Court Opinion

ID: 9496773
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:34:58.790852+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:57:47.309483
License: Public Domain

COLE, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Because I believe: (1) that the in-court identification procedure was impermissibly suggestive; and (2) that the totality of the circumstances, using the five-part analysis set forth in Biggers, clearly demonstrates that the identification was not independently reliable, I respectfully dissent.
The majority correctly sets out the two-step analysis that must be undertaken when determining the admissibility of an identification, and also correctly notes the five Biggers factors that we are to consider in the second step of the analysis. However, I believe that the majority’s application of the test to the facts of the present case is flawed.
I.
First, we must consider whether the in-court identification procedure was imper-missibly suggestive. I believe that it was. The district court made clear that the pretrial photographic identifications were undoubtedly impermissibly suggestive. If we accept that the pre-trial photo identifications were impermissibly suggestive, as I think it is clear we must, the question becomes whether there is a principled basis for concluding that the in-court identification is not.
I am unable to find any principled distinction between the two. In stating that the in-court identification was not imper-missibly suggestive, the majority essentially notes two factors which indicate that the identification was based on Shaw’s recollection of the incident rather than on a recollection of the photographs. First, approximately a year and a half had elapsed between the last photo lineup and the in-*828court identification. .Second, Meyer’s appearance at the time of the in-court lineup differed from his appearance in the photograph, and the district court’s lineup included Meyer and seven men of similar age and general, appearance. In actuality, neither of. these reasons, independently or taken together, support the notion that the in-court identification was somehow unaffected by the prior taint.
While a year and a half had in fact elapsed from the last photo lineup to the in-court identification, over five years had elapsed since the commission of the crime, It seems logical to conclude that, while the taint of the suggestive photo lineups, had dissipated with time, Shaw’s ability to recognize the robber from the day of the crime itself had dissipated to an even greater degree. Indeed, it might more likely be presumed that, because of the lengthy amount of time that had elapsed between the offense itself and the in-court identification, Shaw was all the more likely to have lost his recollection of the event itself, and therefore replaced his memory of the perpetrator’s appearance with images from the more recently viewed photographs.
Additionally, the fact that Meyer’s appearance in court differed from his appearance in the prior photograph, and that the in-court staged lineup included seven other men of approximately the same appearance hardly leads to the inference the majority suggests. Meyer argues that the in-court identification was tainted by the improper photo arrays. The fact that Shaw was able to pick out the very gentleman improperly shown to him from photographs does nothing to demonstrate that the taint from these photographs was no longer present. Moreover, if Meyer’s appearance indeed differed substantially from his appearance in the photograph, it is safe to assume that his appearance also differed at least as substantially from his appearance at the time of the crime. The majority fails to note how the nature of this lineup assuages concerns that Shaw was identifying the man he saw in the improperly suggestive photo arrays rather than the perpetrator of the crime.
Thus, the majority offers no legitimate rationale for distinguishing the in-court lineup from the pre-trial lineups with regard to the impermissibly suggestive nature of the identification. Because the photo lineups were improper, the in-court identification was therefore impermissibly suggestive as well. Thus, our focus should turn to applying the Biggers factors to determine whether the identification nevertheless was independently reliable.
II.
The first Biggers factor is the opportunity of the witness to view the perpetrator at the time of the crime. While the majority finds that this factor weighs heavily in favor of reliability, my view, like the district court, is that this factor weighs only slightly in favor of reliability. While there is little question that the witness did have some opportunity to view the assailant, the encounter was not especially long, and for a substantial portion of the time Shaw was not in a position to observe the robber’s face.
The district court additionally found that the second Biggers factor, the witness’s degree of attention, “cuts only slightly in favor of admissibility.” As the district court noted, Shaw’s testimony indicated that he may have been focused as much on the gun itself as on the gunman’s face, and he was somewhat preoccupied in his search for a way to escape the truck. Thus, I agree that this factor weighs slightly, at best, in favor of reliability.
