Three Forms Of Witness Identification Essay

In chapter 17 we discussed the three forms of witness identification, lineups, showups and photographic identification. I have been a police officer for a little over 10 and half years and have seen all three of these used on several cases. We have seen several police movies who would bring in a victim into the police station to help identify the offender by a lineup of five to six people of similar build and exterior features. Now when the victim attempts to identify the offender somehow the victim feels that this person can see them through the glass window that separates them from the offender. Now this does not happen in real life. The glass that stands between the offender and the witness is built to keep the victim from being seen. The lineup form of identification helps the victim see

This helps the police officers close the case without having to conduct a long drawed out investigation. It helps with the victim’s memory of the offender due to the time that the officers placed the him into custody. The downside to this is that the victim only sees one person that they must identify as the offender which could lead to false identification. When we deal with photographic identification this can be helpful in helping the offender by giving them photos of the offender in the processes of committing the crime. It helps to show and trigger the memory of the victim to see these type of photographs. The photograph of the offender can be admissible without an attorney because the offender is not present and does not need an attorney to protect them. The problem with this, is that sometimes the photograph is not clear and can sometimes show a silhouette of the accused