by Richard Resch

"Close your eyes. Picture it. Now tell me exactly what you saw.” Across America, police treat this as a credibility test. Every day, truthful people fail it.

That is the detective in the interview room. In the courtroom, the prosecutor turns it into an accusation. “If this really happened, you should be able to describe what he was wearing. You can’t even tell us the color, can you?” The assumption is the same. When a person cannot supply vivid visual detail – or cannot “picture” the scene to retrieve it – police, prosecutors, and jurors often treat that inability as evasiveness, deceitfulness, or guilt.

But for approximately 4% of the population, around 13 million Americans, “picture it in your mind” is not just a metaphor. It is a literal cognitive task they simply cannot perform. The phenomenon is called “aphantasia,” a markedly reduced or absent ability to voluntarily generate visual mental imagery, i.e., they have no “mind’s eye.” A person can be attentive, intelligent, and sincere and still be unable to conjure an internal picture of a face, a room, a weapon, or a sequence of movements on demand.

That mismatch creates a predictable risk in criminal cases because the system equates sensory richness with reliability and credibility. But the presence or absence of vivid visual description is not a reliable proxy for truthfulness. Some people can offer striking imagery while being mistaken or influenced by stress, suggestion, or post-­event information. Others may offer little sensory detail while remaining accurate in what they do report. When factfinders are not primed to understand this, a witness’ or suspect’s recall lacking details can be treated as substantive evidence of guilt.

The stakes are not academic. Once a credibility judgment is made, often early in an investigation, it can steer the entire case. The intensity of the investigation, the interpretation of ambiguous evidence, plea leverage, and ultimately how a jury hears everything that follows are often based on that initial assessment. Unrecognized aphantasia has the potential to become another pathway to a wrongful conviction. Truthful people sound unconvincing. Innocent suspects are treated as liars.

For defense counsel, recognizing this trait is a high-­stakes, practice-­critical task because failing to recognize it can quietly cement an early credibility narrative that becomes difficult to dislodge. What follows is a blueprint for identification and advocacy – defining the condition, exposing how standard police interviews fail these individuals, and providing specific litigation strategies to keep “no visual memory” from being weaponized as “no credibility.” This is not a theoretical curiosity. It is a daily reality in criminal cases, often encountered but rarely recognized.

What Aphantasia Is and Is Not

Aphantasia is commonly described as the inability (or near inability) to form voluntary visual mental images. A simple way to understand what that means is to close your eyes and try to picture a red apple. Many people experience at least a faint internal image of its color and shape. People with aphantasia typically report something different. They can think about an apple and describe what they know about it, but they do not experience a visual “picture” in the mind’s eye. This concerns mental imagery. It does not mean a person has impaired eyesight or impaired visual perception, which are typically intact. Neurologist Adam Zeman and colleagues popularized the term in a short paper titled “Congenital Aphantasia—Lives Without Imagery,” Zeman, Dewar, and Della Sala (2015). Medical overviews stress that it is typically treated as a characteristic, not a disease, disorder, or disability, though imagery loss can also be acquired after injury or illness.

Aphantasia is also not simply “bad memory.” Many people with aphantasia recall facts, concepts, and sequences well. What is often reduced is the visual re-­experiencing or “reliving” component of episodic recall. Consistent with that, clinical summaries note that autobiographical memory can be harder to access in a first-­person, image-­based way.

Importantly for the criminal justice system, aphantasia exists on a spectrum. Some people report total absence of imagery; others describe imagery as vague, dim, or fleeting; and some may have imagery in dreams but not on command.

Objective Verification:
Moving Beyond Self-­Report

One reason aphantasia poses a potential risk for defendants is that it often goes unrecognized by the person who has it. A patient-­oriented medical overview published by Cleveland Clinic, which is one of the few major health institutions to address the condition, explicitly notes that people with aphantasia may not realize their experience is uncommon. Some report thinking the word “see” in “see it in your mind” is only figurative. First-­person accounts in mainstream publications describe that same “discovery by accident” dynamic, often in adulthood, when people realize that phrases like “picture it” are literal for most others, who actually experience mental images rather than mere abstract knowledge.

That means a witness or suspect may never volunteer it during an interview because they do not realize it is a “thing” worth mentioning. And if nobody asks, the first time it surfaces may be when police or jurors decide the person’s inability to supply visual detail “doesn’t make sense.”

For courtroom purposes, defense counsel should anticipate the predictable prosecution response that aphantasia is merely self-­report and therefore easy to feign. But the science has moved beyond questionnaires. Researchers have developed behavioral tasks and physiological correlates that distinguish aphantasia from typical imagery and reduce reliance on self-­description alone.

In a widely cited study, Keogh and Pearson (2018) used a binocular rivalry paradigm and found that participants who self-­identified as aphantasic showed almost no imagery-­based priming, supporting the view that aphantasia reflects reduced sensory / phenomenal imagery rather than mere poor “metacognition” about imagery.

Bainbridge et al. (2021) developed a large-­scale “draw what you saw” approach. People with aphantasia produced drawings showing a dissociation – reduced object detail but comparatively preserved spatial layout, suggesting different representational strategies.

Kay and colleagues (2022) reported a physiological correlate using pupillometry. In typical imagers, merely imagining a bright versus dark stimulus produced directionally appropriate changes in pupil size, even though ambient lighting did not change. In the aphantasic group, that imagery-­linked pupil effect was absent despite normal pupil responses to actual light and intact pupil changes with cognitive load. The authors characterize this as physiological evidence consistent with absent visual imagery. While pupillometry is not a standardized forensic “test,” it is difficult to explain as simple impression management or a voluntary performance strategy.

Jin et al. (2024) synthesize the growing (and still developing) measurement literature, emphasizing definitional issues, reliance on instruments such as the Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire (“VVIQ”), a widely used self-­report scale that asks respondents to rate how vividly they can form mental images, and emerging objective correlates.

For defendants, the takeaway is modest but crucial. Aphantasia can be supported with science-­based assessment approaches, and it should not be treated as a purely “made up” explanation for why someone’s recall sounds so sparse that investigators and jurors misinterpret it as not credible.

Eyewitness Reliability and the Risk of Standard Interviews

Until recently, courts could only speculate about how aphantasia affects eyewitness accounts. Now there is direct, criminal-­justice-­relevant experimental work. A 2023 Royal Society Open Science study used a mock-­witness paradigm and found that participants with aphantasia recalled about 30% less correct information and gave less complete accounts, but they made no more errors and were as accurate as typical imagers.

That distinction is vital for the defense because a lack of detail does not equate to falsity. However, the most operationally important contribution of the landmark Dando et al. (2023) study is not simply that aphantasic eyewitness accounts were less complete, but that a widely taught “best practice” retrieval technique can backfire for certain witnesses. Mental Reinstatement of Context (“MRC”) is a core component of the Cognitive Interview tradition. It is designed to improve episodic retrieval by instructing a witness to mentally recreate the original physical and psychological context – where they were, what they felt, what they saw, what they heard – before attempting a free narrative.

That logic is sound for many witnesses. Meta-­analytic work on the Cognitive Interview literature (which includes context reinstatement as a foundational component) generally finds substantial gains in correct detail with relatively smaller increases in error, supporting the technique’s overall value when properly administered and matched to the witness. But that literature also matters for a different reason. It underscores that retrieval techniques have boundary conditions. Their effectiveness is shaped by the interview protocol, the interviewer’s skill, delay interval, and importantly, the witness’ cognitive profile.

