宪法权利视角下的美国目击者辨认证据规则

自1967年的United States v.Wade案开始,美国最高法院逐步发展出目击者辨认证据(排除)规则。在各时期主流司法理念的影响下,律师帮助权和正当程序权利这两项宪法权利共同见证着该规则盛极而衰的历史演变。尽管正当程序正经受国际化浪潮的影响,但是却受到当前美国主流司法理念的抑制,于是很难再产生一次新的革命,目击者辨认证据规则的这一重要理论基础从而也大为削弱。该规则很难再单纯地继续因循修补加完善的传统套路,而是同时需要另辟蹊径采取成文法化的路径来规制辨认程序,这是美国司法界目前及未来面临的一项重要课题。     

Investigating Investigators: Examining the Impact of Eyewitness Identification Evidence on Student-Investigators

This research examined the impact of eyewitness identification decisions on student-investigators. Undergraduates played the role of police investigators and interviewed student-witnesses who had been shown either a good or poor view of the perpetrator in a videotaped crime. Based on information obtained from the witness, student-investigators then chose a suspect from a database containing information about potential suspects and rated the probability that their suspect was the culprit. Investigators then administered a photo lineup to witnesses, and re-rated the probability that their suspect was guilty. Student-investigators were highly influenced by eyewitness identification decisions, typically overestimating the information gained from the identification decision (except under conditions that led witnesses to be very accurate), and were generally unable to differentiate between accurate and inaccurate witnesses.

Sexual assault complainants on the stand: a historical comparison of courtroom questioning

Because most cases of alleged sexual assault involve few sources of evidence, the complainant’s testimony is crucial. In line with empirical research findings, the way in which police question sexual assault complainants has evolved to ultimately maximise both the completeness and accuracy of evidence. But has courtroom questioning changed over time? To answer this question, we compared the courtroom questioning of sexual assault complainants in the 1950s to that used in cases from the turn of the twenty-first century. Overall, lawyers in contemporary cases asked complainants more questions and uttered more words than they did historically. Complainants, too, appear to have become more vocal over time. Across the two time periods, the questioning style used by prosecuting lawyers has shifted towards a more open style. In stark contrast, the format of cross-examination questions has remained remarkably consistent over time, with leading questions still making up the bulk of the questions asked. These findings have important implications for future legal reform and legal practice.     

Group size,misinformation and unanimity influences on co-witness judgements

Researchers have typically observed the effects of co-witness influence on eyewitness pairs. However, research suggests that individuals are more likely to witness crimes in larger groups. Additionally, there is an abundance of evidence suggesting that social influence is heavily moderated by group size. Therefore, the present study aimed to gain a more accurate understanding of the risks of co-witness influence in relation to unanimity and group size effects. Participants (N = 608) viewed and discussed a CCTV footage of a fight breaking out, with co-witnesses, before giving individual statements, where they were asked to identify which person had started the fight; confederates were used to suggest that the wrong man had started the fight. Results indicated that participants were vulnerable to co-witness influence, but only when exposed to misinformation from a majority of co-witnesses. Misinformation presented by an individual confederate did not have a significant influence over the participants’ responses. This study was the first to investigate the effects of group size on blame attribution. The findings suggest that the true risks of co-witness influence may not be as high as originally predicted from research on eyewitness pairs.     

Suggestive Eyewitness Identification Procedures and the Supreme Court’s Reliability Test in Light of Eyewitness Science: 30 Years Later

The U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling concerning suggestive eyewitness identification procedures (Manson v. Braithwaite, 1977, 432 U.S. 98) has not been revisited by the Court in the intervening 30+ years. Meanwhile, scientific studies of eyewitnesses have progressed and DNA exonerations show that mistaken identification is the primary cause of convictions of the innocent. We analyzed the two-inquiry logic in Manson in light of eyewitness science. Several problems are discussed. Ironically, we note that suggestive identification procedures (determined in the first inquiry) boost the eyewitnesses’ standing on three of the five criteria (used in the second inquiry) that are used to decide whether the suggestive procedures were a problem. The net effect undermines safeguards intended by the Court and destroys incentives to avoid suggestive procedures.

