a bad headline

“last-minute push to save U.S. cop killer”

No, that’s precisely what is in question! Almost all of the witnesses have recanted (one of them may have been the killer himself), and the physical evidence against Davis is slim to none.

Even if the eyewitnesses hadn’t recanted, it would still be problematic. I remember reading the obituary a few years ago of a prominent professor of criminal justice who would often pay actors to rob him on the first day of class in front of all the students. He would tell his students to quickly write down descriptions of the “robbers” who had just left the room, and the results would always be appalling. The students couldn’t even agree on the race of the (undisguised) robbers, let alone on things like height, clothing, behavior, etc.

And that was his point, of course. Eyewitness testimony can be so fallible, and so corrupted by various conscious and unconscious motivations, that hard physical evidence is important when convicting people of the most serious crimes.