Jordan Blonsky

Picking Cotton Paper

Race: a social construct; a group of people who share similar and distinct physical
characteristic. Biologically race does not exist. Every human being on the planet has the same
color bones, no ones organs are a different color. Biologically we are all the exact same, yet race
is still one of the biggest issues that is facing this world as a whole. Race is incredibly present
within the judicial system. Whether it is police brutality or misrepresentation, it has become a
huge problem for our country. However, within the book Picking Cotton, I believe race only
became an issue because the judicial system had already failed.
Jennifer Thompson, a white, female college student, was peacefully sleeping in her
apartment when he awoke to her rapist entering her bedroom. As she was raped, she told herself
to study this mans face, to remember every detail about his appearance. If she made it out alive,
she was going to remember this man, tell the police and find him. After helping the police to
make a composite sketch, a drawing that uses descriptions given by witnesses to create a drawing
that is a useful tool for identifying or eliminating a suspect according to
http://www.encyclopedia.com, the police identified Ronald Cotton as a suspect in the case. The
police then ask Jennifer to try and identify her rapist in a photo lineup. She was torn between two
pictures before finally choosing Ronald. After the photo lineup, she was asked to do a physical
lineup. She again was torn between two people and again picked Ronald. This eyewitness
testimony was enough to bring a trial against Ronald.
During both of Ronalds trials, the main piece of evidence was the eyewitness testimony
from Jennifer. This, coupled with the fact the Ronald had messed up his alibi, was enough to
convict him of two counts of Rape. Ronald was sentenced to two life sentences. While serving
his sentences, Ronald met Bobby Poole. Ronald and Bobby had strikingly similar looks and
people confused them often. While he was getting to know Bobby, Ronald was told that Bobby

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Picking Cotton Paper
admitted to doing the crimes he was serving time for. Although Ronald tried to clear his name
and prove Bobby committed the crimes, he was unable to. It was not until Ronald found out
about DNA testing and wrote to his attorney asking to be tested that he was cleared of the crimes.
In a rape kit that was collected 11 years prior on the night of Jennifers rape was sperm that could
be tested for DNA. The DNA test came back negative to Ronald and positive to Bobby Poole.
Ronald Cotton was freed after 11 years of his life were wasted in prison.
The justice system failed Ronald Cotton and Jennifer Thompson; it did not do its job. The
justice system allowed an innocent man to sit in jail for 11 years of his life. The justice system
robbed an innocent man of 11 years of his life. I believe that while race played a factor in this
case, the justice system is more at fault. The Cotton case is a prime example of what can go
tragically wrong when court cases hinge on human recollection. Jennifer seemed like an ideal
witness; she had kept calm during the rape and carefully studied her attackers appearance in
case she was later called upon to identify him. But what the jury did not know was that Jennifer
had been quite unsure of her choice when she initially identified Cotton. She struggled to make a
decision between two photos. Jennifer was not confident in her decision until she received praise
from the police officers. Numerous eyewitness memory experts believe that, at least in some
circumstances, there can be a modest relationship between how confident eyewitnesses say they
were at the time of identifying a suspect (as opposed to during the trial) and the likelihood that
they correctly selected the attacker from a lineup or an array of mug shots (Ryan, 2015). If the
eyewitness is not confident in his or her decision while making it, should his or her statements
hold credibility? If juries can rely a great deal on a witnesss initial confidence level to help them
decide if the defendant is guilty or innocent, then instructing the jury to trust their confidence

Jordan Blonsky
Picking Cotton Paper
level could, at least in theory, help courts do a significantly better job of deciding who is
innocent and who is guilty.
At its most basic level, a police lineup involves placing a suspect among people not
suspected of committing the crime (fillers) and asking the eyewitness if he or she can identify the
attacker. The police lineups can either be photos or physical people. There are multiple ways to
conduct the lineups and some ways are more effective then others. According to Beth Schusters
article Police Lineups: Making Eyewitness Identification More Reliable numerous factors can
influence a lineup, such as the instructions given to the witness, the physical characteristics of
fillers, similarities or difference between the witness and suspect age, race or ethnicity, and the
way the lineup is conducted. There are two methods to preforming a lineup. The lineup is ether
present simultaneously or sequentially. When it is conducted in a simultaneously manner all
photos or people are presented to the witness at one time (Schuster, 2007). They witnesses are
told to try and identify their attacker from the group. This allows the witness to compare the the
subjects of the lineup to one another and not just the image in their memory of their attacker.
This leads to the witnesses picking the person who looks most like their attacker but not
necessarily their attacker. When the lineup is presented in a sequential manner the witness is
present with one photo or person at a time. They then have to identify the attacker based solely
on their memory, not by comparing and picking the one that looks most like their attacker
(Schuster, 2007).
In Picking Cotton, Jennifer was asked to identify her attacker twice. First in a photo
lineup and then in a physical lineup. The simultaneously method was used in both lineups.
Jennifer was very determined to correctly identify her attacker and was confident in her ability to
before she walked into the room to do the photo lineup. Jennifer thought that identifying her

