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ARTICLE · 02 AUGUST 2018

Understanding The Nature Of Memory In Investigation

Withers LLP
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Ian McEwan wrote a perfect novella in 2012. Except he didn't. He just thought he had.

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Meriel Schindler
Meriel Schindler
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Ian McEwan wrote a perfect novella in 2012. Except he didn't. He just thought he had. Having hunted high and low, he was recently forced to admit that this beautiful, career defining work of fiction was just that: a false memory.

When investigators review witness evidence going back many years, they often forget how fallible human memory is. In the digital age, we have adopted descriptions of our minds which reflect the devices to which we have become so wedded. We say things like 'I don't have bandwidth for that' or 'I have wiped that from my hard drive'. But our minds work nothing like computers. Our mental fallibility is multiplied when money, reputation, career and personal friendships are at stake in an investigation or a court room.

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