True witness : cops, courts, science, and the battle against misidentification / James M. Doyle.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Doyle, James M., 1950-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Judicial error--United States.

Judicial error.

Eyewitness identification.

United States.

Eyewitness identification--United States.

DNA fingerprinting--United States.

DNA fingerprinting.

Criminal justice, Administration of--United States.

Criminal justice, Administration of.

Physical Description:

xiii, 223 pages ; 25 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York : Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.

Summary:

The Wrong Man Goes to Prison, and the real criminal goes free. The lives of an innocent man and his family and the lives of the real criminal's next victims and their families are shattered. Mistakes by honest eyewitnesses are the leading cause of wrongful convictions.

True Witness describes the latest battles in a one-hundred-year war between scientists studying the shortcomings of human memory and a legal system that relies on eyewitness testimony as a central tool of identifying and convicting suspects - too often wrongly. As researchers have struggled to solve the mystery of "How do eyewitness mistakes happen?" they have met resistance from prosecutors and courts more concerned with convictions than justice.

Through a vivid cast of brilliant scientists, street-wise cops, glamorous former prosecutors - all haunted by the history of a wrongly convicted man and the agonized cop and victim who sent him to prison - James M. Doyle sheds light on the difficulties balancing the disquieting findings of science with the requirements of the legal system. This is a troubling tale of the intersection of personal ambition, legal and political principles, and scientific inquiry.

Scientists have shown how eyewitness mistakes occur, and thus the question now is how can they be prevented? Can the legal system be made to listen to the answers that the researchers have found? Doyle identifies new eyewitness procedures that should be put in place before tomorrow's headlines blare the news of another unnecessary miscarriage of justice. The outcome of that battle hangs in the balance in every police station and station house in America. Doyle persuasively argues that the promises of improved justice must be realized before another wrongful conviction lets the guilty go free.

Contents:

1 As Sure as I Can Be 1

2 The Lawyer Alone Is Obdurate: Professor Munsterberg Battles Dean Wigmore 9

3 The Lawyers' Art: Bad Verdicts from Good Witnesses 35

4 Nobody Likes a Smartass: Bob Buckhout Joins the Battle 49

5 The Book on the Street: The Cops, the Courts, and the Eyewitnesses 69

6 We Took Loftus Seriously: Elizabeth Loftus and the Science of Memory 83

7 The Way We Look at Seeing: The Accelerating Study of Eyewitness Memory 101

8 The Government Wins When Justice Is Done in Its Courts: Three Prosecutors 109

9 DNA to the Rescue (of Some) 127

10 Break Out Shot: Gary Wells and The System 141

11 A Technical Working Group: The Police Craft a New Book 169

12 A Road Ahead: The Continuing Study of Wrongful Convictions 189

13 An Endgame: Looking Back on Gary Graham 199

Current Events: A Short Bibliographical Note 219.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [207]-217) and index.

ISBN:

1403964300

OCLC:

55067734