Added: 3 years ago
From: CBSNewsOnline
Views: 46,107
Sort by time | Sort by thread (beta)

Link to this comment:

Share to:

All Comments (104)

Sign In or Sign Up now to post a comment!
  • I don't think that should even be a step in the investigation (picture or suspect line-up.) That makes it so easy for someone's brain to form an implanted memory.

  • at 5:05 #3 got some big hips lol

  • I wonder how many people in the history of man has had there lives fucked over due to faulty eye witness testimonies... Considering the age of the witch trials, I would say Probably thousands

  • Looks like 2 people picked Cotton :/

  • that bitch looks like yoda 12:45

    

  • How did bobby poole die in prison ? does anyone know ?

  • @AdesolaLeah most likely another inmate killed him. inmates that aren't in prison for any sexual crime usually try to kill the inmates that are.

  • @NiAmbiTheMelody Ohhh yeaa most probably

  • hahhaha 'an eye witness fingered the wrong person' 00:22

  • HAHAHAHA 0:23 fingered the wrong person

  • OMG Dr. Gary Wells is my professor...I really loves his class :)

  • Only $110,000?!

  • @Kianayala HE IS BLACK. WHAT DO U EXPECT. THAT LIKE £5000 PER YEAR FOR 11 YEARS. THEY ARE TAKING THE PISS

  • Comment removed

  • that man is a good man becuase i would honestly believe if that happened to me i would say if i spent 11 yrs in jail for something i didnt do i would want to kill the person who put me there and finish life sentence happliy. unfortunately thats not the way to think but i cant help it Ronald Cotton true angel

  • EWT is allways changed and rearranged

  • She looks like Angela from The Office.

  • applause :)

  • This is absolutely fascinating. Again the problem seems to be bringing in a person that looks like the description to the line up but I don't see a way round this.

    There was a case in the U.K. where a woman picked a guy she saw on the street as someone that tried to take her kid. She was convinced and he was arrested and tried but only let off when they discovered his face was on the same page as the story about her child in the local press regarding an unrelated fluff story about his career.

  • @AntiFaithNY not a coincidence... people from different ethnic groups cannot easily distinguish different individuals because of the way people scan faces when they are looking at a face from a different ethnic group to their own.!

  • I know it is a very serious documentary about eye - witness testimony, and im watching this video for my psychology course.. but.. COME ON...

    "75 % of this innocent people were convicted because an eye - witness 'fingered' the wrong person."... we saw this in class... even the teacher strted rofling...

  • @CallMeMaQ i knew i wasn't the only one whose mind was in the gutter lmao

  • Whitey pickin' Cotton cuz it's easy to blame a black guy.

  • i see nothin but black people in the system.....

  • @onlyasin12

    Yeah isnt that something.But we black people are just using the race card....

    Only a unbiased intellectually responsible person can admit that theres something racially wrong with the system.

    85% of convicts are poor.Which mean public defenders,which means lack of proper care for certain cases along with the strain from the PD case loads.

    I make some great points dont I

  • he gets 10,000 dollars per year for spending his life in the prison due to faulty line-up? That is bullshit. The government should pay him more. He technically spent his time "working" 24hrs/day, 7days/wk in the prison. He could have made more than a million working like a dog for 11 years.

  • I actually did the calculation out of curiousity. If he makes 10 dollars an hour for his work (which I believe is lower than min. wage now), he could've made 963,600 dollars in 11 years (no spending - because as a matter of fact, he never got a chance to spend his money in prison). That is sooo close to million. Shame on all the police departments and so on. I feel really sorry for that man.

  • no, what its saying is reinforcment alters memories of idiots

  • It'll probably be a really good advantage if people took psychology (or, if they can, the study of memory) if they want to be like a police person or something similar :]

  • @Gleek592 shut up you piece of trash. so bcos you dated one black man you suddenly think you're not racist? women do anything..but in anycase i am talking about this racist bitch in the video NOT you cos i dont give a hoot about you. YOU have a problem with reality. and all the 60mins you watch in the world wont change the fact that white women especially are ignorant racist prejudiced towards blackmen. but can play nice when it suits them. now piss off and stop responding cos u make no sense

  • @pirell You're very, very fond of telling people to "shut up". I know it's hard to read things that don't confirm your world view, but it's a sign of maturity to engage rather than lash out.

  • @Gleek592 shut your mouth you idiot. racism is to act out a prejudice of inferiority, to assume based on prejudice. This woman is a typical example of an overwhelming majority of white women's opinions of black men. I am not racist, this woman clearly is.

  • @pirell You do know that she and Ronald Cotton are good friends now? Once more - have you actually watched this story?

  • This woman mistake wasnt psychological, its a classic example of white people and their fucking ignroant racist thoughts to say black people all look alike. fucking idiot shoudl get raped again. 

  • @pirell You didn't watch and/or understand the video. Did you see the part where the white journalist made mistakes identifying white faces?

