Does the majority of the Court of Appeal have any concerns about the risk of misidentification due to the lapse of time between a police undercover officer's spontaneous identification of defendant at the drug sale site before he was arrested?

The majority's concern over the possibility of a misidentification because of the lapse of time between the July 12 drug transaction which defendant participated in and the undercover officer's prearrest spontaneous identification of defendant at the drug sale site on August 7 is understandable. But the purpose of a Wade hearing is not to prevent all misidentifications, but to prevent a misidentification attributable to suggestive police pretrial identification procedures (see, United States v. Wade, 388 U.S., at 229-235, 87 S.Ct. at 1933-1936, supra ). As previously discussed, the spontaneous identification of defendant at the drug sale site before he was arrested was completely free of both any police arrangements and any suggestive conditions which might require a Wade hearing. The risk of misidentification by the lapse of time was fully explored at the trial by vigorous and searching cross-examination of the undercover officer, and it was well within the jury's province to credit the undercover officer's testimony and conclude that his identification of defendant was accurate.