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In eyewitness identification, in criminal law, evidence is received from a witness "who has actually seen an event and can so testify in court". [1]The Innocence Project states that "Eyewitness misidentification is the single greatest cause of wrongful convictions nationwide, playing a role in more than 75% of convictions overturned through DNA testing."
Mistaken identity is a defense in criminal law which claims the actual innocence of the criminal defendant, and attempts to undermine evidence of guilt by asserting that any eyewitness to the crime incorrectly thought that they saw the defendant, when in fact the person seen by the witness was someone else.
Laura Smalarz received a Bachelor's degree in Psychology from the University of San Diego in 2008. [2] She proceeded to receive a PhD in Social Psychology from Iowa State University in 2015 under the mentorship of both Gary Wells and Stephanie Madon. [1]
Eyewitness memory is a person's episodic memory for a crime or other witnessed dramatic event. [1] Eyewitness testimony is often relied upon in the judicial system.It can also refer to an individual's memory for a face, where they are required to remember the face of their perpetrator, for example. [2]
Psychologists have probed the reliability of eyewitness testimony since the beginning of the 20th century. [1] One prominent pioneer was Hugo Münsterberg, whose controversial book On the Witness Stand (1908) demonstrated the fallibility of eyewitness accounts, but met with fierce criticism, particularly in legal circles. [2]
Amicus curiae briefs were filed by the American Psychological Association, [4] the Innocence Network, and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. [5]The U.S. Supreme Court [6] delivered its 8–1 decision on January 11, 2012, deciding that judicial examination of eyewitness testimony was required only in the case of police misconduct.
"[T]he factors to be considered in evaluating the likelihood of misidentification include the opportunity of the witness to view the criminal at the time of the crime, the witness' degree of attention, the accuracy of the witness' prior description of the criminal, the level of certainty demonstrated by the witness at the confrontation, and the ...
Gary L. Wells is an American psychologist and a scholar in eyewitness memory research. Wells is a professor at Iowa State University with a research interest in the integration of both cognitive psychology and social psychology and its interface with law.