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Manson v. Brathwaite

Supreme Court of the United States · 1977 · Criminal Procedure

Criminal Proceduredue processeyewitness identificationsuggestive procedurereliability testFourteenth Amendmentdue processeyewitness identification

Facts

An undercover state trooper bought heroin from a man who opened an apartment door twice while the trooper stood within two feet of him in natural light. Minutes later, the trooper gave another officer a description of the seller, and two days later, while alone, he identified the seller from a single photograph left in his office. At trial, the prosecution offered no explanation for using a single photograph rather than a lineup or photographic array, and the trooper made both out-of-court and in-court identifications of respondent. The identification evidence was the sole evidence tying respondent to the crime.

Issue

Does the Due Process Clause require automatic exclusion of pretrial identification evidence obtained through a police procedure that was both suggestive and unnecessary, without regard to reliability? More specifically, does the reliability analysis of Neil v. Biggers apply to post-Stovall identifications as well as pre-Stovall identifications?

Rule

The admissibility of identification testimony under the Due Process Clause turns on reliability under the totality of the circumstances, not on a per se rule excluding all identifications obtained through unnecessarily suggestive procedures. The factors to be considered are the witness' opportunity to view the criminal at the time of the crime, the witness' degree of attention, the accuracy of the witness' prior description, the level of certainty demonstrated at the confrontation, and the time between the crime and the confrontation, weighed against the corrupting effect of the suggestive identification itself.

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One of 10 multiple-choice questions for this case. Pick an answer to see why.

In Phoenix, an undercover officer bought stolen watches from a man in a well-lit garage at midday. The officer stood face-to-face with the seller for about three minutes, immediately gave a detailed description including height, hairstyle, facial scar, and jacket color, and the next day identified the seller from a single photograph left on the officer's desk by another detective.

If the defendant argues that the out-of-court identification must be excluded because the police unnecessarily used a single photograph instead of a photo array, how should the court rule?

Explanation. The majority rejected a per se exclusionary rule for unnecessarily suggestive identification procedures. Reliability is the linchpin. The court must weigh the Biggers factors—opportunity to view, degree of attention, accuracy of prior description, certainty, and timing—against the corrupting effect of the suggestive procedure. Here, those reliability indicators are strong, so due process does not require automatic exclusion.