Dando et al. (2023) put that “individual differences” problem on a criminal-­justice-­relevant footing by comparing three conditions after a delay: (1) MRC, (2) Sketch Reinstatement of Context (“Sketch-­RC”), and (3) a control interview that did not provide retrieval support. The results should make defense lawyers re-­examine imagery-­heavy interview transcripts with fresh eyes.

On global correct recall, participants in the Sketch-­RC condition recalled more correct information than those in both the MRC and control conditions. But the key defense point is the interaction. Aphantasic participants performed worse under MRC than under no-­support control. In other words, for aphantasic mock witnesses, being prompted to “go back there” and mentally reconstruct the scene did not merely fail to help. It actually suppressed the amount of correct information they provided. In contrast, Sketch-­RC improved performance relative to MRC, and for aphantasic participants, there was no statistically significant difference between Sketch-­RC and control on correct recall. Accuracy rates did not meaningfully differ across groups, reinforcing the central theme that reduced vividness and reduced completeness do not imply deception.

The completeness findings sharpen the point. Across participants, Sketch-­RC and control produced more complete accounts than MRC, and Sketch-­RC produced more complete accounts than control. Among aphantasic participants specifically, Sketch-­RC and control were more complete than MRC, with no difference detected between Sketch-­RC and control. This means that when the system emphasizes visualization-­based prompts, it may inadvertently reduce the usable, correct output from aphantasic witnesses and then punish them for the very “thinness” the interview technique helped create. This pattern is consistent with a broader body of interviewing research showing that “externalized” retrieval supports can reduce cognitive load and improve reporting for some populations. Sketch-­based reinstatement techniques have been studied as memory scaffolds in other eyewitness contexts. For example, work with older adult witnesses has found that sketch-­based context reinstatement can increase correct recall and reduce inaccurate reporting compared with mental context reinstatement alone. Research with vulnerable child witnesses (including autistic children) similarly explores whether sketch-­based supports can improve access to accurate information without a concomitant increase in errors, while emphasizing that outcomes can depend heavily on protocol details and real-­world implementation. For defense counsel, the practical implications are immediate and case-­specific.

Treat Imagery-­Heavy Prompts as a Potential Confounder When “Vagueness” Becomes an Argument: If the interview contains repeated MRC instructions (“close your eyes,” “picture it,” “put yourself back there,” “see the scene”), counsel should not assume that because “best practice was followed” it means the resulting account is maximally complete. For some witnesses, the technique itself can depress output. That is, their aphantasia is a “potential confounder” that distorts the relationship between the sensory input they got and the memory recall that resulted. This establishes a scientific basis to rebut the claim that the witness was evasive, withholding, or fabricating simply because they “couldn’t give details.”

Reframe “Why Didn’t You Say That Earlier?” Attacks: If an aphantasic witness later provides additional accurate information (especially after reviewing non-­suggestive external anchors like messages, timestamps, locations, or their own contemporaneous notes), the prosecution may frame the change as inconsistency. Dando et al. (2023) supports a more defensible account. That is, the initial interview technique may have been mismatched to the witness, limiting access to correct information at the first retrieval attempt.

Use Interview-­Technique Evidence to Support Targeted Expert Testimony or Cross-­Examination: Counsel need not overclaim that MRC is “junk science” to make this point. The narrower, stronger framing is that technique efficacy is not uniform, and there is now peer-­reviewed evidence that aphantasia can flip the expected effect of a mainstream retrieval prompt. That can be used to (1) blunt credibility arguments, (2) justify defense requests for a memory / interviewing expert where credibility is central, and (3) educate the factfinder that “more vivid” is not the same as “more accurate,” especially when the interviewing method itself can shape what comes out.

Face Recognition and Identifications

Anyone thinking through the legal implications will ask: does aphantasia affect lineup accuracy? The honest answer is that we do not have a clean, courtroom-­ready body of evidence linking aphantasia to identification error rates in lineups the way we do for factors like suggestive procedures or post-­identification feedback.

But there is relevant cognitive research. Monzel et al. (2023) conclude that aphantasia is not associated with a higher prevalence of prosopagnosia (face blindness) and that any recognition deficits observed were small and not confined to faces. This suggests a defense posture of careful restraint. Aphantasia is not “face blindness,” and overclaiming will backfire.

Nevertheless, if an identification case hinges on a witness’ ability to mentally visualize and compare facial images, it is reasonable to explore whether imagery-­related processing differences may have shaped the witness’ memory experience. As such, the central litigation focus should remain on the reliability of identification procedures and the risk of contamination, the “system variables” that mainstream eyewitness science has long emphasized.

How Aphantasia Can
Elevate Suspicion

The innocence-­risk argument is strongest where credibility judgments translate into interrogation pressure. Modern interrogations often reward suspects who can supply a coherent, sensory narrative and punish those who cannot, especially early on, when investigators are deciding whether a denial “sounds real.” A suspect with aphantasia may (truthfully) struggle to produce the kind of visual scene-­building that interviewers routinely prompt (“What did the room look like?” “Picture where everyone was standing.” “Walk me through it like a video.”). In many interrogation rooms, that gap is interpreted as evasion, not as a cognitive difference, and the response is escalation.

That escalation is not a theoretical concern. False confessions are a documented driver of wrongful convictions, and they remain common enough to matter as a system problem. In the Innocence Project’s DNA exoneration data, false confessions were involved in more than 25% of cases, and the organization also reports that many false confessors relayed “non-­public” facts, an observation that underscores how confession evidence can be contaminated by interrogation dynamics rather than “inside knowledge.”

The psychological literature explains why this intersection, involving credibility judgments plus pressure, creates a predictable risk of false admissions. In their American Psychology-­Law Society scientific review paper, Kassin et al. (2010) synthesized evidence that certain tactics and conditions can elicit false confessions and that risk is shaped by both situational pressure and suspect vulnerabilities. Their 2025 update (“Police-­Induced Confessions, 2.0”) highlights the full chain of harm, from the conditions that raise the risk of false admissions to the downstream effects. Confession evidence can corrupt other evidence, increase the likelihood of conviction, and even increase the tendency of innocent people to plead guilty after a false confession has made the case against them appear overwhelming.

Where does aphantasia fit? The literature does not establish aphantasia as a proven cause of false confessions, and the defense should not claim otherwise. The stronger and more practice-­relevant point is that aphantasia can change how truthful memory sounds, and in an interrogation culture that overvalues vividness, that mismatch can intensify pressure.

Interrogators are trained, explicitly or implicitly, to treat certain communication patterns as diagnostic. Some of the most common persuasive tactics are “maximization” (exaggerating the strength of the evidence or the stakes) and “minimization” (downplaying moral seriousness and offering face-­saving themes). Classic experimental work describes how these approaches communicate threats or implied promises “by pragmatic implication,” including minimization themes that signal leniency without making an explicit deal. The 2025 Kassin et al. update makes the same practical point in modern form. That is, courts often reject confessions induced by explicit promises of leniency, but they commonly tolerate minimization themes that imply leniency. The research indicates those themes can elicit admissions from some factually innocent suspects.