Eyewitness Memory in Context: Toward a Taxonomy of Eyewitness Error

Although eyewitness memory and identification have captured substantial research interest in the past decades, an understanding of the types and prevalence of errors typically made by eyewitnesses is lacking. The purpose of the present research was to begin the development of a taxonomy of eyewitness error, employing standardized stimuli and established techniques. Respondents were exposed to a crime scene modeled on SWAT-training scenarios for systematically varied exposure times, and were then asked to describe what they had seen. The stimuli and questions employed were prepared with the aid of senior police field training officers. As anticipated, eyewitness performance in general was subject to a variety of inaccuracies. Physical errors, such as mistakes in the clothing or physical characteristics of the perpetrator, or in details of the environmental context, predominated. However, other less-expected errors were also observed: in relatively low numbers of cases, witnesses inferred emotional states or intent on the part of the perpetrator or victim. Some contributed wholly artificial backstories, reported the future actions of the perpetrator or victim as memories, or even inserted themselves into the scene. The pattern of results was shown to interact with exposure time, gender of the perpetrator, and the presence or absence of weapons in the scene. The results of this study are consistent with reconfigurative theory dating to Bartlett (1932), with subsequent research, and with more recent work under the aegis of Gestalt/Feature-Intensive Processing theory. These findings provide information on types and prevalence of eyewitness error which should prove useful in investigative and courtroom settings.     

Recognition of previous eyewitness testimony from an altered interrogation protocol: Potential effects of distortions

Abstract

The effect of protocol presentation on witnesses’ tendency to point out errors in a transcribed version of their verbal testimony was examined in two experiments. Participants were shown a film depicting a robbery and were subsequently questioned. In the process of typing out the testimony, there were six distortions entered into the protocol. When participants were asked to check the content for approval, they either listened to the experimenter reading the protocol out aloud, or read it on their own. The results showed that witnesses who had listened to the content being read to them pointed out significantly fewer distortions, and suggest that protocol presentation may have important implications for the justice system.     

How to induce resistance to the misinformation effect? Characteristics of positive feedback in the reinforced self-affirmation procedure

ABSTRACT

The memory misinformation effect consists in the inclusion in witness testimonies of information from sources other than the given event. In the present article, research which aims to make people resistant to misinformation is presented. It is based on reinforced self-affirmation (RSA), a method designed to enhance participants’ self-confidence and therefore make them more willing to rely on their own memories instead of external sources. RSA includes self-affirmation and positive feedback. In the present research, the efficacy of various kinds of positive feedback was explored. The results of Experiment 1 suggested that positive feedback relating to memory (MemRSA) is effective in reducing the misinformation effect, while positive feedback relating to general cognitive ability is not. In Experiment 2, the superiority of MemRSA over inefficient feedback relating to attention was demonstrated. In Experiment 3, MemRSA was again effective, and more effective than inducing convictions about the independence of judgements, but this also reduced the misinformation effect. The results are discussed from the perspective of witnesses who remember the correct information yet rely on external sources due to a lack of confidence in t aforementioned heir memories.     

Commentary on “Studying Eyewitness Investigations in the Field”: A Look Forward

Schacter et al. (2007, this issue) address the controversy surrounding an Illinois pilot project that attempted to compare sequential versus simultaneous police lineup formats. The statement by these experts will guide the design and execution of future field lineup experiments. This commentary discusses three aspects of field studies that pose challenges as lineup experiments are interpreted: the imprecise meaning of the dependent measure (eyewitness decisions), the limitations of single studies, and the necessity to devise public policy from incomplete knowledge. A combination of laboratory and field information provides the means to determine best practices in eyewitness identification procedures.     

Moving Forward: Response to “Studying Eyewitness Investigations in the Field”

Field studies of eyewitness identification are richly confounded. Determining which confounds undermine interpretation is important. The blind administration confound in the Illinois study is said to undermine it’s value for understanding the relative utility of simultaneous and sequential lineups. Most criticisms of the Illinois study focus on filler identifications, and related inferences about the importance of the blind confound. We find no convincing evidence supporting this line of attack and wonder at filler identifications as the major line of criticism. More debilitating problems impede using the Illinois study to address the simultaneous versus sequential lineup controversy: inability to estimate guilt independent of identification evidence, lack of protocol compliance monitoring, and assessment of lineups quality. Moving forward requires removing these limitations.