About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

39 Law & Hum. Behav. 1 (2015)

handle is hein.journals/lwhmbv39 and id is 1 raw text is: Law and Human Behavior 2015. Vol. 39. No. 1. 1-14 © 2014 American Psychological Association 0147-7307/15/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/hb0000096 Double-Blind Photo Lineups Using Actual Eyewitnesses: An Experimental Test of a Sequential Versus Simultaneous Lineup Procedure Gary L. Wells Iowa State University Nancy K. Steblay Augsburg College Jennifer E. Dysart John Jay College of Criminal Justice Eyewitnesses (494) to actual crimes in 4 police jurisdictions were randomly assigned to view simulta- neous or sequential photo lineups using laptop computers and double-blind administration. The sequen- tial procedure used in the field experiment mimicked how it is conducted in actual practice (e.g., using a continuation rule, witness does not know how many photos are to be viewed, witnesses resolve any multiple identifications), which is not how most lab experiments have tested the sequential lineup. No significant differences emerged in rates of identifying lineup suspects (25% overall) but the sequential procedure produced a significantly lower rate (11%) of identifying known-innocent lineup fillers than did the simultaneous procedure (18%). The simultaneous/sequential pattern did not significantly interact with estimator variables and no lineup-position effects were observed for either the simultaneous or sequential procedures. Rates of nonidentification were not significantly different for simultaneous and sequential but nonidentifiers from the sequential procedure were more likely to use the not sure response option than were nonidentifiers from the simultaneous procedure. Among witnesses who made an identification, 36% (41% of simultaneous and 32% of sequential) identified a known-innocent filler rather than a suspect, indicating that eyewitness performance overall was very poor. The results suggest that the sequential procedure that is used in the field reduces the identification of known-innocent fillers, but the differences are relatively small. Keywords: eyewitness identification, sequential lineups, eyewitness error, eyewitness field experiments, lineup position effects There is a growing awareness in the general American popula- tion that eyewitness identification evidence can be unreliable. Much of this awareness can be traced to media treatments of forensic DNA exonerations, for which over 75% of the first 250 were cases of mistaken eyewitness identification (Garrett, 2011). Best-selling books such as Picking Cotton (Thompson-Canino, Cotton, & Torneo, 2010), Jennifer Thompson-Canino, Ronald This article was published Online First June 16, 2014. Gary L. Wells, Psychology Department, Iowa State University; Nancy K. Steblay, Psychology Department, Augsburg College; Jennifer E. Dysart, Psychology Department, John Jay College of Criminal Justice. This research was supported by grants from the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, the Open Society Foundations, the JEHT Foundation, and the National Institute of Justice. The American Judicature Society, the Inno- cence Project, and the Police Foundation were key partners in coordinating this project. We thank the Austin (Texas) Police Department, the Travis County (Texas) District Attorney's Office, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg (North Carolina) Police Department, the Mecklenburg County (North Carolina) District Attorney's Office, the Tucson (Arizona) Police Depart- ment, the Pima County (Arizona) Attorney's Office, the San Diego (Cal- ifornia) Police Department, and the San Diego County (California) District Attorney's Office for their cooperation and efforts in collecting these data. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Gary L. Wells, Psychology Department, Iowa State University, West 112 Lago- marcino Hall, Ames, IA 50021. E-mail: glwells@iastate.edu Cotton, and Erin Torneo's story of mistaken identification and redemption, have also had an impact. TV programs, such as CBS's 60 Minutes and MSNBC's Rock Center with Brian Williams, have managed to not only present compelling personal stories of mis- taken identification and wrongful conviction but also highlight the psychological science that attempts to understand and control eyewitness error. Entire states, such as New Jersey, Connecticut, Texas, Florida, and North Carolina, as well as individual law enforcement agencies, such as Boston, Minneapolis, St. Paul, Dallas, and Denver, have made procedural reforms in how they conduct lineups based on laboratory findings of researchers. In 2012, one of the most comprehensive treatments of eyewitness identification by any court was conducted by the Oregon Supreme Court in an attempt to blend the extant scientific literature with the law (Oregon v. Lawson, 2012). In the legal system, the problems with eyewitness identification carry a nascent aura, as though they were only recently discovered. Eyewitness identification scholars know otherwise, as the issues predate even Munsterberg (1908). In fact, this journal (Law and Human Behavior) published the first issue of a scholarly journal devoted solely to eyewitness identification 33 years ago (Wells, 1980). The empirical literature has exploded since that time, much of it focused on what can be done to improve the reliability of eyewitness evidence, an approach commonly known as the system-variable perspective (Wells, 1978).

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Purchase Access

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Contact Us

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most