Wrongful Conviction In Criminal Cases

According to “The Science Behind Eyewitness Identification Reform” there are two main variables that affect eyewitness testimonies “Estimator variables: are those that cannot be controlled by the criminal justice system. They include simple factors like the lighting when the crime took place or the distance from which the witness saw the perpetrator, and the degree of stress or trauma a witness experienced while seeing the perpetrator” and “System variables: are those that the criminal justice system can and should control. They include all of the ways that law enforcement agencies retrieve and record witness memory, such as lineups, photo arrays, and other identification procedures”. Eyewitness misidentification has led to 75% of false convictions that were overruled by modern DNA testing according to “The Innocence

The most vicious cause of wrongful conviction is eyewitness misidentification. According to the Innocence Project, 72% of overturned wrongful convictions through DNA testing were due to eyewitness misidentification1. As this statistics implies, eyewitness identification (Eye-ID) is untrustworthy information. The main reason why Eye-ID lacks accuracy is due to malleability of memories. The Innocence Project asserts there are two variables greatly influence memory and also Eye-ID. One type of variables is “estimator variables” which are incontrollable factors by the criminal justice system. Examples of estimator variables are environmental factors (e.g., lighting and distance) when the crime occurred, racial factors, and psychological factors (e.g., severity of trauma)1. The other type of variable is “system variables” which is controllable by the criminal justice system. These variables are within the procedure of attaining evidences. For instance, post-identification feedback (e.g., confirming feedback that an eyewitness receives), biased lineup/ photo array composition, biased administrators of lineup can negatively influences Eye-ID.

According to Burke (2005), four separate aspects of cognitive bias contributes to the-the maintenance of denial of new evidence in prosecutorial decision making: confirmation bias, selective information processing, belief perseverance, and the avoidance of cognitive dissonance. Confirmation bias leads people to seek and interpret information in a way that supports a view they already hold to be true. While selective bias leads information to be more easily remembered in a way that confirms their already held beliefs. Cognitive dissonance – the desire people have for consistency between their behavior and believes- leads them to adjust their beliefs to their previous behavior. Furthermore, belief perseverance leads people to fail to adjust their beliefs to new information, even when the new information proves that the basis for their previous beliefs was false. For example, believing that someone is the perpetrator even after DNA conclusively proves that´s incorrect. (p. 1593-1594, 1610).

In Canada, the leading cause of wrongful conviction is due to the factor of eyewitness account. It has been proven that individual’s minds are not like tape recorders because everyone cannot precisely and accurately remember the description of what another person or object looks like. The courts looks at eyewitness accounts as a great factor to nab perpetrators because they believe that the witness should know what they are taking about and seen what occurred on the crime scene. On the other hand, eyewitness accounts lead to a 70 percent chance of wrongful conviction, where witnesses would substantially change their description of a perpetrator.

Do you know someone who is serving time for s crime they did not commit? Have you wondered how a system has failed the very people it was designed to serve and protect? The American judicial system has a prolonged record of wrongful conviction dating back centuries ago. Wrongful convictions is when a person, who in actuality is innocent yet have been sentenced by a jury or other official courtroom. This misguided thinking by the system brought about individuals being executed by deadly injection. African Americans are more likely to be wrongfully convicted than Caucasians in murder, sexual assault and drug related cases. Dating back from 1989 to mid-October of 2016 of the 1,900 wrongful convictions documented, 47% involved in the exoneration

This article is about a sexual assault bill that is being considered and that according to supporters would prevent wrongful convictions. It would require victims to corroborate their testimony only if the defendant doesn’t have a prior conviction. Since this could be a very controversial issue a forensic psychologist could be hired to clarify the nature of the problem; to either prove that the bill could help prevent wrongful convictions by using logic and evidence or that it would make those cases where evidence simply doesn’t exist harder. A forensic psychologist could argue, for example, that victims are not always able of providing a reliable story; that it is possible for them to miss a prominent characteristic because it has happened

Have you ever been in a situation to try to prove your innocence? And could you save yourself from wrongful convictions? Director Jean-Xavier de Lestrade had produced the movie, Murder in a Sunday morning, in 2001. This movie won the award for best documentary ceremony at this year. De Lestrade’s movie was really helpful to aware public about overwhelming innocent people rights. He showed that how lawyers can save their defendant’s life. The story is about a black American young boy, Brenton Butler, who was accused of murdering a white tourist, Mary Ann Stephens, at a parking lot in Florida. He had been identified as the killer by the victim's husband and later confessed by enforcement of detectives. Polic officers did not investigation completely,

