Opinion ID: 416515
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Bass' In-Court Identification

Text: 29 Approximately two weeks after the robbery, the teller, Bass, was asked to identify the robber from among a pretrial photographic spread prepared by the FBI. The photographic spread consisted of nine photographs of white males of similar age and possessing similar facial characteristics. Bass selected Barrett's photograph as strongly resembling the robber, although she was not certain of the identification. The day before the trial, Bass was again shown the photographic spread along with the surveillance photographs and two smaller photographs of Barrett before he had shaved his beard and mustache. At trial, she made a positive in-court identification of Barrett. 30 Convictions based on in-court identification following a pretrial identification by photograph will be set aside where the photographic-identification procedure was so impermissibly suggestive as to give rise to a substantial likelihood of misidentification. Simmons v. United States, 390 U.S. 377, 384, 88 S.Ct. 967, 971, 19 L.Ed.2d 1247 (1968). Barrett's principal contention is that the pretrial photographic spread was so impermissibly suggestive that it tainted Bass' subsequent in-court identification. 15 Specifically, Barrett asserts that (1) he was the only person in the photographic display wearing dark glasses (the robber had been described as wearing dark glasses); (2) his photograph was one of five in which height lines typical of a booking facility appeared in the background; (3) all the men in the photographic spread were clean-shaven, implicitly indicating that the robber had shaved; and (4) he was the largest person in the photographic spread. 31 We have examined the photographic spread and agree with both the trial judge's observation that it was an extraordinarily fair throwdown, 16 and his finding that the spread was not impermissibly suggestive. See United States v. Collins, 559 F.2d 561, 563 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 434 U.S. 907, 98 S.Ct. 309, 54 L.Ed.2d 195 (1977). All the men in the photographic display are remarkably similar in appearance. The only noticeable difference is that Barrett is the only one wearing photosensitive glasses and thus his glasses have a darker tint than those worn by the others. But even this difference is barely noticeable and does not serve to single out Barrett from the others. 32 Moreover, even if there were some suggestiveness in the photographic-spread identification, we find that Bass' in-court identification was sufficiently reliable to justify its admission. The reliability of an in-court identification is the linchpin in determining its admissibility. Manson v. Brathwaite, 432 U.S. 98, 114, 97 S.Ct. 2243, 2253, 53 L.Ed.2d 140 (1977); United States v. Field, 625 F.2d 862, 866 (9th Cir.1980). The Supreme Court has identified five factors among the totality of the surrounding circumstances that we must consider in assessing the reliability of the identification testimony. They are: 33 1. [t]he opportunity of the witness to view the criminal at the time of the crime, 34