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I've been watching Psycho-Pass. Makishima has been working as an art professor at a women academy. During an investigation, an audio clip is retrieved where a girl (this particular case's culprit) speaks with him, mentioning his name. So now the investigators know that there is some guy called Makishima within the academy.

After a brief encounter between Tsunemori and Makishima, he escapes. Later, Tsunemori uses an identikit to relive the experience to reproduce his face. After the face is generated, they go to the academy and confirm that he was indeed a professor there.

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To the left is the identikit image, and to the right what I imagine is the academy's archive photo. They compare them (wow, powerful hairspray) and they match.

But why an identikit? They already knew his name, so all they had to do was go to the academy and mention his name. Then they show the archived photo and Tsunemori would recognize it without having to relive the experience.

Saturn
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  • Maybe they're afraid of some form of confirmation bias? If Tsunemori was somewhat unsure of what he looked like, she might pick the wrong Makishima (eyewitnesses do stuff like this all the time in police work, apparently). Or if she says it's not him, she may get "stuck" thinking of the wrong one, and pull traits from him. Whereas if they generate the composite _first_... – Clockwork-Muse Aug 19 '14 at 04:35

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Actually Makishima didn't use his real name to register as a professor at Oso Academy but use his alias "Yukimori Shibata". Only one who knew the truth in the school is Rikako Oryo.

Kasei Joshu
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  • Whatever the chances are of this happening so much later, but could you add a reference for this? – mivilar Sep 29 '15 at 19:53
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As what @Clockwork-Muse have said, it is for confirmation bias, because without recreating the face of Makishima, Tsunemori can just say anyone in the acadamy that he is Makishima without having any evidence even though it is not in Tsunemori memory, so by creating the identikit, they provide an unbiased evidence based on the real image that Tsunemori's memory depicts.

user2705620
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  • But they already have Makishima's name - wouldn't the college staff/students know exactly who is it? They won't ask Tsunemori to point her finger at some guy's photo, because everybody in the academy already knows who is Makishima. – Saturn Aug 29 '14 at 03:41
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    @Omega - Is Makishima only the Makishima in the school? ofcourse you wouldn't know, names can never the basis as names can have duplicates, a name with the face is the most direct evidence they can get, by having a picture, it narrows down their search to the person that matches the picture with a name Makishima. – user2705620 Aug 29 '14 at 05:17
  • But then the school would just show all the Makishima duplicates to Tsunemori, if any. I suppose that the identikit would be necessary only if Tsunemori cannot distinguish between two duplicates, but it doesn't seem like they even tried. – Saturn Aug 29 '14 at 06:49
  • @Omega - as i said, there would be no credibility if they would show all of the Makishima in the school to Tsunemori because she can just pick anyone, on the meantime having the identikit provides them the credibility that it is really what the memory of Tsunemori depicts. – user2705620 Aug 29 '14 at 07:10
  • @Omega also for a number of reasons using identikit would be faster than scanning every Makishima to Tsunemori, our brain cannot retain much of every details we remember, so by reliving the experience again, this refreshes his mind about the face of what she saw, if she didnt do this she might picked a wrong guy. – user2705620 Aug 29 '14 at 07:15
  • I just realized that they also had his last name "Shogo" (Kogami provides it). That should narrow everything to one profile. – Saturn Aug 29 '14 at 11:10
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Correct me if i'm wrong, but typically investigators need solid concrete evidence in order to do a search and seizure, or any form of operation, to avoid being targets themselves. Imagine... A police officer brakes open your door, cracks you with the butt of his pistal on mere speculation on the fact that your name and/or hairstyle matched the criminal he was chasing. Yea... Having a facial recognition may not be accurate, but it would give them enough proof to get a warrant

And while the differences between their targets are pretty big, in'turn increases their chances of being wrong. Using technology to confirm would shorten the distance.

BizzMizz
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    But they have Makishima's name. If they ask the college, they will provide an archive photo and Tsunemori will know it is him. They have done riskier speculations previously in the series (like the guy that was controlling robots in the factory - they just made a guess it was him). – Saturn Aug 29 '14 at 03:39
  • How common is the name Makishima? Having a picture plus name would make it more realist. Plus they needed to recreate his image from her, to make sure its the same one. Its hard to see into other peoples memories. Overall this was the quickest and easiest method they could use without making anything over complicated. – BizzMizz Aug 29 '14 at 07:38
  • They also have his last name "Shogo". – Saturn Aug 29 '14 at 11:11