Evidence Commons^™

Inefficient Evidence, Alex Stein

Alex Stein

Why set up evidentiary rules rather than allow factfinders to make decisions by considering all relevant evidence? This fundamental question has been the subject of unresolved controversy among scholars and policymakers since it was raised by Bentham at the beginning of the nineteenth century. This Article offers a surprisingly straightforward answer: An economically minded legal system must suppress all evidence that brings along a negative productivity-expense balance and is therefore inefficient. Failure to suppress inefficient evidence will result in serious diseconomies of scale. To operationalize this idea, I introduce a “signal-to-noise” method borrowed from statistics, science, and engineering. This method ...

Breaking The Ice: How Plaintiffs May Establish Premises Liability In "Black Ice" Cases Where The Dangerous Condition Is By Definition Not Visible Or Apparent To The Property Owner, Hon. Mark C. Dillon

Hon. Mark C. Dillon

Plaintiffs that are injured as a result of encounters with "black ice," as distinguished from regular ice, face peculiar difficulties in establishing liability against property owners for the dangerous icy conditions on their premises. Black ice results from a unique process under certain conditions by which air bubbles are expelled from water during the freezing process, rendering the ice virtually invisible to the naked eye. Property owners therefore are not typically on actual or constructive notice of black ice conditions as to become subject to the legal requirement of undertaking measures to remedy the conditions. This article explores the law ...

Summary Of Leavitt V. Siems, 130 Adv. Nev. Op. 54, Michael Paretti

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court concluded that: (1) expert alternative causation testimony is permissible; (2) ex parte communication, even when improper, only warrants a new trial when prejudice is established; and, (3) an employee’s default may not be used against an employer codefendant contesting liability.

Symposium: Criminal Law At The Crossroads: Turn To Accuracy, Dan Simon

University of Southern California Legal Studies Working Paper Series

Given the pressing societal need to punish criminal behavior and the solemn nature of depriving people of their liberty and even life, one would expect that the accuracy of these fateful determinations would be the paramount goal of the criminal justice process. This article critically examines the system’s low prioritization of the accuracy of the verdicts it produces, and focuses on four key factors that hinder the attainment of accuracy: problems with the reliability of the evidence produced by police investigations, the opacity of criminal investigations, the intensity of the adversarial process, and the muddled understanding of the system ...

Beyond The Judicial Fourth Amendment: The Prosecutor's Role, Russell M. Gold

New York University Public Law and Legal Theory Working Papers

Scholarly discussion of the Fourth Amendment focuses narrowly on judicial enforcement and the exclusionary rule. This Article takes a different approach: recognizing that prosecutors have a co-equal responsibility to enforce the Fourth Amendment. More specifically, prosecutors have a constitutional and ethical duty not to use evidence that they conclude was unconstitutionally obtained even if that evidence is admissible — the duty of administrative suppression. Instead of analyzing whether evidence would likely be deemed admissible by a court, prosecutors should instead analyze whether the evidence in their cases was gathered unconstitutionally and act accordingly.

Scholars have ignored that as the Supreme Court ...

Summary Of L.V. Dev. Assocs. V. Eighth Jud. Dist. Ct., 130 Nev. Adv. Op. 37, Ryan Becklean

Nevada Supreme Court Summaries

The Court determined whether NRS 50.125 applies to depositions.

Supreme Court Of New York, Bronx County, People V. Womack, Barry M. Frankenstein

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Appellate Division, Third Department, People V. Smith, Jennifer Belk

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Supreme Court, New York County, Hughes V. Farrey, Eric Pack

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Appellate Division, Fourth Department, People V. Hall, Eric Pack

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Adversarial Justice's Casualties: Defending Victim-Witness Protection, Mary Fan

Boston College Law Review

The U.S. Supreme Court and some state courts have constitutionalized an increasingly rigid and broad vision of adversarial adjudication’s requirements. Commentators often celebrate this adversarial revolution as expanding defendants’ rights of confrontation, cross-examination, and self-representation. Yet the adversarial revolution also has created an arsenal of tactics to retraumatize victims of sexual assault and general violent crime. The courts and legislatures are in disarray about what to do to protect vulnerable victim-witnesses. This Article is about adversarial adjudication’s casualties and how to reduce the risk of harm. The Article defends a subset of protective measures that avert further ...

