WASHINGTON - TelAve -- Although there are at least two different real-time video recordings of the tragic events in Minneapolis, there is a stark disagreement among observers not only about the guilt or innocence of the shooter, but also about specific facts; e.g. was the car moving towards the agent?, did the car bump him or not?, was the driver just trying to escape?" etc.

One explanation may lie in an important study reported in a famous 2012 law review article:
"THEY SAW A PROTEST": COGNITIVE ILLIBERALISM AND THE SPEECHCONDUCT DISTINCTION (https://www.stanfordlawreview.org/wp-content/up...)
as well as in other studies which have been used to show law students how they can radically alter the perception - and thus the testimony under oath - of witnesses to a crime or accident, says public interest law professor John Banzhaf.

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In this reported study, participants were shown a video of a protest; some of a protest against military recruiters, and the (same) other a protest against an abortion clinic.

Now here's the catch: There were actually two videos, not one. Each person was shown just one of the two.

The two videos were identical except that the designers of the study altered the videos to change what was being protested. One video was edited so that the protest was against military recruiters, and the second video was edited so that the protest was against an abortion clinic.

"Whether protesters were seen as guilty or innocent depended a lot on the ideology of the study participant doing the seeing . . . people watching the video tended to see what matched their worldview."
The Minnesota ICE Videos and "They Saw A Protest" One explanation for the different reactions (https://reason.com/volokh/2026/01/08/the-minnesota-ice-videos-and-they-saw-a-protest/)

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Other studies have shown that participants' estimates of the speed of vehicles involved in a videotaped accident varied - sometimes by more than 100% - depended upon whether the questioner used words such as "touched," "hit each other," or "collided."

Whether of not they saw broken glass on the ground - there was in fact none - depended on whether they were asked "did you see any glass?" or "did you see the glass."

Studies such as these are important because people's perceptions and interpretations of events can depend upon their ideology (for or against immigration enforcement) and the words used to describe them - e.g. by TV reporters and commentators - but also by how questions may be asked in any resulting criminal or civil trial, says Banzhaf, who actually conducted his own experiment with his own law students.

http://banzhaf.net/   jbanzhaf3ATgmail.com   @profbanzhaf