Eyewitness Testimony Analysis

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What is the story saying about eyewitness testimony? Edgar Allen Poe wrote the story Murders in the Rue Morgue in 1841, the story is known as the first modern detective story. In Murders in the Rue Morgue the main character is C. Auguste Dupin. In this story there were two women, Madame L'Espanaye and Mademoiselle Camille L'Espanaye who were found dead in a room locked from the inside. Madame L 'Espanaye was beaten to death and her daughter Mademoiselle was choked to death. There were multiple people who heard the crime occur; these people testified. The testimony of the witnesses has drawn suspicion and mystery to the crime scene and has lead Dupin to further investigate. A man named Le Bon was arrested for the crime; a crime that has never…show more content…
"In Poe's work, habit and routine not only determine the methods of reasoning used by the police and others, but also the very nature of perception itself, the apprehension of the "facts" that are supposed to form the basis of induction" (Loisa 233). The sound the witnesses heard did in fact come from the killer of these two women, but this sound was not human. I discovered to be from an orangutan. The story is saying that just because the witnesses have a certain testimony, does not mean they are always right. Just as much as these people thought it was a human who killed these two women based off of what they heard with no details, they were wrong. Maybe if the police did a thorough investigation providing more details like the hair being animal fur, they would have been able to relate what they heard to it being an animal. These witnesses were in such astonishment as the police were when Le Bon was arrested. They did not reconsider any other possibilities. As much as they thought there was no way a human could have done it, I am sure they would've never guessed it was an
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