The Pretrial Discovery Process In Civil Cases: A Comparison Of Evidence Discovery Between China And The United States, Elizabeth Fahey Massachusetts Superior Court, Zhirong Tao

Boston College International and Comparative Law Review

This article compares and contrasts the pre-trial discovery mechanisms used in China and the United States, as well as the advantages and disadvantages of each. Although both use similar discovery tools, like requests to inspect evidence and expert examination of the parties, their discovery systems vary greatly. Ultimately, China prefers that judges largely conduct discovery, that the parties mutually select expert witnesses, and that the primary objective is to determine the truth, even at the expense of finality. Conversely, the United States prefers a much more adversarial system, in which the parties collect the evidence, submit motions to the court ...

State V. Pierce: Refining The Standard For The Admission Of Polygraph Evidence, Anton L. Jackson

Tennessee Journal of Law & Policy

Although the inadmissibility of polygraph evidence in the course of a criminal trial has been well-established law in Tennessee for almost fifty years, the quandary presented itself two years ago in State v. Pierce.' This case forced the Tennessee Supreme Court to balance the need to protect state citizens against sexual predators with the wellestablished rules of evidence which hold that "polygraph evidence is inherently unreliable, and therefore irrelevant and inadmissible. ' In Pierce, the issue before the court was whether polygraph test results, which were performed as part of a sex offender risk assessment and encouraged by leading psychosexual analysts ...

Section 1983 Civil Rights Litigation From The October 2006 Term, Martin Schwartz

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Court Of Appeals Of New York - People V. Nieves-Andino, Jason Gines

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Mother's Day Column: Parent-Child Evidentiary Privilege In Montana, Cynthia Ford

Faculty Journal Articles & Other Writings

In this article the author examines the lack of parent-child evidentiary privilege in Montana.

Federal Rules Of Evidence 413, 414, And 415: Fifteen Years Of Hindsight And Where The Law Should Go From Here, Bryan C. Hathorn

Tennessee Journal of Law & Policy

In 1995, Congress added three rules, which governed the admissibility of "prior sexual misconduct" in federal trials, to the Federal Rules of Evidence. The procedure by which Congress added the rules was outside of the normal procedure for the creation of federal rules, it was highly controversial, and it was done over the objections of the judicial conference. The controversy surrounding the rules produced a flurry of scholarship on the rules, which continued for about five years. After this initial period, the storm quieted with a reduced amount of scholarship on the subject. It is now fifteen years since the ...

Transcript: One Advocate's 'Junk Science' Is Another Advocate's Evidence: Forging New Paths In Forensic Science

Tennessee Journal of Law & Policy

No abstract provided.

A Short Primer On The Admissibility Of Forensic Science Evidence In Tennessee: A Checklist, Bernard A. Raum

Tennessee Journal of Law & Policy

For decades, aircraft pilots have been using preflight and approach-to-landing checklists rather than relying on their memory to ensure that everything has been done in its proper sequence. The use of this tool gives pilots the ability to fly their aircrafts safely and according to an established procedure. Similarly, most trial attorneys employ witness checklists during the in-court examination of their witnesses to ensure that all of the witnesses' evidence has been fully presented and their exhibits have been properly marked and received in evidence. It is the intent of this presentation to suggest the use of another evidentiary checklist ...

The Need For Additional Safeguards Against Racist Police Practices: A Call For Change To Massachusetts & Illinois Wiretapping Laws, Andrew Martinez Whitson

Boston College Journal of Law & Social Justice

Police misconduct is still prevalent throughout the United States. Unfortunately for members of minority communities, this misconduct often comes in the form of racially discriminatory police practices. In many cases, such practices are deeply rooted in the police department’s culture. It is imperative that all citizens are equipped with every possible safeguard from such abuse at the hands of the police. In Massachusetts and Illinois, however, wiretapping and eavesdropping laws prevent people from employing one such safeguard that has proven to help change unconstitutional police practices. The safeguard that those laws criminalize is the ability to surreptitiously record on-duty ...