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Newly released courtroom document in the 2d - degree - murder casing against neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman reveal that , in the month following his fatal shot of Trayvon Martin on Feb. 26 , four key witnesses significantly changed their accounts of what they see and heard that night . The more recent versions of their remembering lean to be more damnatory of Zimmerman than their initial statement .
Which raises the doubtfulness : How reliable are eyewitness ?
Mug Shot from Seminole County Florida for George Zimmerman.
For instance , 24-hour interval after the shot , one woman told constabulary she had seen two men run through the streets and then engage in a fisticuffs . Less than one month later , she tell investigators she reckon just one person running , and could n’t describe his or her appearance as she had n’t had her contact lenses in at the time .
Another witness , who was ab initio interviewed March 20 , say she saw two people on the ground immediately afterthe shootingbut was not trusted which one was on top . In another interview with investigators six days subsequently , she enjoin it had decidedly been Zimmerman on top , explain that she was sure because she had been able to liken Zimmerman ’s and Martin ’s sizing after seeing them on boob tube .
A third witness earlier say he look a dim gentleman’s gentleman ( presumably Martin ) pinning down and punch a lighter - skinned gentleman ( Zimmerman ) who was ring for help . Later , the attestator was n’t certain any punches were thrown or that he had take heed hurt calls .
And a man who initially described Zimmerman as seem bloody and in shock after the shot later implied the shooter had been tranquil , nerveless and collected .
Why do people ’s memories change over time ? And which version of these witnesses ' stories are to be believed — the former 1 untarnished by time , or the later single , perhaps less cloud by what may have been put on impressions imbue betimes on by news reports or police interviewers ?
The reliableness of witness testimonial is a immensely complex subject , but legal scholarly person and forensic psychologists say it ’s possible to extract the truth from contradictory accounts and develop memories . According to Barbara Tversky , prof emerita of psychology at Stanford University , the bottom furrow is this : " All other things adequate , earlier recountings are more likely to be accurate than later I . The longer the holdup , the more likely that subsequent entropy will get confuse with the target retentiveness . "
However , in some cases not all other things are equal .
How we remember
retentivity is a rehabilitative process , says Richard Wise , a forensic psychologist at the University of North Dakota . " When an eyewitness recalls a crime , he or she must reconstruct his or her storage of the crime . " This , he aver , is an unconscious process . To redo a retentiveness , the eyewitness draws upon several seed of information , only one being his or her actual reminiscence .
" To fill in gaps in remembering , the eyewitness trust upon his or her expectation , attitude , prejudices , bias , and anterior knowledge . moreover , information furnish to an eyewitness after a offence ( i.e. , post - event selective information ) by the police force , public prosecutor , other eyewitness , spiritualist , etc . , can alter an eyewitness ’s retentiveness of the criminal offence , " Wise enunciate in an e-mail . [ How Are Memories hive away in the Brain ? ]
That external input is what make eyewitness testimony so unreliable . Eyewitnesses are mostly unaware that their store has been altered by post - event info , and feel convinced they ’re recalling only the incident itself . " Once an eyewitness ’s retentivity of the crime has been altered by post - event information , it is difficult or impossible to restore the eyewitness ’s original memory of the crime , " Wise toldLife ’s Little Mysteries .
Elizabeth Loftus , a law prof at University of California at Irvine , said of the Zimmerman case , " There was so much mass medium coverage that it could be that the Modern information that Trayvon Martin had died , that he was unarmed , the new information about the outcry and scandal , had the potential for contaminating and distorting the watcher ' memory . "
Although the eyewitnesses ' earlier accounts of that disastrous Nox — verbal description that were in the main less damning of Zimmerman — might be closer to the truth , they are n’t what the jury will find out during the trial .
On the witness stick out
According to Clifford Fishman , a law prof at the Catholic University of America , a panel tend to accept as accurate the translation of consequence a witnesser describeswhen testify — " even if that version is discrepant in many meaning ways with that witness ’s earlier statement . " In other words , de jure , the former versions of memories reign supreme . The loading falls to the defence lawyer to point out the weaknesses or inconsistencies in the attestant ’s testimony at trial , and to cast off dubiety in the mind of the juror about the accuracy of the witnesser ’s description . [ What is Reasonable Doubt ? ]
The prosecutors can revenge by disputing the witness ’s earlier score ; to do this , they might demonstrate that the police had ab initio asked go questions or otherwise act upon the witnesses ' statement in a way that made them more harmonic of Zimmerman . In that case , the witnesses ' later descriptions could be proved more trustworthy .
Furthermore , it could be that late additions to accounts , as with the witness who ab initio did not know whether she had check Zimmerman or Martin on top during their fight , but later named Zimmerman , it could be that her fuller memory really had been trip by check Zimmerman on television set . " Appropriate cues given afterwards can retrieve additional reliable information that was not to begin with think , " Tversky noted .
Either way , Loftus said , " It looks like these witnesser are start to have some explaining to do . If they use edition two of their chronicle in tourist court , one attorney or the other is going have access to version one . And that can make the case against Zimmerman weaker . "
