Identifying Accused Criminals

When a crime occurs, police become informed by citizens who call either 911 for emergencies, recently committed crimes, and crimes in progress, or who call non-emergency police numbers for cold crimes. When calls are received, trained police dispatchers gather information from the caller. When a crime is in progress or recently committed, dispatchers will ask a series of questions relating to the description of the offending parties. Larger police departments might have dispatch units with specialized workers; some who answer 911 calls and enter information into a computer system and others who communicate that information to police officers on the street via radio. Most modern police officers have radios both in the vehicles and on their bodies as part of the uniform. In smaller departments, the dispatchers handle both the task of answering phones and relating the information from the caller to the officers on patrol.

Good dispatchers know how to prioritize time while a crime is in progress by eliciting as complete a description of the offenders as possible and transmitting it in a timely fashion to mobile police units. Upon receiving the information, police can then immediately respond to the scene in an effort to render aid and use the description as a guide to apprehend the offenders. Any persons who substantially fit the description are subject to being stopped and investigated.

Show up

When a crime is completed but recently committed, the culprits will likely still be relatively nearby, depending on the method of transportation, which is usually a car, bicycle, or foot. Most often the responsible parties will be traveling away from the scene and police will use the description to search the area for fleeing persons fitting the description given by the witnesses who called to report the crime. If a suspect is found within a reasonable time and distance of the scene of the crime, that suspect will be stopped and held. Any available victim or witnesses will be brought to the location of the suspect and be allowed to view the person stopped either to confirm or deny that the person stopped is the offender in the crime. In an attempt to alleviate fear or intimidation, police usually utilize techniques to prevent the suspected criminal from observing the identifying party.

Line up

Perhaps the best-known technique for identifying a suspected criminal offender often portrayed in movies and television shows, a lineup involves a number of persons, usually six or so, who stand in a line to be viewed by an identifying party. Again, techniques are used to keep the identifier anonymous. The lineup consists of at least one person suspected by the police to be the offender and the balance are plants, sometimes even police officers, who closely resemble the same basic description as the suspect.

Photo array

A photo array is similar to a lineup but photographs are used instead of live persons.

Photo books

When police have insufficient leads to identify a suspect, they might request that victims or other witnesses look through books containing photos of frequent offenders of similar crimes in the area, to begin the process of initially identifying a suspect.

Know your rights and protect them

The Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution provide protections from improper police identifying techniques. The above procedures must strictly comport with the parameters provided by the Constitution, and deviations will render them inadmissible in court. For example, once criminal proceedings have begun, any criminal suspect submitting to a lineup is entitled to have an attorney present, and any undue suggestions on the part of the police regarding identity can render the process inadmissible. If you or a loved one was identified as the offender of a crime, contact the criminal defense attorneys at The Nahajski Firm at (206) 621-0500 for a free and confidential initial consultation. We serve the Seattle and Puget Sound Areas.