*829The majority implies that the third factor, the accuracy of the witness’s prior description, cut slightly against reliability. However, as the district court found, this factor was not nearly as tentative as the majority indicates. In fact, the district court stated that the Biggers factor weighed strongly against reliability. At the time of the crime, Meyer was in his early forties. The February 24, 1997, interview report indicates that Shaw described the suspect as a white male in his early thirties, and Shaw testified at the suppression hearing that he originally believed that the suspect may have been in his twenties. As the district court also noted, Shaw described the suspect as having brown hair, but the 1998 photo of Meyer depicted a man whose hair did not match that description. Furthermore, Shaw’s description of the gunman did not mention facial hair, but Meyer has a mustache in each of the subsequent photos. While Meyer’s facial hair certainly could have grown in the interim, there was no indication that this was the case. I therefore agree with the district court that this factor should weigh heavily against reliability.
The fourth Biggers factor is the level of certainty demonstrated by the witness. The district court found that the fourth Biggers is the only one in which the analysis differs from the pre-trial identification to the in-eourt identification. According to the district court, this shift in the fourth factor was sufficient to tip the scale in favor of reliability. With regard to the out-of-court identification, the district court noted that Shaw testified that he was very certain of the identification, but took this certainty “with a grain of salt,” mindful that he was shown the photo under extremely suggestive circumstances. However, because I believe that the in-court identification was also impermissibly suggestive, I think the certainty with which Shaw identified Meyer in court should be viewed with a similar degree of skepticism.
In addressing the fourth Biggers factor, the majority notes that “Shaw’s assurance did not appear to stem from his recollection of the photographs used in the imper-missibly suggestive lineups.” But the majority provides no basis for this assertion. Indeed, I question what Shaw could have done short of saying, “That’s the guy I saw in the picture!” — to make his assurance “appear to stem from his recollection of the photographs.” I am unable to see any logical basis to support the notion that Shaw’s assurance was based on his recollection of the incident rather than his recollection of the tainted photo lineups.
Finally, the length of time between the crime and the confrontation, the fifth Big-gers factor, weighs heavily against reliability. Despite the fact that the majority finds that this factor cuts only slightly in Meyer’s favor, I believe that this factor weighs immensely against reliability to an almost dispositive degree. In fact, in Big-gers itself, the Supreme Court noted that a lapse of seven months between the date of the crime and the time of the confrontation would be “a seriously negative factor in most cases.” 409 U.S. at 201, 93 S.Ct. 375. If a seven-month lapse is generally a “seriously negative factor,” a five-year lapse must be considered exponentially more negative.
In considering the totality of the circumstances, the district court further supported the decision to suppress the pretrial identifications as follows:
[The district court] also finds relevant the fact that Shaw failed to identify Meyer in the second photo lineup. It is true that Meyer’s appearance in that photograph, which was taken in 2000, is quite different from his appearance in *830the photograph Shaw eventually positively identified, which was taken in 1998. Even so, Shaw’s initial failure to identify Meyer suggests that his opportunity to view the gunman at the time of the crime and his degree of attention to the gunman’s appearance ... were perhaps not as great as his testimony would otherwise suggest. If the gunman’s face were truly as emblazoned in Shaw’s memory as he believes it to be, it is unlikely that he would not recognize Meyer after studying the second photo lineup.
I agree fully with this analysis by the district court, and note that this assessment is equally applicable to the in-court identification.
Thus, the first, second, and fourth Big-gers factors cut only slightly, if at all, in favor of reliability. The third and fifth factors, in contrast, weigh strongly against reliability. Accordingly, it is my view that the in-court identification was impermissi-bly suggestive, not independently reliable, and should have been suppressed.
III.
A conviction based on an identification that is so impermissibly suggestive as to give rise to a very substantial likelihood of irreparable misidentification violates the defendant’s constitutional right to due process. See Thigpen v. Cory, 804 F.2d 893, 895 (6th Cir.1986). I, therefore, would find that Meyer’s right to due process has been violated, and would remand the case to the district court for a new trial untainted by an impermissibly suggestive and unreliable identification. Accordingly, we need not reach the second issue in this case, the denial of Shaw’s motion for judgment of acquittal. In this regard, I simply wish to note my agreement with the majority that, with Shaw’s identification admitted as evidence, a rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.
IY.
In sum, I would reverse the district court’s denial of Meyer’s motion to suppress and remand the case to the district court for a new trial.