Stereotypes in Crime Investigation

andie nachgeborenen andie_nachgeborenen at yahoo.com
Thu Dec 19 09:41:49 PST 2002


Miles is right, There are a lot of people in jail, even on death row, on the testimony of a witness or two. Some courts will allwo expert testimony on the unreliability of eyewitnesses. I don't knwo how the cops feel about making a case on jsut eyewitness testimony. I could ask a cop of my acquaintance. jks

Miles Jackson <cqmv at pdx.edu> wrote:

On Thu, 19 Dec 2002, Jordan Hayes wrote:


> > Stereotypes can affect memory when identifying criminal suspects
>
> Every cop already knows this; "witnesses" are the weak link in any
> investigation. ANYTHING else is preferred to having just a witness.
>

You don't have to convince cops to convict somebody. You just have to convince jurors who are more or less ignorant about the unreliability of eyewitness testimony. Hence the DNA exonerations.

Miles

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