People of Michigan v. Elisah Kyle Thomas, 155245

Defendant Elisah Kyle Thomas was accused of shooting the victim; police sought an identification from the victim after the incident.
An officer showed the victim a single photograph and asked, “was this the guy who shot you?”
The victim had viewed the assailant for no more than seven seconds on a dark street while a gun was pointed at him; his initial description was generic and changed between interviews.
Trial court found the single-photo procedure highly suggestive and, under the totality of circumstances, that the resulting identification was unreliable and suppressed both the out-of-court photo ID and the in-court ID.
The Court of Appeals reversed; the Michigan Supreme Court granted review and, in lieu of granting leave, reversed the Court of Appeals and reinstated the circuit court’s dismissal.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether a single-photograph showing was impermissibly suggestive	Police needed to identify suspect; procedure was permissible	Single-photo display with question was highly suggestive	Single-photo showing was highly suggestive and unnecessary in this case
Whether exigent circumstances justified suggestive procedure	Exigency (need to identify quickly) justified using single photo	No evidence exigency required expedited, suggestive ID	Trial court reasonably found no fatal exigency to justify the procedure
Whether the identification was reliable under the totality of circumstances	ID was reliable enough to admit	Reliability was undermined by brief, obstructed viewing and changing descriptions	Identification was unreliable and should be suppressed under totality-of-circumstances test
Whether the in-court identification had an independent basis to purge taint	In-court ID was independent and admissible	In-court ID was tainted by prior illegal photo ID and lacked independent basis	In-court ID lacked independent basis and remained inadmissible

Perry v. New Hampshire, 565 U.S. 228 (reliability is the touchstone for admissibility of identifications)
Manson v. Brathwaite, 432 U.S. 98 (admit suggestive ID if sufficiently reliable)
Neil v. Biggers, 409 U.S. 188 (totality-of-circumstances reliability factors)
Simmons v. United States, 390 U.S. 377 (due process standard for identification procedures)
Stovall v. Denno, 388 U.S. 293 (exigency can justify prompt identification in limited circumstances)
People v. Gray, 457 Mich. 107 (single-photo shows among most suggestive procedures)
People v. Kurylczyk, 443 Mich. 289 (Michigan application of totality-of-circumstances test)
People v. Kachar, 400 Mich. 78 (independent source inquiry for in-court identifications)