  • @zhimbo white people will find any lie to exonerate themselves from wrong doing. the journalist;'s mistake was scientific. when you were raped by someone right on top of you, you shouldve got a good look, but this racist bitch just made it clear in her mind to get any black man since they all look alike, her mistake was no scientific mistake and that whole test is bullshit. come steal my money from my pocket and run away and see if i cant pick you out in a line up. fuck that bullshit xperimnt

  • @pirell All of your ranting just continues to show you haven't watched and/or understood the story. Did you watch both parts 1 and 2?

    This is a very important story about how memory works. Everyone needs to understand that - it's about memory - HUMAN memory, not Jennifer's memory.

  • @pirell Also: your arrogance that YOU could never make such a mistake is exactly the delusion that needs to be debunked. EVERYONE can and DOES make mistakes like this.

  • @zhimbo again i say STFU. making a mistake over a 2 second clip as in the this so called experiement is not the same as someone raping you and the victim claiming she studied his face. but in her racist ignorant mind, similar to most white women, all black people look alike. most of the eye witness mistakes are cases of WHITE people wrongly accusing BLACK people of crimes. fuckign racist bitch..this is not a scientific mistake, its a scientific fact that white people are racist

  • Comment removed

  • @pirell oh no! "STFU". I'm so very intimated by your internet based acronym attack!

    It's exactly and precisely the point that eyewitness memory isn't as reliable as people think. This has been shown in many cases, in many ways. Other cases of mistaken identity have occured in within-race cases. (e.g., white eyewitness, white person wrongfully identified).

    I know you desperately want this to be about racism, but it just isn't.

  • @pirell @pirell For an example, do a search on this bit of text, written by Marc Green:

    "Australian eyewitness expert Donald Thomson appeared on a live TV discussion about the unreliability of eyewitness memory. He was later arrested, placed in a lineup and identified by a victim as the man who had raped her. "

    A white man, misidentified as a rapist, due to false memory. Blows away your "this so-called mistake could only possibly be racism!!!!" argument, doesn't it?

  • Comment removed

  • "That to me is one of the most beautiful things, is i dont have a face"

    hahahahaha

  • lool an eye witness fingured the wrong person...why do i have such a dirty mind

  • picking cottens? come on...

  • If you haven't read the book yet Picking Cotton, go get it. It's cool because you get both Ronald's and Jennifer's view of what happened.

  • @ericaxwonderland Yeah, it's really good. I'm reading it now as a requirement but it's actually very interesting. It's what made me watch this video. lol. From the beginning Jennifer irritated me for some reason. I mean watching this, it's understandable that she made a mistake, but I'm surprised Ron Cotton was so forgiving after how much she accidentally put him through...

  • that guy i think he's a psycholoist has beautiful eyes

  • this is very sad, it illustrates the huge limitation of eyewitness testimony. own race bias where she had difficulty discriminating between two black men, and then a false sense of confidence that she had chsen the right person led her to not even examine the thought tthat it was booby poole who was culprit, when the retrial was given

  • Whoa wait, why was OJ found innocent?

  • Jennifer Thompson is a complete monster.

  • @papabungle You didn't watch the video, did you?

    This video is about EVERYONE'S memory, not just Ms. Thompson's. Literally ANYONE could make a similar mistake.

  • @zhimbo And? People should be held accountable for their mistakes. If I accidentally run over a family of 20, should it be excused because they looked like air and thus, I did not see them?

  • @papabungle You said she was a "monster". She's HUMAN, which is exactly why this happened.

    It is THE ENTIRE POINT OF THE STORY that these are normal consequence of how human memory works.

    Also, if you watch the story, you can see the remorse and pain she went through because of her mistake.

    So: Due to completely normal and universal human attributes, she makes a mistake, and she feels great remorse for the mistake and works to make things better.

    And you call her a "monster"?

  • @zhimbo thats bullshit.. this is just how white people want to make themselves look good that its a psychological mistake. fucking bitch. SHE should go prison herself. that way she can get raped properly. she's a cunt.

  • @pirell You're simply adorable, like a little troll doll.

  • @papabungle I agree

  • OMG! Its Elizabeth Loftus~~!!! She is an awesome psychology! One of my favourites.

  • @annelegaspi  Lol *psychologist.

  • that is simply amazing, and what North Carolina has done with eye witness testimonies should be done in all states.

  • I like Jennifer. This woman is very sincere.

  • "Treating memory like a crime scene...." That's a great way to go.

  • I think the idea that imnnocent people aren't convicted is an idea that people tell themselves bc it makes it easier for them to dpo their jobs w/o guilt or shame.

  • 2:22 oh , they do look awfully siimilar!

  • Eyewitness testimony is important to a court case but to depend solely on it has some serious drawbacks.

  • I think in many ways that is the point. Juries will often believe a credible witness over a lot of other evidence because you have to really weigh up the other evidence carefully while we tend to instantly decide that someone cannot be lying.

  • sosmart, I think you have nailed this one. If other people of the same racial group say they look alike them we can't pin it all on racism.

