Wrongful convictions and prototypical black features: Can a face‐type facilitate misidentifications?

Abstract

PurposeEyewitness misidentification is the leading cause of wrongful convictions, and Black men, more than other racial groups, are affected by this memory error. A subgroup of Black men who have stereotypically Black features (dark skin, wide lips, and nose) are associated with the criminal‐Black‐man stereotype more than their atypical counterparts. This perception of criminality leads to harsh sentencing and misidentification from line‐ups in laboratory studies. In this study, we investigated whether face‐type biases that lead to misidentifications in the laboratory extend to real‐world cases.MethodParticipants rated the face stereotypicality of Black men exonerated by the Innocence Project (IP) with DNA evidence, who were incarcerated due to eyewitness misidentification (IP eyewitness) and for non‐misidentification reasons (IP other).ResultsHigher stereotypicality‐face ratings were given to IP eyewitness exonerates than to IP other exonerates regardless of participant race. Moreover, the face ratings were unrelated to the race of the eyewitness in the actual case (i.e., cross‐race, same race), suggesting that cross‐race misidentification was not associated with higher stereotypicality ratings of the IP eyewitness exonerates.ConclusionsThese findings are consistent with extant laboratory research wherein Black men with stereotypical facial features are at increased risk for eyewitness misidentification and that face‐type biases extend beyond cross‐race judgements. These results further highlight the risk of face‐type judgements in misidentifications that potentially contribute to error in real‐world cases.