On Point blog, page 1 of 1

COA reverses order suppressing identification evidence obtained in a lineup

State v. Andre David Nash, 2018AP1595-CR, 1/7/20, District 1 (not recommended for publication); case activity (including briefs).

Under Wisconsin law, once a defendant shows that an out-of-court identification procedure is impermissibly suggestive, the State has the burden of demonstrating that the identification was still reliable and should be admitted into evidence. Powell v. State, 86 Wis. 2d 51, 66 271 N.W.2d 610 (1978). In this case, the court of appeal held that the circuit court improperly shifted the burden of proof to the State, and so reversed.

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Witness ID of defendant sitting with two others wasn’t a “showup”; no IAC for not getting expert on eyewitness reliability

State v. Melvin Lidall Terry, 2017AP1625, 8/7/18, District 1 (not recommended for publication); case activity (including briefs)

Police arrested Terry, his girlfriend Carter, and his brother X.C. soon after, and in the vicinity of, a fatal shooting. The police seated the three on the curb and directed one man who had witnessed the shooting to “look over and identify who it was”; he identified Terry.

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Lineup procedure was not suggestive

State v. Jamey Lamont Jackson, 2017AP968-CR, Distirct 1, 3/6/18 (not recommended for publication); case activity (including briefs)

Jackson argues his trial lawyer should have moved to suppress the identifications of him in a live lineup viewed by three eyewitnesses to a crime. He claims the identification procedure was impermissibly suggestive because, before the witnesses were interviewed about whether they could identify anyone in the lineup, one witness asked to view the person in position number five (Jackson) again and therefore suggested to the other witnesses who they should identify. (¶¶3, 11). The court of appeals disagrees.

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