Jordan Blonsky
Picking Cotton Paper
attacker would be simple, she had studied his face while her raped her, she had focused on every
detail of him but after she had made her final decision she needed reassurance from the officers
that she had done a good job. During the physical lineup Jennifer felt pressure from herself. The
lineup was done in an open room where the people in the lineup and Jennifer could see each
other. If he was here, now he knew what I looked like in broad daylight. He knew my name. If
he was here, I couldnt screw this up (Thompson-Cannino, 36). Jennifer was scared that if she
didnt identify the right person then they would come and attacker her again after the lineup. She
again was torn between two people. She had them both repeat the process and then made a
decision. She then decided on Ronald. She also again looked for reassurance from the police
officers and didnt feel truly confident until the officers told her she had identified the same
person she had in the photo lineup. If the photos/people had been presented to Jennifer in a
different way, there is a chance she wouldnt have misidentified Ronald. If she had only be able
to go off her memory, there is a much higher chance that she wouldnt have wrongly accused
Ronald of the crime. This is a race issue, this an issue with the judicial system. Every person in
the lineup was black because it was a known fact her rapist was black. The judicial system failed
to set Jennifer up for success. It failed to reduce the risk of misidentification.
Even though the judicial system failed Jennifer and Ronald, it would be wrong to say race
played no role in this case. A black man raped a white woman while she slept alone in her
apartment. The jury was an all white jury and every police officer working on the case was
white. Ronald Cotton was vastly out numbered in the race department. Almost everyone
involved in his case was white. However, Jennifer was one hundred percent positive that she was
raped by a black man. That was never questioned. Ronald Cotton wasnt wrongfully imprisoned
because he was black. He was wrongfully identified as a suspect which lead to him being treated

Jordan Blonsky
Picking Cotton Paper
poorly throughout the trial process. He should have never been considered as a suspect. The jury,
the police officers and the community assumed that because he was black he was guilty but if he
had never been wrongfully identified he wouldnt have been put in that situation. Race played a
role only once Jennifer had already identified him as her attacker.
Race is a social construct that has been created by our society throughout the past few
centuries. It has become more and more present in society and particularly the judicial system
over the past few decades. In the case of Ronald Cotton and Jennifer Thompson it played a same
role, but only because Jennifer wrongly identified Ronald as her attacker. The main factor in the
case was the process of the judicial system. The judicial system failed to do its job and that led to
an innocent man sitting behind bars for eleven years of his life. It allowed for a wrong
eyewitness testimony control a case. Race only became an issue after the judicial system failed.
As a country, we need to reform the judicial system to help prevent situations like this case from
happening. We also need to remove race from the equation. Biologically we are all the exact
same. Outside of the social construct, race isnt a thing and shouldnt impact anyones life.

Jordan Blonsky
Picking Cotton Paper
Reference
"Composite Drawing." World of Forensic Science. 2005. "Composite Drawing."
Encyclopedia.com. HighBeam Research, 01 Jan. 2005. Web. 23 Nov. 2015.
Ryan, Benjamin. "Eyewitness Testimony Is Unreliable... Or Is It?" The Marshall Project. N.p.,
30 Oct. 2015. Web. 23 Nov. 2015.
Schuster, Beth. " Police Lineups: Making Eyewitness Identification More Reliable." National
Institute of Justice. N.p., Oct. 2007. Web. 23 Nov. 2015.
Thompson-Cannino, Jennifer, Ronald Cotton, and Erin Torneo. Picking Cotton: Our Memoir of
Injustice and Redemption. New York: St. Martin's, 2009. Print.