2002
| Author | Biber, Katherine |
|---|---|
| Date | 2002 |
| Source/Publisher | Current Issues in Criminal Justice, 13(3), pp286-300 |
| Link(s) | http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/CICrimJust/2002/3.html |
| Subjects | Policing |
In Smith v The Queen, the High Court ruled that identification evidence based on police inspection of a bank security camera photograph of a hooded, apparently Aboriginal bank robber, was irrelevant and therefore inadmissible under section 55 of the Evidence Act 1995 (Cwlth). Mundarra Smith’s conviction was quashed and a retrial was ordered. This paper examines the eyewitness testimony given in the original case, and Smith’s own reaction on being shown the photograph, and finds that the case raises concerns about the use of photographic technologies in the policing and criminalisation of Aboriginal individuals and communities. The photographs offer a kind of visual confirmation of a psychosocial assumption that conflates blackness with deviance.
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