This one-hour training helps prepare 9-1-1 dispatchers for calls involving eyewitness identifications. It addresses:

• How stress or fear can negatively affect a person’s ability to provide accurate descriptions/identifications.

• The importance of following the recommended guideline when attempting to obtain the description of a suspect – especially when a caller is in distress.

• How the visible presence of a weapon during an encounter negatively affects memory for faces and identification accuracy because witnesses tend to focus their attention on the weapon instead of on the face or appearance of the perpetrator.

• The need to avoid using suggestive wording and leading questions during an interview and to make sure that inquiries are specific, direct, and clearly worded.

• Factors about a witness or a witnessed event that might contribute to a witness misidentification.

• Factors that might increase or decrease a witness’s reliability.