Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
- Keyword
-
- Testimony (25)
- United States Supreme Court (25)
- Witnesses (23)
- Confrontation Clause (19)
- Sixth Amendment (19)
-
- Cross-examination (18)
- Admissibility (12)
- Crawford v. Washington (11)
- Police (9)
- Testimonial (8)
- Expert evidence (7)
- Hearsay (6)
- Juries (6)
- Reliability (6)
- Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals Inc. (4)
- Davis v. Washington (4)
- Exclusionary rule (4)
- Hammon v. Indiana (4)
- Jurors (4)
- Scientific evidence (4)
- Searches (4)
- Seizures (4)
- Unavailability (4)
- Confessions (3)
- Expert witnesses (3)
- Frye v. United States (3)
- Mapp v. Ohio (3)
- Trials (3)
- Truth (3)
- Arrest (2)
Articles 1 - 30 of 41
Full-Text Articles in Evidence
Introduction, Shari S. Diamond, Richard O. Lempert
Introduction, Shari S. Diamond, Richard O. Lempert
Articles
Experts bedeviled the legal system long before seventeenth-century Salem, when the town's good citizens relied on youthful accusers and witchcraft experts to identify the devil's servants in their midst. As in Salem, claims of expertise have often been questioned and objections raised about the bases of expert knowledge. Expertise, then and now, did not have to be based on science; but the importance of science and the testimony of scientific experts has since medieval times been woven into the fabric of the English jurisprudence that Americans inherited. In cases as long ago as 1299 we find examples of courts seeking …
Confrontation And Forensic Laboratory Reports, Round Four, Richard D. Friedman
Confrontation And Forensic Laboratory Reports, Round Four, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
Crawford v. Washington radically transformed the doctrine governing the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution. Before Crawford, a prosecutor could introduce against an accused evidence of a hearsay statement, even one made in contemplation that it would be used in prosecution, so long as the statement fit within a "firmly rooted" hearsay exception or the court otherwise determined that the statement was sufficiently reliable to warrant admissibility. Crawford recognized that the Clause is a procedural guarantee, governing the manner in which prosecution witnesses give their testimony. Therefore, a prosecutor may not introduce a statement that is testimonial …
The Sky Is Still Not Falling, Richard D. Friedman
The Sky Is Still Not Falling, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
Cases since Crawford have mainly fallen into two categories. One involves accusations of crime, made by the apparent victim shortly after the incident. In Michigan v. Bryant, a majority of the Court adopted an unfortunately constricted view of the word "testimonial" in this context. That decision was a consequence of the Court having failed to adopt a robust view of when an accused forfeits the confrontation right. How the Court will deal with this situation-one mistake made in an attempt to compensate for another-is a perplexing and important question. This Essay, though, concentrates on the other principal category of post-Crawford …
Hanging On By A Thread: The Exclusionary Rule (Or What's Left Of It) Lives For Another Day, David A. Moran
Hanging On By A Thread: The Exclusionary Rule (Or What's Left Of It) Lives For Another Day, David A. Moran
Articles
Back when there was a Soviet Union, foreign intelligence officers would anxiously await the May Day parade in Moscow to see who would be standing next to the chairman of the Communist Party and who would be missing from the reviewing platform altogether. Since the Soviet government and the statecontrolled press published very little about what was really going on in the halls of state power, this was considered the most reliable way to determine who was in or out of favor and, by extension, how the domestic and foreign policies of the world's second most powerful country were likely …
Who Must Testify To The Results Of A Forensic Laboratory Test? Bullcoming V. New Mexico, Richard D. Friedman
Who Must Testify To The Results Of A Forensic Laboratory Test? Bullcoming V. New Mexico, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
Does the Confrontation Clause permit the prosecution to introduce a forensic laboratory report through the in-court testimony of a supervisor or other person who did not perform or observe the reported test?
Giles V. California: A Personal Reflection, Richard D. Friedman
Giles V. California: A Personal Reflection, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
In this Essay, Professor Friedman places Giles v. California in the context of the recent transformation of the law governing the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment. He contends that a robust doctrine of forfeiture is an integral part of a sound conception of the confrontation right. One reason this is so is that cases fitting within the traditional hearsay exception for dying declarations can be explained as instances of forfeiture. This explanation leads to a simple structure of confrontation law, qualified by the principle that the confrontation right may be waived or forfeited but not subject to genuine exceptions. …
Does An Accused Forfeit The Confrontation Right By Murdering A Witness, Absent A Purpose To Render Her Unavailable?, Richard D. Friedman
Does An Accused Forfeit The Confrontation Right By Murdering A Witness, Absent A Purpose To Render Her Unavailable?, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
If an accused murdered a witness, should he be deemed to have forfeited the right under the Sixth Amendment "to be confronted with" the witness, absent proof that the accused committed the murder for the purpose of rendering her unavailable as a witness?
