The Innocence Project has released a new report point­ing to the prob­lems with eye­wit­ness iden­ti­fi­ca­tions in crim­i­nal cas­es and offer­ing rec­om­men­da­tions for mak­ing the sys­tem more reli­able. The report, ​“Reevaluating Lineups: Why Witnesses Make Mistakes and How to Reduce the Chance of a Misidentification,” states that over 175 peo­ple (includ­ing some who were sen­tenced to death) have been wrong­ful­ly con­vict­ed based, in part, on eye­wit­ness misiden­ti­fi­ca­tion and lat­er proven inno­cent through DNA test­ing. But DNA test­ing is not a solu­tion to the prob­lem since it is only avail­able in 5 – 10% of all crim­i­nal cas­es, accord­ing to the report. The find­ings in the report included:

• In 38% of the misiden­ti­fi­ca­tion cas­es, mul­ti­ple eye­wit­ness­es misiden­ti­fied the same inno­cent per­son.
• Fifty-three per­cent of the misiden­ti­fi­ca­tion cas­es, where race is known, involved crossracial misidentifications.

• In 50% of the misiden­ti­fi­ca­tion cas­es, eye­wit­ness tes­ti­mo­ny was the cen­tral evi­dence used against the defen­dant (with­out oth­er cor­rob­o­rat­ing evi­dence like con­fes­sions, foren­sic sci­ence or informant testimony).

The report offered a num­ber of rec­om­men­da­tions for reform, 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.

(​“Reevaluating Lineups: Why Witnesses Make Mistakes and How to Reduce the Chance of a Misidentification,” The Innocence Project, Benjamin Cardozo School of Law, July 2009). See Studies and Innocence.

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