Now layer on the “aphantasia credibility trap.” If an interviewer equates truth with visual detail, an aphantasic suspect may be pushed into a lose-­lose position. Either (1) stick with an honest but sparse account and be treated as “not making sense” or (2) try to satisfy the demand for imagery by speculating, reconstructing, or agreeing with suggestions, actions that can create inconsistencies, apparent “evolving stories,” and in the worst cases, outright false admissions. The danger is not limited to overt lying by police. Even a “benign” bluff (“we’ve got the evidence,” “it’s all on camera,” “your phone shows it,” “your buddy already gave you up”) can shift an innocent person’s calculus. Kassin et al. (2010) describe controlled-­experiment evidence that false-­evidence presentations increase false confessions and can even lead some people to internalize culpability. They also discuss the “bluff technique,” which can paradoxically increase innocent confessions because it suggests future exoneration is inevitable – when in fact any confession given will not necessarily be discounted even after evidence of the bluff is revealed.

A related concept that is highly useful for defense framing is memory distrust syndrome. In a widely cited review, Gudjonsson (2017) describes how, under isolating and guilt-­presumptive pressure, some people develop profound distrust of their own memory and become susceptible to external cues and suggestions, sometimes culminating in pressured-­internalized false confessions (“confabulation”). Aphantasia does not equal memory distrust. But when interrogators repeatedly insist “you would remember” and they treat a cognitive recall gap as proof of deception, they are pressing directly on the psychological pressure point that the memory-­distrust literature warns about.

Practice guidance starts with disciplined transcript and video analysis. In cases where defense counsel suspects aphantasia (or related autobiographical-­memory limitations), look for pressure points that map onto the “detail = truth” assumption and turn it into leverage.

Imagery-­Heavy Prompts and “Video Recorder” Demands: Note every instruction to “picture,” “visualize,” “see it,” or “run it back,” and whether the interviewer treats noncompliance as willful. Those moments are significant because they help explain why the suspect’s account lacks sensory detail, or why it later “fills in” only after suggestion.

The “You Should Remember” Refrain: Catalog statements that explicitly equate inability to provide sensory detail with lying (“If you were there, you’d remember what it looked like”). Those are credibility attacks in real time, and they lay a foundation for a coercion narrative that is intelligible to judges and jurors.

Minimization Themes That Imply Leniency: Identify any language that downplays moral seriousness (“anyone would do this,” “it was an accident”) or that offers a face-­saving path to confession. The classic concern is that these themes imply leniency without stating it outright, and experimental work has raised serious questions about their effects on innocent suspects.

False-­Evidence or Bluff Moves: Track claims about evidence that are framed as inevitable proof (or “evidence to be harvested”), and how the suspect reacts. The controlled-­experiment literature discussed by Kassin et al. (2010) treats false-­evidence presentations as a high-­risk tactic, with demonstrated increases in false confessions compared to other approaches.

Contamination Markers: Compare “new facts” in the confession to what the interrogators supplied earlier. Innocence Project reporting that many false confessors included non-­public facts is a reminder that “inside details” can be imported through the interview process itself, especially after long, leading, or repetitive questioning.

Building a litigation record also has some aphantasia-­specific wrinkles. The goal is to keep the suppression motion focused and readable while making the coercion narrative concrete and legible.

Anchor the Issue in Observable Interrogation Mechanics: Note the detail demands, the credibility attacks, the minimization / bluff moves, the time course, and the suspect’s changing language. Then, if the case warrants it, use the aphantasia evidence to explain why those mechanics affect this suspect differently, not as an excuse, but as context for how an innocent person can look “wrong” under the system’s folk assumptions about memory.

Consider Targeted Expert Support: In many jurisdictions, false-­confession experts are routinely litigated; the key is fit. The strongest fit is often an expert in interrogation and confession science who can explain why certain tactics increase error risk and why vividness is not a reliable credibility marker. The aphantasia component can be presented narrowly. The suspect’s difficulty generating visual detail made them an easier target for the “video recorder” expectation and the escalating inference that recall devoid of details equals deceit.

Treat Policy Reforms as Persuasive Authority, not Binding Law: Kassin et al. (2025) note that U.S. law has historically tolerated some deception tactics (including Supreme Court approval of certain uses of deception), while also describing recent legislative movement, particularly restrictions on police lying to minors in multiple states. Even in those jurisdictions that have not adopted those limits, the trend can help frame why certain tactics are now viewed as high-­risk and out of step with evidence-­based practice.

No one should pretend the literature proves “aphantasia causes false confessions.” It does not. What the literature does support, and what defense counsel can use without overclaiming, is that the system already has well-­documented failure modes that produce false admissions; those failure modes are fueled by credibility heuristics that overvalue vividness; and aphantasia can make truthful accounts sound dubious in precisely the way that triggers escalation. That is enough to justify careful investigation, rigorous transcript work, and a deliberate record that reframes “thin” recall as a cognitive mismatch rather than a lack of credibility.

The Alibi Problem: Aphantasia and Severely Deficient Autobiographical Memory

Aphantasia is usually framed as a missing mind’s eye. In criminal cases, the higher-­stakes problem can be what sometimes accompanies that imagery profile: an unusually limited ability to re-­experience personal past events in the way investigators, prosecutors, and jurors assume normal memory works.

One research-­defined syndrome that captures this risk is Severely Deficient Autobiographical Memory (“SDAM”). The condition was first formally defined in 2015 by Palombo and colleagues, who identified SDAM as a lifelong inability to vividly recollect or “re-­live” autobiographical events from a first-­person perspective, even though general cognition and day-­to-­day functioning are otherwise intact. The practical consequence is not that the person “has no memory.” It is that when asked to retrieve a specific personal episode, the person may lack the subjective sense of returning to the scene and pulling out sensory detail, even where they can still know the relevant facts.

For defense counsel, the critical point is that this is a form of cognitive heterogeneity that the criminal justice system is not built to recognize. A suspect can be honest and still sound wrong, not because the facts are false, but because the narrative does not carry the kind of scene-­based texture that police and jurors have been conditioned to treat as a marker of credibility.

The overlap question requires careful wording. The strongest defensible claim is not that SDAM “frequently co-­occurs” with aphantasia or that aphantasia implies SDAM. What the literature more cautiously supports, including work by Zeman et al. (2020) and Watkins (2018), is that aphantasia, in large samples, is associated with elevated self-­reported difficulty in autobiographical memory and that some individuals describe a broader profile in which low imagery and autobiographical recall deficits appear together. That variability matters in criminal cases because the system routinely treats the style of recall – vividness, detail, and ease of retrieval – as if it were an indicator for truthfulness.

The defense relevance becomes obvious in the most common investigative scenario, i.e., the routine alibi question. “Where were you last Tuesday at 7:00 p.m.?” Many people answer by mentally retracing the evening – who they were with, what the room looked like, what they ate, what they watched, what they texted. Those internal cues help reconstruct the story.

A person with SDAM-­like autobiographical limitations may not be able to do that on demand. Unless the date is tied to a distinctive anchor (a birthday, an unusual appointment, an argument, a receipt-­worthy purchase), they may have little more than routine knowledge (“Tuesdays I usually…”) or nothing they can retrieve confidently without external prompts. In real cases, that mismatch can create an “alibi trap” that escalates suspicion rather than clarifying the truth. Two predictable failure modes follow:

The “I Don’t Know” Inference: The suspect truthfully answers, “I don’t remember.” In the culture of criminal investigation, that answer is often treated as concealment or consciousness of guilt, especially when investigators believe an innocent person should be able to reconstruct an ordinary day.