Waiting For The Other Shoe: Hudson And The Precarious State Of Mapp, David A. Moran
Waiting For The Other Shoe: Hudson And The Precarious State Of Mapp, David A. Moran
Articles
I have no idea whether my death will be noted in the New York Times. But if it is, I fear the headline of my obituary will look something like: "Professor Dies; Lost Hudson v. Michigan' in Supreme Court, Leading to Abolition of Exclusionary Rule." The very existence of this Symposium panel shows, I think, that my fear is well-grounded. On the other hand, I am not quite as fearful that Hudson foreshadows the complete overruling of Mapp v. Ohio2 and Weeks v. United States3 as I was when I published an article just three months after the Hudson decision …
Is A Forensic Laboratory Report Identifying A Substance As A Narcotic 'Testimonial'?, Richard D. Friedman
Is A Forensic Laboratory Report Identifying A Substance As A Narcotic 'Testimonial'?, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
Is a state forensic analyst's laboratory report, prepared for use in a criminal proceeding and identifying a substance as cocaine, "testimonial" evidence and so subject to the demands of the Confrontation Clause as set forth in Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004)?
Crawford, Davis, And Way Beyond, Richard D. Friedman
Crawford, Davis, And Way Beyond, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
Until 1965, the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution hardly mattered. It was not applicable against the states, and therefore had no role whatsoever in the vast majority of prosecutions. Moreover, if a federal court was inclined to exclude evidence of an out-of-court statement, it made little practical difference whether the court termed the statement hearsay or held that the evidence did not comply with the Confrontation Clause.
Crawford And Davis: A Personal Reflection, Richard D. Friedman
Crawford And Davis: A Personal Reflection, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
I have to say that when I stood up to argue Hammon I felt the wind at my back. I was basically a lawyer with an easy case, and there wasn't anything particularly unpredictable at the argument of Hammon. Now it got a little bit interesting, as I will explain later, because to a certain extent I was trying to argue the other case as well. But Hammon itself was sort of ordinary, normal law.
Forfeiture Of The Confrontation Right After Crawford And Davis, Richard D. Friedman
Forfeiture Of The Confrontation Right After Crawford And Davis, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
So my topic this morning is on forfeiture of the confrontation right, which I think plays a central role in confrontation doctrine. And to try to present that, let me state the entirety of confrontation doctrine as briefly as I can. This is, at least, what I think the doctrine is and what it can be: A testimonial statement should not be admissible against an accused to prove the truth of what it asserts unless the accused either has had or will have an opportunity to confront the witness-which should occur at trial unless the witness is then unavailable-or has …
We Really (For The Most Part) Mean It!, Richard D. Friedman
We Really (For The Most Part) Mean It!, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
I closed my petition for certiorari in Hammon v. Indiana by declaring, “ ‘We really mean it!’ is the message that lower courts need to hear, and that decision of this case can send.” The prior year, Crawford v. Washington had transformed the law of the Confrontation Clause, holding that an out-ofcourt statement that is testimonial in nature may be admitted against an accused only if the maker of the statement is unavailable and the accused has had an opportunity to cross-examine her. But Crawford deliberately left undetermined what the term “testimonial” meant. Many lower courts gave it a grudging …
Grappling With The Meaning Of 'Testimonial', Richard D. Friedman
Grappling With The Meaning Of 'Testimonial', Richard D. Friedman
Articles
Crawford v. Washington, has adopted a testimonial approach to the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment. Under this approach, a statement that is deemed to be testimonial in nature may not be introduced at trial against an accused unless he has had an opportunity to cross-examine the person who made the statement and that person is unavailable to testify at trial. If a statement is not deemed to be testimonial, then the Confrontation Clause poses little if any obstacle to its admission.2 A great deal therefore now rides on the meaning of the word "testimonial."
