PROTECTING INNOCENT DEFENDANTS, NAILING THE GUILTY - A MODIFIED SEQUENTIAL LINEUP

Can the traditional lineup procedure be modified in such away as to st ill secure positive identifications of guilty persons while minimizing the risk of misidentifications? Witnesses interacted with a 'culprit' who they were later called upon to identify from a 20-person sequenti al video lineup. Both culprit-present and culprit-absent lineups were employed and witnesses could choose more than one suspect. In 61 culpr it-present lineups 43% chose only the suspect, while in 93 culprit-abs ent lineups no-one did. In culprit-present lineups 25% chose him along with foils, while 5% did so in culprit-absent lineups. Larger lineup size, and the ability to make multiple choices, helped lower the proba bility of choosing only an innocent suspect. Using Baysian analysis, t he probability that a chosen defendant was innocent, based on the line up alone, equalled 0.03, compared to 0.258 in traditional lineups. (C) 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.