Innocence Project Releases A New Report on Eyewitness Identification and Lineups
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Today the Innocence Project released a new report entitled Reevaluating Lineups: "Why Witnesses Make Mistakes and How to Reduce the Chance of a Misidentification". The new report discusses several attempts at reforming lineups, including:
• Double-blind presentation: photos or lineup members should be presented by an administrator who does not know who the suspect is.
• Lineup composition: “Fillers” (the non-suspects included in a lineup) should resemble the eyewitness’s description of the perpetrator and the suspect should not stand out. Also, a lineup should not contain more than one suspect.
• Witness instructions: The person viewing a lineup should be told that the perpetrator may not be in the lineup and that the investigation will continue regardless of whether an identification is made.
• Confidence statements: At the time of the identification, the eyewitness should provide a statement in her own words indicating her level of confidence in the identification.
• Recording: Identification procedures should be videotaped.
• Sequential presentation (optional): Lineup members are presented one-by-one (by a “blind” administrator) instead of side by side.
