Ronald Cotton Case Study

The Ronald Cotton case is a primary example of an innocent citizen being sentenced to jail by a mistaken eyewitness testimony. The reliability of eyewitness testimonies to what actually occurred is slim. With the help of the justice system, Ronald Cotton was released and compensated, and the number of cases of mistaken eyewitness testimonies decreased.

In July of 1984, an attacker entered the apartment of Jennifer Thompson and proceeded to rape and rob her. In January of 1985, Ronald Cotton was convicted for both the rape and the burglary. He was sentenced to life plus fifty-four years. The evidence presented in the case was a major factor in his prosecution. A photo identification was made by one of the victims along with a police identification

Thompson herself said, "I was just trying to pay attention to a detail, so that if I survived... I'd be able to help the police catch him." She identified Cotton in a photo lineup as well as in a live lineup and she was one hundred percent sure that Ronald Cotton was her attacker ("Ronald Cotton - Innocence Project." Innocence Project RSS. 2016 Innocence Project., n.d. Web. 28 Sept. 2016.). Without her faulty testimony, Cotton wouldn't have been exonerated on June 30th, 1995 or serve ten years in

The inaccuracy of her testimony and the faultiness of the procedures in gathering the eyewitness testimony make this case one of the most known. The first factor is race. Studies have proven that opposite races have difficult times identifying the other race (Finkelstein, Shari. "Eyewitness: Anatomy Of A Story." CBSNews. CBS Interactive, 11 Mar. 2009. Web. 28 Sept. 2016.). Jennifer Thompson was white while her attacker was African American. The second piece is gender; females are better at identifying females and the same applies to males. It's due to the familiarities of the features that one looks at everyday that can be applied when identifying. Procedural reforms have been completed to improve eyewitness reliability but no matter what there is always going to be room for error. It's human nature to make mistakes and when people experience these crimes it's not always their fault if they can't identify their assailant one hundred percent correctly. If only cameras were around at every corner to catch these people.

Mistaken eyewitness testimonies happen pretty frequently, but the Ronald Cotton case received a lot of publicity at the time. This case is only one of many where an innocent person was sent to jail. Authorities can't solely rely on eyewitness testimonies due to the faultiness, but with