Minimizing The Jury Over-Valuation Concern (Visions Of Rationality In Evidence Law Symposium), Richard D. Friedman
Minimizing The Jury Over-Valuation Concern (Visions Of Rationality In Evidence Law Symposium), Richard D. Friedman
Articles
A great deal of the rhetoric of evidence discourse concerns the supposed cognitive inadequacies of the jury. In various contexts we are told that although an item of evidence is probative, it must be excluded because the jury will give it too much weight. I believe this approach has played far too great a role in evidentiary law, and that it is an interesting project to see whether we can construct a satisfactory body of law without relying at all on the cognitive inadequacy argument. I think that, at least to a large extent, we can. In some settings, where …
Crawford V. Washington, Richard D. Friedman
Crawford V. Washington, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
On June 9, by granting certiorari in Crawford v. Washington, 02-9410, the Supreme Court signaled its intention to enter once again into the realm of the Confrontation Clause, in which it has found itself deeply perplexed. This time there was a difference, however, because the grant indicated that the Court might be willing to rethink its jurisprudence in this area. Crawford, like Lee v. Illinois, 476 U.S. 530 (1986), and Lilly v. Virginia, 527 U.S. 116 (1999), presents a classic case of what might be called station-house testimony. Michael Crawford was accused of stabbing another man. His wife, Sylvia, was …
Squeezing Daubert Out Of The Picture, Richard D. Friedman
Squeezing Daubert Out Of The Picture, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
In this essay, I will offer some thoughts on how we might reframe the issues governing the admissibility of expert evidence. My principal focus is not on any particular type of expert evidence but on broader questions: the extent to which we ought to rely on rulings of admissibility, the standards that should govern admissibility rulings, and the role of the trial and appellate courts in making those rulings. To some extent, I will concentrate on the context of criminal cases, but for the most part my conclusions apply in both civil and criminal litigation. Here are my conclusions: First, …
Confrontation As A Hot Topic: The Virtues Of Going Back To Square One, Richard D. Friedman
Confrontation As A Hot Topic: The Virtues Of Going Back To Square One, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
I have been working so obsessively on the accused's right to confront the witnesses against him 1 that I am gratified that the organizers of this conference have designated confrontation as one of the "hot topics" of Evidence law. I am not so egotistical as to think that my work has made confrontation into a hot topic; I am just glad to know that I am working where a good deal of action is, and that other scholars recognize that confrontation is an important area in which dramatic changes may be occurring.
In Defense Of The Search And Seizure Exclusionary Rule (Law And Truth - The Twenty-First Annual National Student Federalist Society Symposium On Law And Public Policy - 2002), Yale Kamisar
Articles
think Dean Pye's advice about casebook writing was sound,6 and what he had to say also applies to discussions and debates about such issues as the search and seizure exclusionary rule. We cannot (at least we should not) begin with Mapp v. Ohio. We need a prelude.
Narrative Relevance, Imagined Juries, And A Supreme Court Inspired Agenda For Jury Research, Richard O. Lempert
Narrative Relevance, Imagined Juries, And A Supreme Court Inspired Agenda For Jury Research, Richard O. Lempert
Articles
This paper has its roots in Old Chief v. United States, a case the Supreme Court of the United States decided in 1997. I will begin by describing this case; then comment on its implications for the Supreme Court’s conception of the jury, and conclude by examining the agenda one may draw from it for empirical jury research. Old Chief arose when Johnny Lynn Old Chief was charged not only with assault with a dangerous weapon and using a firearm in the commission of a crime of violence, but also with violating a law that forbids convicted felons from possessing …
Expert Testimony On Fingerprints: An Internet Exchange, Richard D. Friedman, David H. Kaye, Jennifer Mnookin, Dale Nance, Michael Saks
Expert Testimony On Fingerprints: An Internet Exchange, Richard D. Friedman, David H. Kaye, Jennifer Mnookin, Dale Nance, Michael Saks
Articles
In United States v. Llera Plaza, 188 F. Supp. 2d 549 (E.D. Pa. 2002), a federal district initially limited expert opinion testimony on fingerprint identifications because the government was unable to show that such identifications were sufficiently valid and reliable under Federal Rule of Evidence 702. Then, the court withdrew the opinion. This article reproduces an exchange of notes on the initial opinion submitted by five law professors.