  • @MTAllenby Yeah , when Is ay they look alike I really don't feel like I am being racist. I really think Booby Poole and Ronald Cotton really do bear a strong physical resemblance to each other.

  • Our ability to spot distinctions in facial features is based at least in part on early childhood experiences. If we see mainly faces of our own racial group we notices differences that a strongest in our own racial group. This is not racism in itself, it only becomes racism when be take the fact that we do find it harder to spot individual differences in other racial groups to suggest that this means other racial groups are 'all alike' and so get into dnagerous stereotypes.

  • I don't think we can blame anyone for the wrongly conviction. Even the most educated/experienced person were shocked when hearing about this case. We learned from our mistakes and that's what matters.

  • tell that to the guy in prison for 20-30 years

  • THere are alot of people to blame for this, the most educated people got Ronald off because they did their job. The prosecutor of the second case who was gun ho about trailing Ronald, never even apologized. There was no conclusive evidence, all evidence was circumstantial. We can blame the people within our judicial system that do not take the time or effort to make sure that they are convicting the right guy. We can also blame the prosecutor for trailing the defendant with an all white jury

  • Does anyone else feel the need to SMACK that blond reporter? I know it's their job, but I can't stand when interviewers act like grave, personal subjects are coffee-table matters.

  • Ronald Cotton is my uncle and I'm not even black...

  • this only happens in the usa

  • I think you are fooling yourself. The memory processes are the same the world over and it is a danger in all jury based legal systems. Most of us would be convinced by a victim who was so sure of themselves regardless of what country we are from.

  • Look all I'm saying is that she acted in malice, she may not have knew exactly wat her rapist looked like but even in the second trial she didn't even care to examine the other guy to possibly be like ohhh it could be him. No ones perfect I understand that and everything happens for a reason, but two wrongs don't make a right. My sister was raped, so i understand her anger. PRAYING to GOD for him to die isn't christian like, GOD fights all battles for us.

  • It's pretty amazing how their frienship blossomed though. This was indeed a very intresting case

  • Your name is SOO smart!! WRONG you ass! Look at what your typing before you post, "she acted with no malice?? are you kidding me?? Fucking unbelievable. First of all she prayed every night for this guy to die and be raped in prison in case you didn't hear that. Ergo (THEREFORE) just in case im too witty for you, she acted in malice! Secondly the second victim "Poole" deserves Cotton's time cause Jennifer was so angry at him she still assumed it was Cotton even when she saw the actual rapist.

  • If over 200 cases have been proven to be false...then common sense dictates that there are thousands upon thousands more that have yet to be discovered as false.

    Ronald Cotton is not anything other than AWESOME! Truly. I can only hope that I would be as forgiving, if I faced this, as he is. Bless his heart.

  • This is such crap. I don't blame Jennifer because she did what anyone would do, she picked the one who look the most like the assailant. But how do you people assume these two black guys look anything alike is beyond me. I don't see a resemblance with these two. It just perpetuates the myth that ' all blacks look alike'; which means that 'all blacks are suspects if one black person is identified'.

  • How can you say that? they can actually go for brothers you nit-wit!!! Im african american and it seems that the right thing happened at the end of the day...but i cant believe that you have the audacity to say, "that they dont look alike, all blacks are suspects" and even though she a horrid crime happened to Jennifer, yes she can be blamed!!!! Ronald Cotton spent 11 years of his life in prison, in which he only recieved a check for $110,000...wow this fuckin person unbelieveable!!!

  • Number 1, your dumbass. Number 2, don't think I'm suppose to give your statement some kind of credit because you claim, "I'm a African American", either. Number 3, what fucking side are you on? All blacks don't look alike, and these two blacks guys damn sure look nothing alike. Number 4, you can't blame that white women because she was reassured by the police that at least one of the photos in the line up was her rapist, so naturally she picks someone she thinks looks like him. Your an idiot.

  • Even bad things happen for a reason. It is a great thing that Ron Cotton is not acting like a victim and is doing something to help others. Those that want to speak bad of Jennifer should realize this could happen to them. We all could be that victim who makes this mistake.

  • it's scary knowing that this could really happen to somebody. even if you get exhonerated, you just lost all those years living in a cage while they sorted the whole thing out. And to know that this has happened around 233 times. really is scary.

  • this woman is trying to make money off from this book from a man she wrongfully convicted and had to spend 11 yrs of his lives in jail? man america is a shocking country.

  • that women sent that poor man to jail for 11 years i dont know how the hell i would be able to forgive her........that man is one in a million what a great kind hearted person truly is person

  • Comment removed

  • @chrisok115 Ronald Cotton is making money too. I think it is great they decided to tell their story because this could happen to anyone.

Loading...
Alert icon
0 / 00Unsaved Playlist Return to active list
    1. Your queue is empty. Add videos to your queue using this button:
      or sign in to load a different list.
    Loading...Loading...Saving...
    • Clear all videos from this list
    • Learn more