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Although it is estimated that domestic abuse is as common in gay male and lesbian intimate relationships as in heterosexual relationships, the legal system often fails to recognize or respond to same-gender cases. Empirical research examining the impact of sexual orientation on perceptions of abuse is virtually nonexistent. Undergraduates (N = 252) read a summary of a domestic abuse incident in which victims and perpetrators varied by gender and, by implication, sexual orientation. Victim and respondent gender, rather than the couple's sexual orientation, primarily affected responses to domestic abuse. Domestic abuse perpetrated against women was perceived to be more serious and in need of intervention than abuse against men. Women were more likely than men to believe the victim and to recommend criminal justice system interventions. Because they are inconsistent with gender role stereotypes, domestic abuse cases involving male victims or female perpetrators may not receive equitable treatment within the criminal justice system.

The risk of eyewitnesses making false identifications is influenced by the methods used to construct and conduct lineups. The legal system could impose 4 simple rules to reduce false identifications: (a) Eyewitnesses should be informed that the culprit might not be in the lineup, (b) the suspect should not stand out in the lineup, (c) lineups should be administered by someone who does not know who the suspect is, and (d) witnesses should be asked how certain they are of their choice before other information contaminates their judgment. The U.S. Supreme Court has acknowledged the dangers of mistaken identification but has not used exclusionary rules to control unnecessary risk. Judicial rulings should focus on risky lineup methods and impose standards to eliminate potential justice system contributions to false identification.

An eyewitness takes the stand and describes salient aspects of an event that he or she witnessed several months earlier. Then, in the hush of the courtroom, points to the defendant and says "That's him. That's the man I saw. " Simple, clean, and convincing. And therein rests the problem; what appears to be a simple identification is in fact the result of a series of complex and potentially unreliable social and cognitive events that began unfolding several months earlier when the event was originally witnessed. This chapter, and much of the empirical research on which it is based, operates on an assumption that there are two sources of unreliability in eyewitness accounts. First, there are some inherent limitations in human information processing. These limitations exist at sensory levels (for example,