The “Scripted Narrative” Effect: If the suspect can answer, the account may be built from semantic structure (routine, sequence, and “what I generally do”) rather than scene-­based recollection. It can sound contrived and procedural, more like a checklist than a story. Investigators and jurors who equate richness with honesty may misread that tone as rehearsed.

This is an innocence issue because it creates a pathway for error even without overt misconduct. Credibility judgments get made early, and once a person is tagged as “evasive,” the system tends to interpret everything that follows through that lens.

The practice response is straightforward, and it is good lawyering even when SDAM is only a possibility. Counsel should not build an alibi case around introspection and “trying harder to remember.” Build it around anchors.

Externalize Memory Early: If counsel suspects an SDAM-­like autobiographical profile – whether signaled by aphantasia or simply by the client’s consistent inability to retrieve scene-­based detail – treat external records as retrieval scaffolding, not mere corroboration. Secure what you can quickly (location history if available, call / text logs and metadata, bank timestamps, workplace logs, rideshare records, surveillance requests while retention windows are still open). For some clients, those records are the practical difference between a credible reconstruction and a damaging void.

Do Not Push the Client Into Guessing: The combination of pressure and gaps is a recipe for inconsistent statements that the prosecution will later portray as lies. If the client cannot retrieve details with confidence, it is often safer to acknowledge that limitation and pivot to records, routine anchors, and third-­party sources.

Use Established Frameworks to Explain the “Type” of Detail(without claiming it proves truth): If credibility becomes central, a qualified expert may be able to educate the factfinder on the difference between episodic-­style detail and non-­episodic detail, and why the absence of episodic-­style detail is not a reliable “lie cue.” One widely used research framework is Levine et al.’s Autobiographical Interview (2002), which provides a structured way to distinguish episodic / context-­specific (“internal”) from non-­episodic (“external”) components of autobiographical narratives. The defensible use of that framework is limited but powerful. It helps show that two people can be equally sincere but differ systematically in the kind of details their narratives contain.

None of this proves innocence. The claim is narrower and stronger. When the prosecution’s theory depends on the inference that “a truthful person would remember,” counsel should be prepared to show that this premise is not universally valid and that the safer course, consistent with good defense practice, is to demand corroboration rather than reward narrative vividness.

Investigation and Pre-­Trial Strategy

Understanding the science is only the first step. The real challenge is translating that knowledge into actionable advocacy. The following framework provides a roadmap for identifying and litigating aphantasia issues from the initial interview through postconviction review.

Screening and
Interview Strategy

Counsel does not need a formal diagnosis to begin investigating. Counsel can ask clients or witnesses simple, plain-­language questions: “When you think of a red apple, do you see an image, or do you just know what an apple is?” or “If I ask you to picture a loved one’s face, do you get a picture in your mind, or is it blank?” It is also useful to ask, “Do you have visual dreams?” – bearing in mind that many people with aphantasia do dream visually, so a “yes” does not rule it out. If answers suggest low imagery, structured tools like the VVIQ can serve as a screening mechanism, though practitioners must keep in mind that self-­reported prevalence often differs from scale-­based measurement.

If a client appears aphantasic, counsel should not use “mind’s-­eye” retrieval. Instead of asking them to “visualize the room,” counsel should use non-­visual retrieval cues such as timelines, phone records, receipts, calendar entries, routine anchors, and “what happened next” sequencing. Counsel should also consider using drawing-­based aids as organizational tools because empirical data suggests that while object imagery may be reduced in aphantasics, spatial layout accuracy often remains preserved. Additionally, if litigating the adequacy of a police interview, Dando et al. (2023) provides a concrete, source-­based argument that imagery-­heavy techniques (like “close your eyes and picture it”) can actually reduce completeness for aphantasic individuals.

Discovery and
Record Preservation

If low-­imagery recall is even a possibility, treat corroboration as a time-­sensitive litigation task, not a closing argument theme. The practical risk is that the prosecution will convert recall lacking detail into a credibility narrative long before trial, and the defense will be left trying to rebut it with nothing but words. Counsel’s best counter is a record.

Counsel should start with the interview itself and obtain every version of the statement evidence, including complete audio / video, officer notes (including “rough” notes if they exist and are retained), report drafts, supplements, and any contemporaneous logs (CAD / MDT entries, dispatch notes, time stamps). If the interview includes repeated visualization prompts (“close your eyes,” “picture it,” “go back there”), preserve that fact in the record because it becomes a concrete, testable explanation for reduced completeness in aphantasic witnesses and suspects. This recasts the issue as a documented interviewing variable, preventing the prosecution from dismissing the explanation as a mere defense excuse.

Next, move aggressively on objective anchors with short retention windows. Video is the obvious category, but treat it as broader than retail surveillance. Look for any camera that could resolve timing, movement, or presence, e.g., body-­worn camera, dash camera, station-­house camera, jail intake camera, courthouse camera, bus cameras, apartment or HOA cameras, doorbell systems, traffic cameras where available, and any privately held footage. Do the same with electronic access logs and transactional time stamps. The point is to replace “I can’t picture it” with “the record shows it.”

On digital evidence, anticipate statutory and practical barriers and plan around them. Providers commonly resist third-­party subpoenas for content by invoking the Stored Communications Act (“SCA”) framework. The SCA treats content (the substance of communications) as more protected than non-­content records like subscriber information or metadata, so defense counsel should understand what can be subpoenaed directly versus what requires government process. When communications content or platform data matters, counsel should not wait until the eve of trial. Consider early motion practice that seeks an order requiring the prosecution to use its lawful process to obtain and/or preserve specific categories of evidence within its reach, and to disclose what was sought, what was obtained, and what was not. Courts vary in their willingness to grant such relief, but the motion preserves the issue and can support later arguments about investigative adequacy or spoliation. If the prosecution already has the data, counsel’s focus should be disclosure and completeness. If the prosecution never collected it, the focus is preservation, spoliation, and the reasonableness of the investigation in a case that turns on credibility.

Finally, treat eyewitness identification materials as a discrete discovery category that should be requested with the same rigor counsel would use in a Henderson-­style case (referring to New Jersey’s landmark 2011 decision in State v. Henderson, 27 A.3d 872 (N.J. 2011), reforming eyewitness identification procedures) even outside New Jersey. Demand the full identification “packet,” including photos shown, lineup composition, administrator identity, exact instructions given, recordings if they exist, the witness’ confidence statement in the witness’ own words, any confirmatory feedback, any post-­identification communications, and all documentation of the procedure. Mainstream eyewitness science and law enforcement guidance emphasize that reliability turns heavily on what the system did, what it recorded, and what it can later prove. If vividness becomes a basis for truth in the case, then the defense should insist on the kind of documentation that prevents the system from laundering suggestive or confidence-­inflating procedures into “she seemed sure.”

Litigating Credibility and Confessions

In motion practice and cross-­examination, the goal is to reframe “lack of detail” as a known cognitive profile rather than deceit. Counsel can tie the issue to what jurors demonstrably do, i.e., they treat detail as credibility and often misunderstand memory, despite findings that aphantasic witnesses are less complete yet equally accurate. Strategies include, where permitted by local practice and pattern instructions, proposing a tailored instruction (or at minimum creating a clear record through an instruction conference) to counter common misconceptions about memory and credibility, and/or seeking to admit expert testimony on imagery variability when credibility is central and the factfinder is likely to draw improper inferences from a non-­visual narrative containing few details.

