Eyewitness Testimony Part 1

Lesley Stahl reports on flaws in eyewitness testimony that are at the heart of the DNA exonerations of falsely convicted people like Ronald Cotton, who has now forgiven his accuser, Jennifer Thompson.

>>[Leslie Stahl] It's a
cliche of courtroom dramas:

that moment when the eyewitness
is asked, "do you see the person

who committed the crime here
in this courtroom before you?"

Well, it happens in real
courtrooms all the time.

And to jurors, that point of the
finger by a confident witness is

about as damning as
evidence can get.

But there is one type

of evidence that's
even more persuasive

and that, of course, is DNA.

There have been 233
people exonerated by DNA

in this country, and now a
stunning pattern has emerged.

More than three quarters of
them were sent to prison,

at least in part, because an
eyewitness pointed a finger,

an eyewitness who we
now know was wrong.

(chirping)

It was hot and
humid in Burlington,

North Carolina on the
night of July 28, 1984.

Jennifer Thompson, then a
22-year-old college student,

had gone to bed early in
her off-campus apartment.

As she slept, a man shattered the
lightbulb near her back door,

cut her phone line and broke in.

>>[Thompson] I remember kind of waking
up and turning my head to the side

and saying, "who's
there, who is it?"

And I saw the top of
someone's head kind of

sliding beside my mattress.

And I screamed and I felt
a blade go to my throat.

>>[Stahl] A knife?
>>[Thompson] A knife.

And he told me to shut up
or he was going to kill me.

>>[Stahl] Her first thought was

to offer him anything
she had to go away.

>>[Thompson] You can have my credit
card, you can have my wallet,

you can have anything
in the apartment.

You can have my car.

And he looked at me and said,
"I don't want your money."

And I knew what was
getting ready to happen.

>>[Stahl] She vowed to stay
alert and study him so that

if she lived she could
help put him away forever.

>>[Thompson] What is his voice,
does he have an accent?

Does he have a scar?

Is there a tattoo?

>>[Stahl] He's raping you and
you're studying his face?

>>[Thompson] It was just trying
to pay attention to a detail

that if I survived,
and that was my plan,

I'd be able to help
the police catch him.

>>[Stahl] After about half an hour
Jennifer tricked the rapist

into letting her get
up and fix him a drink,

and she ran out the back door.

He fled and raped a second
woman half a mile away.

Detective Mike Gauldin met
Jennifer at the hospital.

>>[Gauldin] The first comment I
remember her making was that "I'm going

to get this guy that
did this to me."

She said "I took the
time to look at him.

I will be able to identify him
if I'm given an opportunity."

>>[Stahl] Detective Gauldin
worked with Jennifer

to make a composite sketch
pouring over eyes, noses, ears,

lips--trying to recreate the
face she had seen that night.

The sketch went out and
tips started coming in.

One of those tips was about a
young man named Ronald Cotton

who worked at a restaurant
near the scene of both rapes

and had a record, a guilty
plea to breaking and entering,

and as a teenager
to sexual assault.

Three days after the rape
Mike Gauldin called Jennifer in

to do a photo lineup.

He lay these six pictures
down on the table,

said the perpetrator may
or may not be one of them,

and told her to take her time.

Did she say immediately
"that's him"?

>[Gauldin] No. She studied
each photograph.

>>[Thompson] I can remember almost
feeling like I was in an SAT test

where you start narrowing
down your choices.

You can discount A and B.

>>[Stahl] Oh, like multiple choice.
>>[Thompson] Exactly.

>>[Stahl] According to the police
report, Jennifer studied the

pictures for five minutes.

>>[Gauldin] She picked
up Ron's photograph

and said that's the
man who raped me.

>>[Stahl] And you must have said,
"Are you sure?" and she said yes?

>>[Gauldin] Yeah, oh yes, certainly.

>>[Stahl] Ronald Cotton heard the
news from his mother's boyfriend.

>>[Cotton] He told me, he said, "Ron,
the police are looking for you."

And I said for what?
And he told me for rape.

I said I didn't commit
such a crime like that.

>>[Stahl] Did you panic?
>>[Cotton] I didn't panic.

I'm trying to figure out why.

>>[Gauldin] He comes in and gives
me a very detailed account

of where he was, who
he was with that night.

