Dallas police drop study, plan photo-lineup changes
08:27 AM CST on Friday, January 16, 2009
By JENNIFER EMILY / The Dallas Morning News
jemily@dallasnews.com
After two years of delays, Dallas police have dropped out of a study designed to determine the best method for showing photo lineups to crime witnesses.
Instead, the department will change its policy to adopt a technique that was to be highlighted in the study. The new approach, called the sequential blind method, is regarded for reducing the number of eyewitness misidentifications.
Dallas Police Chief David Kunkle said Thursday that he ordered the changes because the department could wait no longer to improve its procedures.
"The study was taking way too long, and even with the results, I don't know that it would change where we would end up," Kunkle said. "The standard to where the department should be is a little clearer than it was a few years ago."
No deadline is set for rewriting the policy, but police officials said they want to make the change soon.
Dallas will become just the eighth department in Texas to use the sequential blind lineup, according to a survey by the Justice Project, a nonprofit reform group. Others include Richardson, Lewisville and Haltom City.
Because of the delays, the Urban Institute, the group doing the study, lost its funding from the National Institute of Justice, police said. The Urban Institute thought the study had an automatic extension, police said, but it did not.
Terry Dunworth, who was planning to conduct the study, could not be reached for comment.
Traditionally, Dallas detectives show witnesses photo lineups with six pictures all at once. In the sequential blind method, someone who does not know which photo is the suspect's shows them to the witness one at a time.
Dallas County public defender Michelle Moore, who has represented several exonerees as they sought DNA testing, said it was "about time" the department made the change.
"It's a great improvement for the Dallas Police Department. We've had problems with the way they do things," Moore said. "We all know this is the way to do lineups."
Conflicting information exists about whether the sequential blind method is best. That's why Kunkle said he wanted to participate in the study.
But the chief said Thursday that he is certain that the sequential blind method is the best way to eliminate errors.
Misidentifications have been cited as a key factor in an estimated 75 percent of the 220 wrongful convictions exposed by DNA testing nationwide since 1989.
Dallas County has had 19 DNA-based exonerations – more than any jurisdiction in the nation – since 2001, when a state law began allowing post-conviction DNA testing. Dallas police investigated 13 of the 19 cases. All but one of the exonerations were based on faulty eyewitness testimony, a Dallas Morning News investigation determined last year.
Dr. Gary Wells, an Iowa State University psychology professor who developed the sequential blind method, said the decision "tells me that the DPD is genuinely interested in doing something about this problem and has no interest in latching on to convenient excuses."
"Frankly," Wells said, "the way that the DPD was repeatedly delayed by the Urban Institute from starting this study could easily have been used as an excuse to do nothing."
Two types of photo lineups
TRADITIONAL
How it works: Typically, a detective shows a witness at least six pictures of possible suspects at one time.
Results: Critics say physical and verbal cues from the detectives conducting such a lineup can taint the results, even if the detectives are not deliberately trying to do so. Using a booking photo of a suspect from a past crime (with height markers and ID numbers across the chest, for example) can also suggest guilt in the recent crime.
SEQUENTIAL BLIND
How it works: Photos are shown to a witness one at a time by someone who does not know which picture is the suspect's.
Results: Experiments show that viewing pictures sequentially results in fewer misidentifications when the perpetrator is not in the lineup, probably because the witness isn't just comparing one person with another and picking the person who looks most like the criminal. However, a witness is also less likely to pick the correct person.
SOURCE: Dallas Morning News research
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