The New Jersey Supreme Court ruling in State v. Henderson is available in Adobe .pdf format.
Today's New York Times reports, "In New Jersey, Rules Are Changed on Witness IDs." It's written by Benjamin Weiser.
The New Jersey Supreme Court, acknowledging a “troubling lack of reliability in eyewitness identifications,” issued sweeping new rules on Wednesday making it easier for defendants to challenge such evidence in criminal cases.
The court said that whenever a defendant presents evidence that a witness’s identification of a suspect was influenced, by the police, for instance, a judge must hold a hearing to consider a broad range of issues. These could include police behavior, but also factors like lighting, the time that had elapsed since the crime or whether the victim felt stress at the time of the identification.
When such disputed evidence is admitted, the court said, the judge must give detailed explanations to jurors, even in the middle of a trial, on influences that could heighten the risk of misidentification. In the past, judges held hearings on such matters, but they were far more limited.
The decision applies only in New Jersey, but is likely to have considerable impact nationally. The state’s highest court has long been considered a trailblazer in criminal law, and New Jersey has already been a leader in establishing guidelines on how judges should handle such testimony.
Stuart J. Rabner, the court’s chief justice, wrote in a unanimous 134-page decision that the test for reliability of eyewitness testimony, as set out by the United States Supreme Court 34 years ago, should be revised.
The new rules come at a time of increased scrutiny of the eyewitness identification issue among lawyers, law enforcement officers and the scientific community. The opinion noted that task forces have been formed to recommend or put into effect new procedures to improve reliability.
The State Supreme Court’s ruling was seen as significant because it was based in part on an exhaustive study of the scientific research on eyewitness identification, led by a special master, a retired judge, who held hearings and led a review of the literature on the issue. The special master, Geoffrey Gaulkin, estimated that more than 2,000 studies related to the subject had been published since the Supreme Court’s original 1977 decision, the court noted.
“Study after study revealed a troubling lack of reliability in eyewitness identifications,” Chief Justice Rabner wrote. “From social science research to the review of actual police lineups, from laboratory experiments to DNA exonerations, the record proves that the possibility of mistaken identification is real.
“Indeed, it is now widely known that eyewitness misidentification is the leading cause of wrongful convictions across the country.”
"N.J. Supreme Court rules in favor of tighter restrictions on eyewitness testimony in court," by MaryAnn Spoto in the Newark Star-Ledger.
New Jersey's standards for eyewitness testimony in the courtroom are unreliable and can encourage police misconduct, the state Supreme Court said Wednesday in ordering a revision of investigative and court practices.
The highly anticipated decision is the first formal recognition by the state’s courts of three decades of scientific studies concluding that memory isn’t as reliable as initially believed and that investigators as well as private citizens continue to taint the identification process.
The unanimous 134-page ruling, which relied in part on a study conducted by a retired state appellate judge recommending tighter restrictions on eyewitness testimony, is likely to have far-reaching consequences beyond New Jersey, which has been at the forefront in establishing guidelines for identifying suspects.
“This is a highly significant decision,” said Alan Zegas, a defense attorney from Chatham who represented a defendant in one of the two cases on which the Wednesday’s ruling was based. “The opinion called into question the reliability of eyewitness testimony, which is something that has long been questioned by forensic scientists.
“The issue of reliable identification has been litigated in probably every court across the country,” he added, “but having reached the highest court in New Jersey — which is very highly respected — the two decisions will influence what occurs in other states.”
Although the court kept intact the tradition of lineups and photo arrays of suspects, it ordered judges to hold pretrial hearings if there is evidence of suggestive identification methods. The ruling also directs trial judges to give jurors more instruction on how eyewitness testimony can be influenced.
The AP filing is, "NJ court says witness ID process flawed, orders changes to how such evidence is presented," via the Washington Post.
The ruling is being closely watched because New Jersey has long been at the forefront in identification standards. In 2001, the state became the first to establish police guidelines for lineups designed to prevent mistaken suspect identifications. Other states followed suit.