As it turns out that
was a false alibi.

>>[Cotton] I realized later that
I had got my weekends confused,

and so therefore I
gave him the reason

to think that I was lying.

>>[Stahl] This was August 1, 1984.
>>[Cotton] Right.

>>[Stahl] You go in
to clear yourself.

When did you actually leave?

>>[Cotton] I didn't.

>>[Stahl] He was locked up and days
later put in a physical lineup.

>>[Cotton] I'm number five.
>>[Stahl] Are you scared?

>>[Cotton] I was very
scared, nervous.

I was so nervous
I was trembling.

You know, I felt my
body just shaking.

>>[Gauldin] They were asked to step
forward, speak and step back.

>>[Thompson] I can remember looking
to the detective and saying "it's

between four and five, can
I have them do it again?"

>>[Stahl] And then she knew it
was number five, Ronald Cotton.

>>[Stahl] Did you feel
absolutely certain?

>>[Thompson] Absolutely certain.

>>[Stahl] Did anybody say
to you, "good job?"

>>[Thompson] Well, what was said

to me afterwards was, "that's
the same person you picked

out in the photo lineup."

So in my mind I thought
bingo, I did it right.

I did it right.

>>[Stahl] In a week-long
trial the jury heard

about Ronald Cotton's
faulty alibi, his clothing

that matched Jennifer's
description,

and a piece of foam found on
her floor that seemed to come

from one of his shoes.

And most powerfully they
heard from Jennifer.

>>[Stahl] When they ask you, "do you
recognize the man who did this

to you?"--did you point to him?

>>[Thompson] Oh, absolutely.
>>[Stahl] It was Ronald Cotton?

>>[Thompson] It was Ronald Cotton.

>>[Cotton] She pointed a finger

and that's all it
takes it seemed like.

>>[Stahl] What did
that feel like?

>>[Cotton] It felt like someone
pushing a knife through me.

>>[Stahl] It took the
jury just 40 minutes.

The verdict: guilty
on all counts.

>>[Thompson] And he was sentenced
to life and 50 years.

And it was for me that
moment that you know

that the justice system
works because I am the victim

and he is a horrible person

and he will never,
ever be free again.

>>[Stahl] Ronald Cotton was
handcuffed, shackled and taken

to North Carolina's
Central Prison.

He was 22-years-old.

>>[Cotton] You know they say grown
men don't cry but that's a lie.

I grabbed my pillow many times

and hugged it wishing
I was hugging my mom,

my dad, sister, brother.

I wish it didn't
have to be this way.

(Background Singing)
>>[Stahl] He started working

in the prison kitchen, singing
in the choir and writing letter

after letter to his attorneys
hoping to get a new trial.

Then one day as he watched
a new inmate being brought in

he had a strange feeling.

>>[Cotton] I said, "excuse me,
you look familiar."

I said, "where are you from?"

He said, "I'm from Burlington."
I said, "I am, too."

I said, "you kind of resemble the
drawing of a suspect in a crime

of which I'm falsely imprisoned for.
"Did you commit this crime?"

And he told me no he did not.
>>[Stahl] Wait a sec.

You saw him and thought
of that composite drawing?

>>[Cotton] Mmm-hmm.

>>[Stahl] His name was Bobby
Poole, and he was in for rape.

He started working in
the prison kitchen too.

>>[Cotton] The stewards were calling
me Poole instead of Cotton.

>>[Stahl] They were
calling you by his name?

>>[Cotton] Yes.

>>[Stahl] In other words people
were mistaking the two of you.

>>[Cotton] Yes, exactly.

>>[Stahl] Then a fellow
inmate told him

that he'd heard Bobby Poole
admit to raping Jennifer

and the other woman that night.

Ronald Cotton won a new trial,

and his lawyers called
Bobby Poole to the stand

with Jennifer sitting
right there.

It was the moment Ronald
Cotton had been hoping for.

Bobby Poole is in the courtroom.

You look over there.

What happens inside you?
>>[Thompson] Nothing.

>>[Stahl] Nothing?
>>[Thompson] Nothing.

As a matter of -- the strongest
emotion I felt was anger

at the defense because
I thought how dare you?

How dare you question me?

