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Marilaura Garcia
Ali M. Meghdadi
English 39C/Section 33374
May 19, 2014
A New Start
When the penitentiary system began it was a place to rehabilitate and become a better
citizen. After time jails became a form of punishment. The inmates are treated wrongly and live
under harsh conditions. Prisons are not a place where one would ever fancy to be put in yet some
of these men and women are innocent and placed in such conditions. It is a serious issue because
it is not just a couple of people who are falsely accused there is many people. Their lives are
stripped away and are forced to live in a prison for years. People might always be falsely accused
because they were at the wrong place at the wrong time but it does not mean that it should be
allowed without prevention. There is not an ultimate solution to save every innocent person but
there is an opportunity to lessen future innocent people from being jailed.
So far only 249 innocent prisoners have been exonerated since 1989 because of DNA
testing. Even though DNA testing is the most relatively reliable evidence to prove the guilt or
innocence of a person it is not as available as it should be. Even though DNA testing may
confirm the innocence of a person it
is hard to pass legislations to access
it. It costs a lot of money to collect
and process DNA evidence. The
numbers vary because Phoenix, Los
Angeles, and Orange County have
Table 1 Denver is highlighted because officials are assumed "best
practices".
Source: Ritter, Nancy. "DNA Solves Property Crimes (But Are We
Ready for That?)." National Institute of Justice. N.p., n.d.
Web. 13 May 2014

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bigger populations than Topeka and Denver. Then when there is a huge population crime tends
to occur more frequently. On average it costs one thousand four hundred to collect and process.
Then four thousand five hundred two for each identified suspect. DNA testing would be a smart
choice to help prosecute someone, although due to funds it would be difficult to use it.
Convicting someone of a crime is not an easy thing to do. Yet, one of the causes that send
innocent people to jail is false eyewitness. Even though one might claim whole-heartedly that
they are positive the person on trial is the man/woman they saw still leads to misidentification. -
and people can reliably tell whether they remember a prior event or whether they dont
remember the event, but just know that it happened.. (Gleitman 322). People fail to recognize
the difference if they actually know or are just familiar which leads them to believe that they are
completely sure of their claim. Some witnesses are not even sure that the person they claimed
they saw is the right person. Witnesses substantially changed their description of a perpetrator
(including key information such as height, weight and presence of facial hair) after they learned
more about a particular suspect (Innocence Project). Using eyewitness testimony as evidence
for a crime is not often reliable because of the fault with someones memory. A person cannot
recall everything they have seen because memory can be contaminated. It can be contaminated
because our memory can be tricked. Memory is a tricky thing; a person cannot recollect
something that happened a week ago with precise recollection. Eyewitness becomes an issue if
the witness did not get a perfect view of the criminal. These people are evidence and even though
we would like to believe they would be correct, it is not likely
According to the statistics Eyewitness misidentification is the single greatest cause of
wrongful convictions nationwide, playing a role in nearly 75% of convictions overturned through
DNA testing (Innocence Project). Due to misidentification many innocent men have gone to
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jail. It would be unwise to take out eyewitnesses out of cases because sometimes it is the best
evidence a case can have. Although there are mistakes due to human error, causing it to be
the biggest reason why people go to jail, it can be made better.
Misidentification happens a lot and is the reason why so many innocent people are found
guilty. Misidentifications dont only threaten the innocent, they also derail investigations. While
police focus on finding evidence against an innocent person, the perpetrator can get
away(Innocence project). While an innocent man or woman is being suspected the investigation
in way halts because a person is in custody and focus on them instead of trying to see if there are
any other perpetrators. Thus leading an innocent man or woman in jail while the real criminal
gets away. It is stressful for victims and eyewitnesses to identify a perpetrator, and they make
mistakes. Sometimes these mistakes are triggered by a gap in memory or the desire to make an
identification at all costs(Innocence Project). As a human being one can be put under stress with
these types, in which a lot of responsibility is left to them. This type of stress leads a person to
make honest mistakes. To fix this issue, the witness should be calmed down and relaxed so he or
she are able to recall the incident with the best of their abilities. The stress that a witness
undergoes while being questioned can mess up the memory. Fixing the small issues that lead to
misidentification can lead up to having fewer innocent people going to jail because if we reform
the methods then it would lead to fewer mistakes.
