P. v. Smith
Defendant Charles Smith was accused of five separate crimes as the result of two incidents occurring on the same evening in the same neighborhood within a short time of one another. The first incident involved the attempted robbery of Robert Eady. The second incident involved the carjacking, kidnapping and forcible oral copulation of Jane Doe. At the time of the attempted robbery Eady saw the man who attempted to rob him, an African American, get into a pickup truck at the same place that Jane Doe was carjacked. Eady and Jane Doe were the principle witnesses against defendant.
Defendant, who is African-American, was picked up by the authorities when he was walking down a sidewalk in the area in which the crimes had been committed. When defendant was detained, he matched the only description authorities had of the perpetrator of the Jane Doe incident -- a black male.
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