Admissibility determinations depend on the local expert-­evidence framework, whether that involves Rule 702, Daubert, Frye, or a hybrid standard. Regardless of the specific test, the most persuasive approach treats the testimony as providing cognitive-­science context. This helps the jury evaluate the meaning of memory features without offering a diagnosis to excuse weak testimony or an opinion on truthfulness.

The initial step is defining the scope to prevent any confusion with vouching. The objective is not to diagnose a witness in the clinical sense or to instruct the jury on how to decide credibility. Instead, the goal is to provide a scientifically grounded explanation of memory phenomenology. This explains why some people may sincerely recall an event while reporting limited visual imagery and why certain imagery-­heavy interview techniques may be a poor fit for that population. Counsel should frame it as context that improves factfinding accuracy by preventing jurors from misinterpreting the absence of vivid mental pictures as a sign of deception.

Notably, counsel should not be deterred if a search of reported cases yields no published opinions containing the term “aphantasia” (as of this Article’s publication). The legal system invariably lags behind cognitive science. The lack of published cases reflects the novelty of the terminology, not necessarily the rejection of the concept. Additionally, courts routinely address cognitive and memory phenomena without adopting the newest terminology, and the operative legal questions remain the familiar ones: whether the proffer will assist the factfinder, whether any expert testimony is reliable and fits the issue under the jurisdiction’s standard, and whether unnecessary limits would impair the defense’s ability to present a fair account of how memory works in this case. Prudent framing is to treat aphantasia as shorthand for individual differences in mental imagery and memory phenomenology and to connect the argument to concrete interview mechanics and the specific inference the jury is otherwise likely to draw, viz., that absence of visual detail equals deceit.

In the current context, a robust offer of proof typically includes three specific components.

Purpose and Fit: Identify the exact inference the jury is likely to draw without expert help and the specific misconception the expert will correct. Examples with a cleaner fit than general credibility opinions include explaining why a witness gives fewer visual descriptors even when recalling accurately or why prompts to “see it in your mind” are not reliable truth markers.

Reliable Foundation: Anchor the testimony in peer-­reviewed research on visual imagery and episodic recall. This includes work discussing low-­imagery traits, validated assessments, and what the research indicates regarding recall completeness versus accuracy. The expert must avoid overclaiming and should be prepared to articulate what is well-­established while acknowledging measurement limitations.

Reliable Application and Narrow Opinion: If the expert evaluates an individual witness, the application should be transparent. This involves reviewing interview history relevant to imagery experience, using validated measures, and conducting consistency checks. The opinion must remain explanatory. Safe formulations state that research suggests some individuals provide less complete visual descriptions without necessarily being less accurate or that imagery-­heavy questioning strategies may affect completeness. Opinions regarding whether a witness is truthful or an identification is unreliable must be avoided as they risk exclusion for improper bolstering.

Counsel should also anticipate standard objections and build the answers into the motion record:

Objection: “It’s subjective self-­report and easy to fake.”

Response: Concede that self-­report is part of the evidentiary picture. Then demonstrate that the opinion is methodologically grounded through standardized measures, converging indicators, and internal consistency checks. Emphasize that the inquiry focuses on whether the testimony assists the jury and whether the method is reliably applied rather than on whether the subject matter is perfectly objective.

Objection: “It’s novel, trendy, and not generally accepted.”

Response: Distinctly separate the label from the principles. The relevant science is the longstanding body of research on mental imagery variability and memory phenomenology, not the specific buzzword. In Frye jurisdictions, the proffer should focus on that underlying accepted principle and the limited inference being offered.

Objection: “No known error rate or standardized forensic protocol.”

Response: Acknowledge that no single universal forensic protocol exists. Highlight that reliability factors are flexible and explain why formal error rates may be less informative for testimony aimed at educating the jury about perception. Show rigor through the use of peer-­reviewed literature, transparent reasoning, and careful limitation of conclusions.

Objection: “This invades the jury’s role and improperly bolsters credibility.”

Response: Make the boundary unmistakable. The expert will not opine on truthfulness or the accuracy of the specific account. The testimony serves only to help jurors avoid unsupported heuristics, such as equating vivid imagery with truth.

Finally, Rule 403 often becomes the actual battleground. Even if the testimony satisfies the admissibility threshold, courts may exclude it if they believe the jury will give it undue weight. Counsel should address this head-­on by explaining why the testimony clarifies rather than confuses. Offering limiting language and avoiding demonstratives that appear to be diagnosis theater can further protect the record. If a serious contest is anticipated, counsel should push for a clean pretrial ruling to make the record explicit on the precise purpose, limits, and methodology. This maximizes the chance of admission and builds a defensible record for any necessary appeal.

This approach is equally critical in confession cases. Counsel should review transcripts for patterns where investigators insisted the suspect “should” be able to visualize the scene, followed by escalating confrontation. If the client appears aphantasic, counsel can proactively educate the court on why a “lack of vivid recall” is not a lie cue and why interrogation inferences built on that premise are scientifically fragile, especially given the known risks of memory distrust syndrome.

Postconviction Considerations

For prisoners and postconviction counsel, discovering aphantasia years later does not automatically create “new evidence.” Whether it qualifies as newly discovered evidence or supports other claims (like ineffective assistance of counsel) is highly jurisdiction-­ and record-­dependent. However, it can serve as a missing explanatory layer to recontextualize record evidence previously argued as consciousness of guilt, such as vague statements or an inability to provide narrative detail. Used responsibly, it can support claims that investigators mischaracterized behavior as deception or challenge the reliability of confession evidence where pressure exploited a perceived “memory failure.” The strongest postconviction use will usually be corroborative, paired with case-­specific evidence of contamination rather than relied upon as a standalone theory.

Trial Strategy: Voir Dire, Opening, and Testimony

Most jurors walk into court with an assumption that tacitly shapes everything they hear. They expect truthful memory to play back like a digital recording. In a nationally representative survey of U.S. adults, Simons and Chabris (2011) found that 63% agreed that “human memory works like a video camera,” accurately recording what we see and hear so it can be reviewed later, even though every memory expert they surveyed rejected that proposition. That misconception is not an academic problem. It is a credibility filter jurors bring with them into the jury box.

In aphantasia cases, the danger is practical and predictable. A defendant or defense witness may testify in a fact-­first way, with limited visual description and little “scene painting.” Many jurors will not interpret that as a cognitive difference. They will interpret it as evasion. That creates a hidden credibility penalty on the defense, especially in trials where visual recall and perceived certainty are doing real work for the prosecution’s theory.

A generic “can you be fair?” exchange cannot fix this. Where the court permits meaningful voir dire, counsel should use it to expose and dispel the “detail equals truth” heuristic before the jury ever hears an aphantasic witness. The objective is to identify jurors who treat vividness as an indicator of truthfulness and to explore whether they can evaluate testimony without using detail as indicative of credibility. Several lines of questioning can do that work without turning jury selection into a lecture.