According to research there is fewer risk of misidentification if the police officer that is
administrating is blind on who the suspect is, blind administration. By doing this it stops the
police officer from pushing the witness to choosing the suspect. If the administrator is unaware,
the witness will not be influenced to pick someone other than the real criminal. To also help from
the administrator influencing the witness would be if the process of questioning the witness were
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recorded. By videotaping the procedure it protects the innocent suspects from any misconduct by
the lineup administrator. Then, during court it would help the prosecution because if the jury
asked to view the questioning, it would be able to see how the questioning was conducted and
whether or not it followed unbiased protocol.
Then during the lineup, is when possible suspects are lined up either in person or picture
and the witness would try to point the suspect out, the suspects and fillers, non-suspects in a
lineup, should all fit the description given by the witness because if there is one person stands out
they would choose the person who stands out. For example one of the suspects should not be the
only one of his/her race. Also there should not be multiple lineups with same suspect because it
would lead to misidentification as well. If the witness is shown the same suspect multiple times
he/she will choose that person not because it is the actual perpetrator but because of the
familiarity that the witness will have from seeing the suspect to many times.
During the questioning of the witness, the witness should be told from the beginning that
the perpetrator might not be in the lineup. By doing this it takes off the pressure of the witness
that they do not have to pick someone out of the lineup. They should also be told that the
investigation would not end there if no one is chosen. Doing this assures the witness that it is
crucial that the right suspect is found, but it is not solely up to the witness to find the suspect.
The last thing the witness should be told is that he/she should not look towards the administrator
for guidance because it would influence and lead to a misidentification.
Doing these simple steps takes off the pressure of choosing the suspect and would lead to
fewer misidentifications. Then finally after the lineup procedure is over the eyewitness should
write out a statement on how confident they of the information they provided. The statement
would help because in court it would show how sure the witness is. Another thing that would
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help out would be that instead of showing all the suspects at once they should be shown to the
witness one by one. Doing this contributes to finding the real perpetrator and stops from an
innocent man/woman from being convicted. It is of value because if the witness does not know
how many suspects there are, he or she may feel that one of the suspects is the actual criminal,
rather than feeling obligated to choosing one of the suspects whether he/she is correct.
There are other proposed ideas to help remediate the issue at hand but they do not handle
a big portion of the problem, which is misidentification. Although they are good ideas they are
still in progress and there needs to be a more immediate way to mitigate the problem. With the
249 people who were exonerated seventy-five percent were convicted because of
misidentification. Even though eyewitness has jailed many innocent people getting rid of
eyewitness as a source to convict someone cannot be done. Eyewitness even though there is error
has jailed many guilty men. Misidentification will always occur but it does not weigh out that
eyewitness points out real criminals. The way to go would be to prevent it by trying to lessen the
problems regarding eyewitness. Many innocent people are jailed because of misidentification. If
this can be solved there will be fewer innocent citizens accused for crimes. It is not a solution but
it is a start.







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Works Cited
Gleitman, Henry. Psychology. 8
th
ed. New York: Norton & Company, n.d. Print.
Levs, Josh. "Innocent Man: How Inmate Michael Morton Lost 25 Years of His Life."
CNN. Cable News Network, 04 Dec. 2013. Web. 04 May 2014.
"Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie ." Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie. N.p., n.d.
Web. 04 May 2014.
McCormack, Simon. "Daniel Villegas Exonerated: Man Convicted Of Murder 20 Years
Ago." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 14 Jan. 2014. Web. 04 May 2014.
Pelaez, Vicky. "The Prison Industry in the United States: Big Business or a New Form of
Slavery?" Global Research. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 May 2014.
"Prison History." Architects/Designers/Planners for Social Responsibility. N.p., n.d.
Web. 04 May 2014
Ritter, Nancy. "DNA Solves Property Crimes (But Are We Ready for That?)." National Institute
of Justice. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 May 2014
Schenwar, Maya. "35,948 Arrested Yesterday." Truthout. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 May 2014.
"The Innocence Project - Home." The Innocence Project - Home. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 May
2014.