The reliability if an eyewitness testimony is questionable. The witness may be so certain that the person that thy are pointing out is one hundred per cent the suspect or they could be so certain when it comes to retelling the incident, although these people are so sure on what it is they are doing, their testimony cannot always accurate. Due to the lack of accuracy with eyewitness

The first and greatest cause of false convictions is eyewitness identification according to the innocence project website almost 75% of cases later overturned were due to wrongful eyewitness identification. One of the main issues as we learned in class is that our minds do not keep a perfect recording of events in our memory they are often impacted by additional information given after the fact. Information about a suspect given afterwards such as suggesting their hair color, height, weight, or other attributes about them could influence our memories. Another issue found is using things like “show ups” for victims and witnesses; this is discussed on the innocence project page and was in class. Show ups tend to lead to wrongful identification because there is only one person instead of several potential suspects like a lineup. The Innocence project website discusses two variables that affect wrongful eyewitness identification Estimator and System variables. Estimator variables are things the justice system cannot influence such as the lighting, distance used when the victim or witness saw the suspect, the amount of stress or anxiety the victim is under, and research shows that it is hard for witnesses to identify someone of a different race than they are. The 2nd group of variables discussed are the system variables, these are things that the system can impact such as the type of lineup like line up or show up, how they administer lineups such as how similar the suspects

Eyewitness identification and testimony play a huge role in the criminal justice system today, but skepticism of eyewitnesses has been growing. Forensic evidence has been used to undermine the reliability of eyewitness testimony, and the leading cause of false convictions in the United States is due to misidentifications by eyewitnesses. The role of eyewitness testimony in producing false confessions and the factors that contribute to the unreliability of these eyewitness testimonies are sending innocent people to prison, and changes are being made in order to reform these faulty identification procedures.

Every year, hundreds of people get convicted wrongly as a result of criminal proceedings that are rooted in miscarriage of justice. The defendants are convicted for crimes not committed where errors are not proven until their death or having served a lot of jail time. Wrongful convictions are fueled by false witnesses, incompetence of defense lawyers and inadequate evidence among others. However, with the emergence of forensic DNA in collection of evidence, the rate of wrongful convictions has decreased in the past few years. This paper focuses on the fallibilities that lead to miscarriage of justice and what role technology has played in correcting and mitigating the previously erroneous judicial system.

Many of us are familiar with historical films such as “The Shawshank Redemption”, but the reality is that wrongful convictions have occurred throughout history and although less frequently, still occur today. A wrongful conviction can greatly impact an individual’s life and may continue to be an issue even after exoneration. Many people are under the impression that individuals who are wrongfully convicted and later exonerated have won the battle over the justice system, however this is rarely the case. Exonerees experience great amounts of hardship once released back into society. There are flaws in the justice system, which make it extremely difficult for exonerees to experience true freedom. Wrongful convictions occur not only in the United States, but also across the entire globe. It is a serious injustice when an innocent person is forced to experience life as a convicted felon.

Have you ever been accused of something that you did not do? You, yourself being the only person knowing that you are innocent while everyone around you believes you are guilty. To add to the guilt all the evidence points to you as well. Even though you may prove your innocence, that negative stigma of being accused of something lingers around you and people still believe something must have been wrong. This was the case with Ivan Henry he was accused of a series of sexual assaults and spent 27 years behind bars for something he did not do. Ivan Henry is the perfect example of a victim of a wrongful conviction and how the justice system is flawed when it comes to convictions. Misconduct by the police and the Crown not disclosing important information led to Henry’ wrongful conviction.

A wrongful conviction is a terrible injustice that is magnified when an actual innocent person spends years, sometimes even decades in prison and/or death row. This has been recognized by the U.S Legal system for quite some time now and the rising number of exonerations are growing.

There are many causes that can contribute to a wrongful conviction. Witness misidentification is the most common cause; we know that the human mind is not like a tape recorder, and can make mistakes. Forensic analysts presenting evidence that has little or no scientific basis, false confessions by suspects during the interrogation process, government officials taking steps to ensure that a suspect is convicted despite poor evidence, testimony by people with incentives to testify, and poorly prepared lawyers are just some of the other causes that can result in a wrongful conviction. The death penalty case of Cameron Todd Willingham, of Corsicana, Texas, is one that experts now agree that the evidence proves he was wrongfully convicted. But unfortunately, he was already put to death by lethal injection.