  Mystery
This week: I saw it with my own eyes! Edited by: Arakun the Twisted Raccoon  
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Quote for the week:“I can provide a witness who didn’t see me at the scene of the crime. That witness can also prove they didn’t see me anywhere else either, thus showing that I didn’t exist at that moment in time.
”
― Jarod Kintz, 99 Cents For Some Nonsense |
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A crime has been committed and there are several eyewitnesses. This will be an easy mystery to solve, right? Not necessarily! Eyewitness accounts are not always reliable, and may actually complicate the case.
Witnesses may deliberately lie or distort the truth. Some witnesses like the attention and embellish their account or exaggerate their own heroism. Others, due to fear of retribution from the killer, may insist they saw nothing. Or maybe the nicest, most helpful witness IS the killer...
Some witnesses may tell the truth as they perceive it, but that doesn't mean their perceptions are accurate. In Edgar Allan Poe's famous mystery, "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," several witnesses overheard an argument between a deep voice and a shrill voice. While all witnesses agreed that the deep voice spoke French, every one reported the shrill voice speaking a different language. Not only did they disagree, but all of them were wrong. Read the story to find out why!
Witnessing a crime is a traumatic experience, and the person may not have had a clear view of the suspect. The investigator's job will be even more challenging if the witness is very young, has impaired vision or hearing, or is mentally disabled. Consider the following scenario from a crime drama I watched years ago. (I would give credit to the show, but I can't remember what it was).
A murder was committed, and a five year old girl saw someone running from the scene. She identified the fleeing figure as her teenage babysitter, a young man she called "Horsie". Her insistent testimony convinced investigators until one of them asked why she gave her babysitter this nickname.
She replied, "Because of his horsie."
The young man was a member of a high school basketball team called the Broncos, and often wore a team jacket with the logo of a bucking horse on the back. The child's identification was not based on the suspect's face, which she did not see, but on his jacket. Dozens of young men in the area, including the real killer, owned identical jackets.
The killer might even deliberately alter the witness's perception of events. Convicted murderer Kyle Bell set back every clock in his house the night he committed his crime, so his wife would later report that he was home at the time of the murder.
To keep your story realistic, you may want to do research on police procedures for questioning witnesses. If your detectives do not follow proper procedures, they should have good reasons, and there should be consequences. You may also want to learn about clues psychologists and interrogators use to determine whether a witness is lying. Even if you don't mention the clues in the story, you can use them to develop your characters' mannerisms.
Something to try: Write a mystery story in which all witnesses tell conflicting stories. |
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Mystery: December 04, 2013 Issue [#6026]
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