Test the “Details Equals Truth” Assumption: Ask the venire whether they expect a truthful person to be able to describe an event “like describing a scene from a movie,” including what the room looked like or what people were wearing. Ask whether they would hold it against a witness who says they cannot picture those details.

Draw on Personal Experience: Ask whether jurors have ever “known for a fact” they were somewhere but could not describe incidental visual details such as the wallpaper, the lighting, or what strangers were wearing.

Address the “CSI Effect”: Ask whether jurors watch crime shows where witnesses give unusually rich descriptions and whether those shows have influenced what they expect from real testimony. Then ask whether jurors can accept that a truthful witness’ recall may lack detail because their mind does not supply pictures on demand.

Screen for Low-­Imagery Jurors: If the court allows it and the case warrants it, ask whether any juror has ever realized that phrases like “picture it” or “see it in your mind” are literal for other people in a way they do not experience. Frame it as normal variation rather than a diagnosis, and be prepared for blank stares. Many people who would answer “yes” will not recognize the question as describing aphantasia.

If the jury is seated and aphantasia will likely matter at trial, counsel should not wait until cross-­examination to explain why the client’s account may sound suspiciously limited and non-­visual. Counsel should address it in the opening statement to set accurate expectations. The goal is to prevent the prosecution from converting a cognitive trait into a character flaw.

This must be done carefully. Counsel should preview the issue only if there is a good-­faith basis to believe the evidence will support it, and counsel should avoid suggesting that aphantasia proves truthfulness. The point is simply to explain why the testimony sounds different and why vividness is an unreliable proxy for credibility.

A defensible framing is to tell the jury what they will hear and why it will sound unfamiliar. Counsel can explain that the evidence will show the witness gives a bare, non-­visual, fact-­based account and that the jury should evaluate truthfulness based on accuracy rather than storytelling flair. Counsel can also give the jury a concrete framework to focus on consistency and logic. If the account aligns with the physical evidence or remains internally consistent despite the lack of sensory language, that is the proper measure of reliability. If the prosecution later argues that the witness was “vague,” the jury is more likely to recognize it as a criticism of the memory’s format rather than the evidence’s accuracy.

The opening statement creates an expectation that the witness must fulfill. If counsel promises a limited but accurate account, the witness must be prepared to deliver exactly that without falling into the trap of trying to “help” the jury with guessed details. Preparation should focus on comfort with the phrase “I don’t know.” Witnesses with aphantasia often compensate in daily life by inferring visual details based on logic or semantic knowledge. In a casual conversation, it is harmless to assume a stop sign was red. On the witness stand, that inference can be devastating on cross-­examination if the physical evidence contradicts it. Counsel must explain that the jury will judge them on accuracy, not vividness. The witness should be instructed to rely strictly on what they know for a fact rather than what they can imagine.

Cross-­examination requires specific attention because the prosecution’s most predictable move against an aphantasic witness is also the most intuitive to jurors: “If you were really there, you should be able to describe what it looked like.” That attack relies on the same common misconception about memory that counsel worked to expose in voir dire and neutralize in the opening. The difference at trial is that the prosecutor will try to collapse the issue into a crime-­specific “convenient gap” and invite the jury to treat it as proof of deception or nonpresence.

The defense response starts with sequencing. If your client is the aphantasic witness or if you are presenting an aphantasic witness on direct examination, the safest approach is to establish the lifelong pattern before the testimony turns to the charged events. Once the jury hears the limitation as a global trait, the absence of visual description in the case-­specific narrative stops looking like an opportunistic ploy. It reads as consistent presentation.

If the court permits it and you have a good-­faith basis, consider building that foundation with plain-­language questions that are unrelated to the alleged crime. These questions should be simple enough that the witness can answer without sounding coached and concrete enough that jurors immediately understand what is being discussed. Examples include:

“When you think about a familiar place, do you get an actual picture in your mind, or do you just know what it looks like?”

“If I asked you to picture a close family member’s face right now, do you see an image, or is it blank?”

“Has it always been that way for you, for as long as you can remember?”

“Does that affect whether you can know facts about what happened, or does it affect only whether you can form mental pictures?”

If the court wants these framed more openly on direct, the same foundation can be laid with questions like:

“Describe what happens when you try to picture a familiar place or a familiar face.”

“How long has it been that way, and what can you still recall accurately even without mental pictures?”

That distinction between mental pictures and factual recall matters because it keeps the testimony linked to what the jury is asked to decide. The defense is not asking for sympathy. The defense is explaining why a truthful account can sound questionable without being false.

Preparation also has to anticipate what a prosecutor will do with the issue once it is in the open. A common cross theme is to push the witness into defensiveness or into guessing. If the opening promised accuracy over vividness, the witness must be able to deliver that discipline under pressure. The goal is to give the witness a short, factual response that does not invite follow-­up and does not tempt them into inventing “helpful” sensory details. A response like “I do not form pictures in my mind, but I know who was there and what was said” is often stronger than trying to debate the premise of the question. It meets the question directly, it explains the limitation in ordinary language, and it brings the jury back to the substance of the testimony.

It is also worth preparing for a second prosecution tactic, which is to isolate the limitation as suspiciously selective. Prosecutors sometimes imply that the witness can remember other things just fine, so the lack of visual description here must be evasion. The best antidote is consistency across contexts. If the witness has already explained that they do not form mental pictures for ordinary memories either, the prosecutor’s implication loses force. The jury hears that the limitation is stable rather than strategic.

Redirect is where the defense can reclaim the explanation if the prosecutor succeeds in making the limitation sound disingenuous. Redirect should be tight and purposeful. It should avoid rearguing the science. It should reestablish three points in a sequence that jurors can follow. First, the witness has always experienced memory in this non-­visual way. Second, the prosecutor’s questions demanded a kind of description the witness cannot produce. Third, the witness has been consistent about what they do and do not know, and the jury should evaluate reliability by consistency, logic, and corroboration rather than by how cinematic the account sounds. In practice, that can be achieved with a few questions that return to plain English. For example:

“You have been clear that you do not form mental pictures, correct?”

“That has been true your entire life?”

“Even without pictures, you can still know facts and recall conversations?”

“When you told the jury you could not ‘picture’ the room, you were not refusing to answer, you were describing how your mind works?”

These questions are technically leading, but many courts permit some latitude during rehabilitation of a witness whose credibility has been attacked. If an objection is sustained, counsel can rephrase with minimal disruption. The goal is to rehabilitate without inviting the witness to oversell or to sound rehearsed. Examples of effective non-­leading questions include:

“Please describe, in your own words, how your ability to form mental pictures works.”

“When did you first notice that this is how your mind works when you try to form mental pictures?”

“When you told the jury you couldn’t ‘picture’ the room, what did you mean by that?”

“What kinds of things can you still remember accurately even without mental pictures?”

A different but related opportunity arises when the issue comes up with an adverse witness. If a prosecution eyewitness provides a limited description, the defense instinct is often to attack the gap as incompetence or dishonesty. That approach can backfire in the current situation. It can prompt the witness to speculate, it can make the witness sympathetic, and it can signal to the jury that the defense is demanding a “video camera” memory standard that jurors already find intuitive. When there is a reason to think the witness’ lack of details reflects memory style rather than evasion, a more defensible cross can explore the limits of the witness’ recollection without bullying the witness into filling gaps. The aim is to help the jury understand what the testimony is and what it is not.

