Title
Arizona Justice Project
Description
The Arizona Justice Project in a not For Profit charitable organization that was formed in 1998 to focus on addressing wrongful convictions. As part of these efforts, the Arizona Justice Project collaborated with the Arizona Attorney General's Office to develop best practices of the Eyewitness Identification Process. This item provides an overview of the recommendation best practices as it relates to eyewitness identification.
THIS ITEM IS FOR INFORMATION AND DISCUSSION.
Report
Summary
In 2024, the Arizona Attorney General's Office conducted a survey of eyewitness identification processes by Arizona agencies. The Arizona Justice Project and Attorney General's Office collaborated to develop 12 best practice recommendations to improve eyewitness identification and reduce the significant number of misidentifications, which has led to hundreds of wrongful convictions in the United States. The following recommendations are also in alignment with the best practices published by the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) in 2016.
Pre-identification-procedure interview - Officers should be specifically trained in cognitive interviewing to obtain as much detail as possible from the witness in their own words and avoid leading or suggestive questioning or implanting details.
Evidence-based suspicion to include a suspect in a line-up - There should be articulable grounds to suspect the individual is guilty of the crime being investigated and the ground for the suspicion should be documented prior to conducting the lineup.
One suspect per lineup - If there is more than one suspect, include only one in each lineup or photo array and place each suspect in different positions in each lineup or photo array.
Lineup fillers - All lineups should contain at least five appropriate fillers to keep the suspect from standing out. All fillers should match the description provided by the eyewitness.
Double-blind (or equivalent) procedure - Lineups should be conducted without the administrator nor the witness knowing who the suspect is in the lineup.
Pre-lineup instruction protocol - Officers should not inform the witness of any information that the witness has not already provided nor should officers suggest that the culprit will be present in the lineup or that anyone in the lineup has been arrested.
Confidence statement - A confidence statement should be taken from the witness as soon as an identification decision is made and should be in the witness' own words and recorded.
Avoid repeated identification procedures with the same witness and same suspect - Only one identification procedure should be administered with the same suspect and the same witness.
Separate witnesses - Do not conduct a lineup with more than one witness present at a time.
Require video-recording - The entire identification procedure, from pre-lineup instructions through the witness confidence statement, should be video-recorded with a dual focus on the administrator and the witness.
Avoid show-up procedures whenever possible - Avoid show-ups, which is a file or one-on-one identifications involving the presentation of a single suspect to a witness without any fillers.
Sequential vs. simultaneous - The Arizona Justice Project does not take a position on conducting an identification sequentially (showing a witness one suspect at a time) or simultaneously (presenting six or more suspects all at once to the witness).
Each of the 12 recommendations will be discussed in greater detail during the Public Safety and Justice Subcommittee meeting.
Department
Responsible Department
This item is submitted by Assistant City Manager Lori Bays and the City Council Offices.