one incident some of the group were fitted with devices to track where they were looking at any moment, and even then when it could be shown they had looked perpetrators in the eye these witnesses failed to provide accurate accounts.
Meanwhile the numbers of successful appeals against convictions based on eye witness testimony has prompted a reevaluation of such evidence to the effect that its utility and application be treated alike to hearsay.
E
I have seen something similar to this on TV here, E.
But there may be other errors besides faulty eye-witness testimony in the pursuit of Justice. In the Rolando Cruz case which Jefff mentioned earlier from Chicago police misconduct, prosecutorial malfeasence, local politics (the chief prosecutor is an elected office), and defendent stupidity were also factors. Here is a brief description from the Innocence Project website:
Several months later, under pressure from the community and in the midst of an election year, the police picked up Alejandro Hernandez, who pointed them to Rolando Cruz for a small reward. The two continued to incriminate each other for cash rewards and petty benefits from the police — Hernandez was given $10,000 in reward money for making inculpatory statements against Cruz and a man named Stephen Buckley, who was not convicted.
The case against Cruz and Hernandez was based on alleged statements the two had made. The officers who had questioned Cruz and Hernandez, testified in court that the two had both made incriminating statements. Several witnesses gave suspicious testimony that Cruz and Hernandez had divulged to them that they had intimate knowledge of the crime. Neither had strong alibis. Finally, the most unsubstantiated and damning evidence was the testimony of the sheriff's detectives, who testified that Cruz had reported "visions" of the murder, and that these "visions" closely represented the details associated with the crime. Their testimony was admitted as evidence even though there had been no attempt to record the vision statement.
Cruz would eventually endure three trials and three convictions due to winning appeals with the help of Northwestern University's Larry Marshall and David Protess, who assigned their students to investigate the case. In September 1995, DNA tests showed that spermatozoa found near the crime scene could not have come from Cruz or Hernandez, and that a man named Brian Dugan could not be eliminated as a contributor. Prosecutors retried them, asserting that they could have been present at the crime. Cruz's defense team decided on a bench trial; Hernandez was to have a fourth jury trial. Before the judge gave his verdict in the Cruz case, a sheriff's department lieutenant recanted testimony he had given in previous trials.
On November 3, 1995, after both men had served, respectively, nearly 12 years on death row, both cases were dismissed and Cruz and Hernandez were set free. The court acquitted Cruz and dismissed Hernandez's case on the basis of the recanted testimony, the DNA evidence, and the lack of any corroborated evidence against them.
Brian Dugan has not been charged with the murder. His confession, made through hypothetical statements during a plea bargain for other crimes, could not be used against him.
Cripes, even the defendents cannot be trusted! However, stupidity should not warrant the death penalty, although I am sure some on here would think so.
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vML
Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. ~ MLK Jr.
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RE: The death penalty...does the method matter? - 
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