Opinion ID: 491683
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: Ramirez' Identification

Text: 49 Ramirez claims on appeal that Mesa's March 23 and in-court identifications violated due process and tainted his convictions. An identification procedure violates due process if it is unnecessarily suggestive and conducive to irreparable mistaken identification. Stovall v. Denno, 388 U.S. 293, 302, 87 S.Ct. 1967, 1972, 18 L.Ed.2d 1199 (1967). Six factors affect whether Mesa's identification was impermissibly suggestive and unreliable: (1) Mesa's opportunity to view Ramirez at the time of the alleged crime; (2) Mesa's degree of attention during the alleged crime; (3) the accuracy of Mesa's identification; (4) Mesa's level of certainty at the time of the identification; (5) the time elapsed between the alleged crime and the identification; and (6) the corrupting influence of the suggestive identification. Manson v. Brathwaite, 432 U.S. 98, 114, 97 S.Ct. 2243, 2253, 53 L.Ed.2d 140 (1977); United States v. Watkins, 741 F.2d 692, 695 (5th Cir.1984); United States v. Atkins, 698 F.2d 711, 713 (5th Cir.1983). 50 On March 22, Mesa viewed Ramirez in close quarters for four or five minutes in normal light. Mesa, like the witness in Manson, was a trained officer: he knew he would have to identify the conspirators, and he was attentive to detail, even under pressure. He identified and arrested Ramirez within twenty-four hours of the crime. At trial about three months later Mesa again identified Ramirez, gave a detailed account of the March 22 transaction, and testified that he had no doubt whatsoever about Ramirez' identity. He also explained that, during the March 23 arrest, he simply picked Ramirez and the other defendants out of a crowd on the boat; he did not use a one-on-one show-up or a planned line-up. 51 Given all these circumstances, Mesa's identification was neither overly suggestive nor likely to result in misidentification.