“There is no question this case will have an effect on every state and federal court in the country,” said Barry Scheck, co-founder of the Innocence Project, a New York legal center specializing in overturning wrongful convictions.
Because New Jersey has already updated guidelines for police on how to conduct lineups and other methods for witness identifications, the ruling will have a greater impact in New Jersey courtrooms.
Just as important as the ruling, Scheck said, was a yearlong review ordered by the state Supreme Court of procedures used by police when they ask witnesses to identify suspects.
Scheck, who presented testimony during the hearings that called for stricter ID standards, called the review the “most extensive examination of social science in the area of eyewitness identification that has been done, using the leading experts around on witness IDs and psychology.”
The review found that a test, created in 1977 and used by courts in 48 states and the federal system, to assess the reliability of witness identification is flawed and inadequate — a finding the court appeared to cement in its ruling Wednesday.
“A vast body of scientific research about human memory has emerged,” wrote Supreme Court Chief Justice Stuart Rabner in a unanimous ruling, which encompassed two cases. “That body of work casts doubt on some commonly held views relating to memory.”
Nationally, eyewitness misidentification is the single greatest cause of wrongful convictions nationwide, playing a role in more than 75 percent of the 273 convictions overturned through DNA testing, according to the Innocence Project, and three of the five exoneration cases in New Jersey involved misidentification.
And:
Because New Jersey already had guidelines in place for police on how to conduct eyewitness identifications and line-ups, the ruling will have a more practical effect in changing the courtroom procedure for challenging those IDs.
New Jersey uses what’s called a sequential blind lineup, a widely praised technique designed to reduce mistakes by witnesses when trying to identify suspects. In sequential blind lineups, mug shots are shown one at a time. Detectives displaying the photos don’t know who the suspect is, which means they can’t intentionally or accidentally tip off witnesses.
Some other states and cities — Dallas, Boston, Minneapolis and Denver, along with North Carolina — use sequential blind lineups or some variation. However, most police departments use a so-called six-pack or other traditional method where a witness views several people or photographs at one time.
Some of the new science presented during the hearings showed that witnesses are likely to stay committed to the first mug shot they pick — even if it’s wrong. It also showed how identifying witnesses who identify someone from a different race increases the chance of misidentification and how the presence of a weapon can distract witnesses from remembering details about a perpetrator.
Michelle Sahn writes, "Changes ordered in witness ID cases. Stems from Monmouth attempted murder conviction," for the Asbury Park Press.
A pair of decisions – issued Wednesday in separate cases stemming from a Monmouth County attempted murder conviction and a Camden County homicide – said that in certain cases, pretrial hearings are necessary to determine whether an eyewitness identification has been tainted by suggestiveness.
The court also said the instructions given to jurors by trial judges about eyewitness testimony should be revised.
“Study after study revealed a troubling lack of reliability in eyewitness identifications,” the court said in its decision on the Camden County case. “From social science research to the review of actual police lineups, from laboratory experiments to DNA exonerations, the record proves that the possibility of mistaken identification is real. Indeed, it is now widely known that eyewitness misidentification is the leading cause of wrongful convictions across the country.”
The court said the current standards do not offer “an adequate measure for reliability or sufficiently deter inappropriate police conduct.”
The justices also said those measures overstate a jury’s ability to “evaluate evidence offered by eyewitnesses who honestly believe their testimony is accurate.”
The Monmouth County case involved an eyewitness identification made outside the presence of police officers.
And:
On Wednesday, in its decision stemming from that Camden reckless manslaughter conviction, the court said if defendants can show some evidence of suggestiveness, which could lead to mistaken identification, then a pretrial hearing should be held.
But in cases where there is no police action involved in the identification process – such as the Ocean Township attempted murder case – defendants must meet a higher burden to trigger a hearing. In those cases, defendants must show there were “highly suggestive circumstances,” not simply suggestive conduct, that could lead to mistaken identification, the court ruled Wednesday.
The next post will contain a news release issued by the Innocence Project. Related posts are in the eyewitness identification index.