Counsel can do that by asking how the witness remembers generally, again in plain language, while avoiding any suggestion that counsel is diagnosing the witness. This approach departs from the typical cross-­examination preference for tightly controlled leading questions, but the tactical trade-­off can be worth it when the goal is to lower the perceived resolution of testimony rather than to impeach. Questions like “When you remember things, do you usually get pictures in your mind, or is it more like facts and impressions?” and “Right now, as you sit here, do you have a clear picture in your mind of the person’s clothing, or is that detail simply not something you can retrieve?” can accomplish that without accusing the witness of lying. If counsel prefers tighter control, the same point can be made with leading questions that limit narrative, such as:

“You do not have a clear mental picture of the clothing today, correct?”

“Your memory of that detail is based on an impression rather than a vivid image, correct?”

That supports an argument focused on the weight of the evidence rather than its admissibility. Counsel can concede the witness’ sincerity while challenging the reliability of the witness’ recall, emphasizing that the witness’ memory does not function in the vivid, replayable way jurors assume. In this context, confidence is simply not a reliable method of determining accuracy.

Finally, unless the court has admitted expert testimony or otherwise permitted the issue to be presented as a formal cognitive condition, witnesses should generally avoid using the medical label “aphantasia” on the stand. Labels can sound rehearsed, and if the witness tries to explain mechanisms, it can draw an objection that they are offering unqualified expert testimony. Describing the functional limitation in plain English is usually safer and more relatable to jurors, and it keeps the testimony anchored to what matters in trial practice.

Model Language for Motions, Instructions, and Argument Control

The goal is to prevent “no visual detail” from becoming an unreliable pseudo-­scientific credibility standard. Courts vary widely on how receptive they are to novel-­sounding cognitive evidence, so the safest strategy is to (1) police the rhetoric, (2) educate through neutral framing, and (3) ask for narrowly tailored remedies that do not invite vouching.

Motion in Limine (core concept; adapt to local practice): The defense moves to preclude the prosecution from arguing or implying, in opening, closing, or through questioning, that a truthful person would be able to “picture” the event or supply vivid visual detail on demand and that the absence of such detail is evidence of deception, guilt, or consciousness of guilt. Such claims ask jurors to treat a contested proposition about memory phenomenology as a factual premise without evidentiary foundation. If the prosecution contends that visualization capacity or sensory richness is probative of truthfulness in this case, the prosecution should be required to establish that proposition through admissible evidence under the jurisdiction’s expert-­evidence standard.

Request for a Neutral Limiting Instruction (useful even without an expert): The defense requests a brief instruction advising the jury that people differ in how they experience and retrieve memory; some individuals report little or no voluntary visual imagery; and the presence or absence of vivid visual description is not, by itself, a reliable indicator of whether a person is telling the truth. The jury may consider all of the circumstances, including the questioning method, delay, stress, suggestion, and corroborating evidence. This is purpose-­built to counter a common lay misconception while leaving the ultimate credibility determination to the jury. Jurisdictions that already use detailed eyewitness identification instructions provide an established template for this type of education without vouching.

When Litigating Expert Testimony, Keep the Ask Narrow and Court-­Friendly: Frame the testimony as education about memory and individual differences, offered to prevent a specific error in reasoning, rather than a diagnosis offered to rescue a weak narrative. In federal court, the 2023 amendments to Rule 702 and the advisory committee notes reinforce that the court must perform gatekeeping and that admissibility turns on a reliable basis and reliable application, which the proponent must establish by a preponderance of the evidence. That standard pairs well with a tightly scoped proffer that avoids opinions on truthfulness.

Built-­In Discovery Tie-­In (Brady / Giglio framing where appropriate): When the case turns on credibility and the prosecution’s theory implicitly relies on “thin recall equals deception,” counsel should not overlook impeachment material that bears on interview methods and investigative bias. Training materials, policy guidance, prior sustained findings of interview misconduct, and prior inconsistent descriptions of what the witness did or did not say can become credibility-­critical when the prosecution suggests that jurors should treat omissions as lies. Where such items exist in the prosecution’s possession, Brady and Giglio principles provide the disclosure framework. Courts apply a materiality standard to Brady and Giglio claims, so counsel should articulate specifically how the requested items bear on the credibility theory the prosecution is advancing.

The Future Blindspot: Sentencing and Allocution

The impact of aphantasia does not end with how a person reconstructs the past. In some individuals, it also changes how the future is mentally represented, and that difference can matter most at the moment the system is most discretionary – sentencing.

Cognitive science has long treated remembering and imagining as closely related processes. Classic neuroimaging work on “event construction” shows substantial overlap in the brain networks engaged when people remember past events and when they imagine possible future ones. Aphantasia provides a real-­world test of what happens when that imagery is reduced. In a 2022 Cognition study using an adapted Autobiographical Interview, Dawes and colleagues reported that participants with aphantasia generated significantly fewer episodic details than controls when describing both past and future events. The reductions were driven in part by diminished visual retrieval and were accompanied by lower ratings of subjective richness and less perceptual language.

Why does that matter at sentencing? Because sentencing is one of the places where impressions – insight, responsibility, and perceived remorse – can carry weight, even though the assessment of remorse is widely recognized as difficult, expectation-­laden, and variable across judges.

The “Remorse” Gap: During allocution, the system often expects a defendant to communicate an appreciation of harm in a way that feels emotionally engaged and specific. Some judges ask questions that implicitly request scene-­based narration (“Think about what this did to the family”). A defendant with aphantasia may be less able to generate vivid, image-­like descriptions, even if their moral understanding and regret are genuine. The result can be a mismatch in presentation. That is, remorse expressed as principle, responsibility, and commitment to change may sound “flat” to a listener who expects sensory texture. That mismatch is a defense problem, not a character flaw. It is also predictable. The research points to selective reductions in episodic detail, not an absence of conscience.

Plea Decision-­Making: There is not yet courtroom-­specific research showing that aphantasia changes plea decisions. Still, counsel should be alert to a practical possibility suggested by the episodic-­simulation literature that some clients may understand the arithmetic of “5 years versus 15” (years) yet experience long horizons as unusually abstract because they do not spontaneously “pre-­live” the future in vivid scenes. This is not a claim about plea validity; it is a counseling point. Do not assume that numbers automatically translate into felt consequences for every client.

Mitigating the Aphantasic Allocution: If the client has aphantasia (or otherwise presents with consistently low imagery), counsel should adjust preparation to reduce demeanor-­based misreads.

Bridge the Imagery Gap: Counsel should not rely on the client to generate a vivid narrative on demand in the pre-­sentence investigation interview or allocution. Counsel can help the client express remorse through responsibility, values, and concrete commitments such as specific steps taken, specific steps planned, and specific supports in place. This shifts the presentation away from sensory detail and toward action.

Contextualize “Flatness”: If the client’s delivery is literal, sparse, or emotionally muted, counsel should consider whether it can responsibly be contextualized as cognitive style rather than disrespect. Where appropriate, this may be done through a narrowly tailored expert explanation or a sentencing memorandum grounded in the relevant research.

Make consequences concrete: When advising on pleas, counsel should move beyond sentence-­length abstractions. Counsel should use specific, non-­speculative anchors (“Your son will be X years old,” “this program eligibility cutoff”), so the client can evaluate consequences in semantic terms that do not depend on vivid episodic future thinking.

