Duke Photo ID: Only Photos of Players Included
This is a continuation of yesterday's post, Duke Accuser's Photo Identifications of the Lacrosse Players.
The defense received a copy of the lineup details Friday. Sure enough, the only photos shown were of Duke lacrosse players.
To obtain the identification, Durham police showed the woman photos of the 46 lacrosse team members one at a time, sources said. The woman said she was 100 percent certain that Finnerty and Seligmann were involved and 90 percent certain that a third player was involved.
....Defense attorneys also noted that two people at the party who aren't on the lacrosse team weren't included in the photos shown to the woman. Those two people also have never submitted DNA samples to authorities for testing, attorneys said.
This increases the chance for misidentification. But, as I wrote yesterday,
- Guidelines for eyewitness identification procedures are not law. They are best practices.
- This does not mean the identifications will be suppressed, although the defense can request suppression arguing that the procedure used was impermissibly suggestive rendering the resulting identification unreliable.
- If the case goes to trial, the defense likley will use a psychological expert like Gary Wells or Elizabeth Loftus to explain the principles of eyewitness identification and memory to the jury so they can determine what weight to place on the accuser's identification.
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