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Thursday, November 03, 2011

Courts - "Supreme Court examines reliability of eyewitness testimony"

Joan Biskupic of USA TODAY has a long story today about the oral argument before the SCOTUS yesterday in the case of Perry v. New Hampshire. The story begins:

WASHINGTON – Supreme Court justices on Wednesday challenged the notion that testimony from arguably unreliable eyewitnesses should be specially scrutinized at trial because of how it can lead to wrongful convictions.

"Why is unreliable eyewitness identification any different from unreliable anything else" introduced at trial, Justice Antonin Scalia asked during arguments in a New Hampshire case.

"Eyewitness identification evidence is unique," responded lawyer Richard Guerriero. He represents a man whose theft conviction was based partly on the report of a woman who said she watched him out her apartment window. Guerriero called mistaken IDs "the leading cause of miscarriages of justice."

Lyle Denniston of SCOTUSblog posted a long analysis yesterday afternoon headed "Argument recap: Eyewitnesses discredited? Hardly."

For background, start with this ILB entry from Sept. 1, 2011.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on November 3, 2011 10:04 AM
Posted to Courts in general