How dare you try to
paint me as someone

who could possibly have
forgotten what my rapist looked

like, I mean the one person
you would never forget.

How dare you?

>>[Stahl] Ronald Cotton was
convicted again this time given

two life sentences.

Back in prison seven years later
he and everyone else was riveted

by a big news story, the
trial of O.J. Simpson.

>>[Cotton] I would get my radio
and put my earplugs in,

and go outside, and
sit in a corner.

>>[Stahl] And listen to the trial?
>>[Cotton] Yeah.

>>[Stahl] He was intrigued by
something he had never heard of: DNA.

He wrote to his new attorney,
law professor Rich Rosen.

Rosen warned him that there
probably wasn't any evidence

left to test, and if there
was, DNA could cut both ways.

>>[Rosen] Understand if the
DNA comes back and shows

that you did this crime,

whatever legal issues we have
don't make any bit of difference.

You're going to spend the
rest of your life in prison.

>>[Stahl] He warned you that if it
comes up positive, you're sunk.

>>[Cotton] I told him to put his
foot down and go with it.

>>[Stahl] Packed away on the shelves

of the Burlington Police
Department was 10-year-old

evidence from the
two rapes that night.

Inside one of the rape
kits was a fragment

of a single sperm
with viable DNA.

It proved what Ronald Cotton
had been saying all along,

he was innocent, and the
rapist was Bobby Poole.

(applause)

Within days, Ronald
Cotton was back in court.

>>[judge] You're walking out of
here today as a free man.

>>[Stahl] This time to be released.

So not only do you find out
that Ron didn't do the crime,

you find out Bobby Poole did.

>>[Gauldin] It was just utter
shock, really, disbelief.

I mean, by this time
this is 11 years later.

And, you know, I know that
I've been involved in a case

where a man has lost
11 years of his life.

And I was so sad for
him and his family.

>>[Stahl] In the years since
Ronald Cotton's conviction,

Jennifer had married
and had children.

Are you the one
that tells her?

>>[Gauldin] Yes. Her reaction
"no, that can't be true.

It's not possible."

You know, "I know
Ronald Cotton raped me.

There's no question in my mind."

>>[Thompson] It was like someone
had just taken my life and, like,

turned it upside down.
>>[Stahl] Did she cry?

>>[Gauldin] Oh, she cried.
She broke down.

I mean, she took it all on
herself, you know, the guilt,

you know, "I did this
to that man."

>>[Stahl] Shame?

>>[Thompson] Shame, terrible shame,
a suffocating, debilitating shame.

>>[Stahl] But when she thought
or dreamed about that night,

it was still Ronald
Cotton's face she saw.

To get past it, she
asked if he would meet

with her at a local church.

>>[Thompson] I remember him
walking into the church,

and I physically
could not stand up.

>>[Cotton] She was nervous, scared.

>>[Thompson] I started
to cry immediately.

And I looked at him, and I said,
"Ron, if I spent every second

of every minute of
every hour for the rest

of my life telling you how sorry
I am, it wouldn't come close

to how my heart feels.
I'm so sorry."

And Ronald just leaned
down, he took my hands.

>>[Stahl] Oh gosh.

>>[Thompson] And he looked at me,
he said, "I forgive you."

>>[Cotton] I told her, I said,
"Jennifer, I forgive you."

"I don't want you to
look over your shoulder."

"I just want us to be
happy and move on in life."

>>[Thompson] The minute
he forgave me it's

like my heart physically
started to heal.

And I thought this is what
grace and mercy is all about.

This is what they teach you in
church that none of us ever get.

And here was this man
that I had hated with...

I mean I used to pray
every day of my life

during those 11 years
that he would die.

That he would be raped in prison

and someone would
kill him in prison.

That was my prayer to God.

And here was this man who with
grace and mercy just forgave me.

>>[Stahl] That is overwhelming,
it's overwhelming.

>>[Thompson] Yeah, how wrong
I was and how good he is.

>>[Stahl] How is it that Jennifer
could have studied her rapist

so carefully and still
made this mistake?

And how could she have failed
to recognize Bobby Poole,

the actual rapist, when he
sat right in front of her

in the courtroom
three years later?

That part of the story
when we come back.

(Clock Ticking)