Articles Posted in Experts

I’ve posted before on issues about potential bias and unreliability with forensic and other expert testimony: here and here. In particular, we’ve referenced the National Academy of Sciences study. Well it’s not just in the United States. Here is a piece from the U.K. Frances Gibb, Why the Law Commission is worried about expert evidence,…

I take some back, almost. Again I was looking at the NKO Criminal Law Division’s practice tips and I came across this one dealing with the ““Blackout” defense to alcohol facilitated sexual assault.” No, it’s not. This title implies that the accused has deliberately gotten the complaining witness drunk. This is not the case in…

I noticed an article on the Navy JAG NKO site today that should be treated with some caution by defense counsel. It is entitled Practice Tip: Presenting medical evidence in a sexual assault case. I have no problem with the beginning and essential premise of the article – the absence of genital trauma in a…

I’m sure you, like me, have used or tried to use PTSD at trial, either on the merits or at least in sentencing. Along with TBI, PTSD seems to have a significant impact, especially when it results from combat. There has been a lot published over the last few years about how the military handles…

We previously commented on an issue of voodoo science, and more on voodoo science, and the National Research Counsel report on the future of forensics. The promoters of this piece of voodoo — a voice stress analyser — convinced law enforcement to fund and buy their expensive machine and methods for using voice stresses to…

Here’s a filler piece from Slate.Nina S. Rastogi, Murder, She Wrote: How forensic handwriting identification works, Slate, 26 March 2009.Here’s an interesting standard for expert testimony admissibility: According to the handful of studies on the subject, a trained examiner will be correct more often than a layman. One 1997 study asked both professionals and amateurs…

A lot of times we get caught up in the need for an “expert” witness. If you have an expert witness the person is testifying under Mil. R. Evid. 702. True, the expert can “get-in” more information than other witnesses, but do you always need an expert. Federal Evidence blog reminds us that lay witnesses…

According to the MJ ruling in a case I just completed in Korea, the Intoxilyzer SD2 is reliable if administered in accordance with its instruction manual and the applicable AR. However, at Camp Casey, Korea, they are not admissible. That is because the MP’s do not conduct proper calibrations in accordance with the test instructions…

Prof. Colin Miller has posted on how to and who may authenticate a persons voice, Follow My Voice: Seventh Circuit Finds That Voice Authentication Doesn’t Need To Be Done By An Expert. Federal Rule of Evidence 901(b)(5), which states that the requirement of authentication or identification as a condition precedent to admissibility is satisfied by…

Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence (2d ed. 2000), Federal Judicial Center. A third edition is in the works.