Dial-In Testimony, Richard D. Friedman, Bridget Mary Mccormack
Dial-In Testimony, Richard D. Friedman, Bridget Mary Mccormack
Articles
For several hundred years, one of the great glories of the common law system of criminal justice has been the requirement that prosecution witnesses give their testimony in the presence of the accused" face to face," in the time-honored phrase-under oath, subject to cross-examination, and, unless unfeasible, in open court. In the United States, this principle is enshrined in the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment, which provides that "[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right ... to be confronted with the witnesses against him." But now a new way is developing for witnesses for the prosecution …
The Conundrum Of Children, Confrontation, And Hearsay, Richard D. Friedman
The Conundrum Of Children, Confrontation, And Hearsay, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
The adjudication of child abuse claims poses an excruciatingly difficult conundrum. The crime is a terrible one, but false convictions are abhorrent. Often the evidence does not support a finding of guilt or innocence with sufficient clarity to allow a decision free of gnawing doubt. In many cases, a large part of the problem is that the prosecution's case depends critically on the statement or testimony of a young child. Even with respect to adult witnesses, the law of hearsay and confrontation is very perplexing, as anyone who has studied American evidentiary law and read Supreme Court opinions on the …
Proposed Amendments To Fed. R. Crim. P. 26: An Exchange: Remote Testimony, Richard D. Friedman
Proposed Amendments To Fed. R. Crim. P. 26: An Exchange: Remote Testimony, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
Recently, the Supreme Court declined to pass on to Congress a proposed change to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 26 submitted to it by the Judicial Conference. In this Article, Professor Friedman addresses this proposal, which would allow for more extensive use of remote, video-based testimony at criminal trials. He agrees with the majority of the Court that the proposal raised serious problems under the Confrontation Clause. He also argues that a revised proposal, in addition to better protecting the confrontation rights of defendants, should include more definite quality standards, abandon its reliance on the definition of unavailability found in …
Miranda And Some Puzzles Of 'Prophylactic' Rules, Evan H. Caminker
Miranda And Some Puzzles Of 'Prophylactic' Rules, Evan H. Caminker
Articles
Constitutional law scholars have long observed that many doctrinal rules established by courts to protect constitutional rights seem to "overprotect" those rights, in the sense that they give greater protection to individuals than those rights, as abstractly understood, seem to require.' Such doctrinal rules are typically called "prophylactic" rules.2 Perhaps the most famous, or infamous, example of such a rule is Miranda v. Arizona,' in which the Supreme Court implemented the Fifth Amendment's privilege against self-incrimination4 with a detailed set of directions for law enforcement officers conducting custodial interrogations, colloquially called the Miranda warnings. 5
Dna As Evidence: Viewing Science Through The Prism Of The Law, Peter Donnelly, Richard D. Friedman
Dna As Evidence: Viewing Science Through The Prism Of The Law, Peter Donnelly, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
In this article, we analyze a problem related to DNA evidence that is likely to be of great and increasing significance in the near future. This is the problem of whether, and how, to present evidence that the suspect has been identified through a DNA database search. In our view, the two well-known reports on DNA evidence issued by the National Research Council (NRC) have been badly mistaken in their analysis of this problem. The mistakes are significant because the reports have carried great authority with American courts; moreover, the DNA Advisory Board of the FBI has endorsed the second …
Lilly V. Virginia: A Chance To Reconceptualize The Confrontation Right, Richard D. Friedman
Lilly V. Virginia: A Chance To Reconceptualize The Confrontation Right, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
In Lilly v. Virginia, the Supreme Court once again has the opportunity to grapple with the meaning of the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendmel).t. The basic facts of Lilly are simple, for they present the ageold problem of accomplice confessions. Three men, Gary Barker and Ben and Mark Lilly, went on a crime spree, during which one of them shot to death a young man they had robbed and kidnaped. Ben Lilly was charged with being the triggerman, and Barker testified to that effect at Ben's trial. Mark did not testify. But Mark had made a statement to the …
Narrative Relevance, Imagined Juries, And A Supreme Court Inspired Agenda For Jury Research, Richard O. Lempert
Narrative Relevance, Imagined Juries, And A Supreme Court Inspired Agenda For Jury Research, Richard O. Lempert
Articles
This paper has its roots in Old Chief v. United States, a case the Supreme Court of the United States decided in 1997. I will begin by describing this case; then comment on its implications for the Supreme Court's conception of the jury, and conclude by examining the agenda one may draw from it for empirical jury research. Old Chief arose when Johnny Lynn Old Chief was charged not only with assault with a dangerous weapon and using a firearm in the commission of a crime of violence, but also with violating a law that precludes convicted felons from possessing …
Dna Database Searches And The Legal Consumption Of Scientific Evidence, Peter Donnelly, Richard D. Friedman
Dna Database Searches And The Legal Consumption Of Scientific Evidence, Peter Donnelly, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
DNA evidence has transformed the proof of identity in criminal litigation, but it has also introduced daunting problems of statistical analysis into the process. In this Article, we analyze a problem related to DNA evidence that is likely to be of great and increasing significance in the near future. This is the problem of whether, and how, to present evidence that the suspect has been identified through a DNA database search. In our view, the two well-known reports on DNA evidence issued by the National Research Council ("NRC"), each of which has carried great authority with the American courts on …
Lost Lives: Miscarriages Of Justice In Capital Cases, Samuel R. Gross
Lost Lives: Miscarriages Of Justice In Capital Cases, Samuel R. Gross
Articles
In case after case, erroneous conviction for capital murder has been proven. I contend that these are not disconnected accidents, but systematic consequences of the nature of homicice prosecution in the general and capital prosecution in particular - that in this respect, as in others, death distorts and undermines the course of the law.