Conclusion

Aphantasia is an innocence issue hiding in plain sight. It is a cognitive difference present in millions of Americans, but it remains rarely recognized in criminal practice. It can sit silently in police reports, interview recordings, and trial transcripts until someone decides that a human being “should” be able to do something they simply cannot do.

Our system rewards vividness. It punishes vagueness. It treats details as truth and their absence as evasion, even though decades of research show that details can be fabricated or contaminated, that jurors routinely misunderstand how memory works, and that investigators are generally poor judges of deception.

The risk is structural, not speculative. Truthful people will be discounted. False or contaminated accounts will be credited. And some of those people will be convicted.

The defense bar should treat aphantasia the way it now treats suggestion, lineup contamination, and interrogation coercion. It belongs in the baseline science for litigating any case that depends on human recall. It calls for early recognition, questioning that avoids equating “no picture” with “no truth,” and insistence on corroboration when sensory detail is being used as proof. In appropriate cases, it also supports narrowly framed expert testimony that educates without vouching.

The mind’s eye is not universal. The failure to recognize that has already cost people their freedom. Whether it continues to do so depends on those who stand between the accused and the state.  

Sources: Donna Rose Addis et al., Remembering the Past and Imagining the Future: Common and Distinct Neural Substrates During Event Construction, 45 Neuropsychologia 1363 (2007); Aphantasia, Cleveland Clinic (last visited Dec. 19, 2025); Wilma A. Bainbridge et al., Quantifying Aphantasia Through Drawing: Object Imagery Deficits for Memory but Not Perception, 135 Cortex 159 (2021); B.E. Bell & E.F. Loftus, Trivial Persuasion in the Courtroom: The Power of (a Few) Minor Details, 56 J. Personality & Soc. Psych. 669 (1989); Michael J. Beran et al., Assessing Aphantasia Prevalence and the Relation of Self-­Reported Imagery Abilities and Memory Task Performance, 14 Frontiers Psych. 1190457 (2023); Charles F. Bond, Jr. & Bella M. DePaulo, Accuracy of Deception Judgments, 10 Personality & Soc. Psych. Rev. 214 (2006); Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963); C.J. Dance et al., The Prevalence of Aphantasia (Imagery Weakness) in the General Population, 97 Consciousness & Cognition 103243 (2022); Coral J. Dando, Drawing to Remember: External Support of Older Adults’ Eyewitness Performance, 8 PLoS ONE e69937 (2013); Coral J. Dando et al., Real-­World Implications of Aphantasia: Episodic Recall of Eyewitnesses with Aphantasia Is Less Complete but No Less Accurate, 10 Royal Soc’y Open Sci. 230357 (2023); Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharms., Inc., 509 U.S. 579 (1993); Alek Dawes et al., Memories with a Blind Mind: Remembering the Past and Imagining the Future with Aphantasia, 227 Cognition 105192 (2022); Steven A. Drizin & Richard A. Leo, The Problem of False Confessions in the Post-­DNA World, 82 N.C. L. Rev. 891 (2004); DNA Exonerations in the United States, Innocence Project (last visited Dec. 19, 2025); Eyewitness Misidentification, Innocence Project (last visited Dec. 19, 2025); False Confessions & Recording of Custodial Interrogations, Innocence Project (last visited Dec. 19, 2025); Fed. R. Evid. 702; Frye v. United States, 293 F. 1013 (D.C. Cir. 1923); Gen. Elec. Co. v. Joiner, 522 U.S. 136 (1997); Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150 (1972); Gisli H. Gudjonsson, The Psychology of Interrogations and Confessions: A Handbook (2003); Gisli H. Gudjonsson, Memory Distrust Syndrome, Confabulation and False Confession, 23 Eur. Psychologist 95 (2017); Rebecca K. Helm, Evaluating Witness Testimony: Juror Knowledge, False Memory, and the Utility of Evidence-­Based Directions, 12 Frontiers Psych. 616358 (2021); Lucy A. Henry et al., Verbal and Non-­Verbal Methods of Interviewing Witnesses with Autism Spectrum Disorder, in Psychology and Law (2017); Ze Jin et al., A Systematic Review of Aphantasia: Concept, Measurement, Neural Basis, and Theory Development, 14 Behav. Scis. 110 (2024); Saul M. Kassin & Karlyn McNall, Police Interrogations and Confessions: Communicating Promises and Threats by Pragmatic Implication, 15 Law & Hum. Behav. 233 (1991); Saul M. Kassin et al., Police-­Induced Confessions: Risk Factors and Recommendations, 34 Law & Hum. Behav. 3 (2010); Saul M. Kassin et al., Police-­Induced Confessions, 2.0 (Am. Psych.-­Law Soc’y White Paper Update) (2025); Lachlan Kay et al., The Pupillary Light Response as a Physiological Index of Aphantasia, 11 eLife e72484 (2022); Rebecca Keogh & Joel Pearson, The Blind Mind: No Sensory Visual Imagery in Aphantasia, 103 Cortex 152 (2018); Kumho Tire Co. v. Carmichael, 526 U.S. 137 (1999); Brian Levine et al., Aging and Autobiographical Memory: Dissociating Episodic from Semantic Retrieval, 17 Psych. & Aging 677 (2002); David F. Marks, Visual Imagery Differences in the Recall of Pictures, 64 Brit. J. Psych. 17 (1973); Amina Memon et al., The Cognitive Interview: A Meta-­Analytic Review and Study Space Analysis of the Past 25 Years, 16 Psych. Pub. Pol. & L. 340 (2010); Model Jury Instructions on Eyewitness Identification, 473 Mass. 1051 (2015); M. Monzel et al., No Increased Prevalence of Prosopagnosia in Aphantasia, 5 Brain Commc’ns fcad041 (2023); Nat’l Inst. of Just., Eyewitness Evidence: A Guide for Law Enforcement (1999); Nat’l Rsch. Council, Identifying the Culprit: Assessing Eyewitness Identification (2014); Daniela J. Palombo et al., Severely Deficient Autobiographical Memory (SDAM) in Healthy Adults: A New Mnemonic Syndrome, 72 Neuropsychologia 105 (2015); Michael J. Proeve, Remorse, in A Handbook of Legal and Forensic Psychology (2023); Hannah J. Robbins, Allocution in Federal Sentencing: The Impact of a Defendant’s Words, Digital Commons (2014); Melissa B. Russano et al., Investigating True and False Confessions Within a Novel Experimental Paradigm, 16 Psych. Sci. 481 (2005); Daniel J. Simons & Christopher F. Chabris, What People Believe About How Memory Works: A Representative Survey of the U.S. Population, 6 PLoS ONE e22757 (2011); State v. Henderson, 27 A.3d 872 (N.J. 2011); Stored Communications Act, 18 U.S.C. § 2703; Nicholas W. Watkins, (A)phantasia and Severely Deficient Autobiographical Memory: Scientific and Personal Perspectives, 105 Cortex 41 (2018); Adam Zeman et al., Lives Without Imagery – Congenital Aphantasia, 73 Cortex 378 (2015); Adam Zeman et al., Phantasia – The Psychological Significance of Lifelong Visual Imagery Vividness Extremes, 130 Cortex 426 (2020); R. Zhong, Judging Remorse, 39 N.Y.U. Rev. L. & Soc. Change 133 (2015).

Subscribe today

Already a subscriber? Login