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Full-Text Articles in Evidence
Probability, Individualization, And Uniqueness In Forensic Science Evidence: Listening To The Academies, David H. Kaye
Probability, Individualization, And Uniqueness In Forensic Science Evidence: Listening To The Academies, David H. Kaye
Journal Articles
Day in and day out, criminalists testify to positive, uniquely specific identifications of fingerprints, bullets, handwriting, and other trace evidence. A committee of the National Academy of Sciences, building on the writing of academic commentators, has called for sweeping changes in the presentation and production of evidence of identification. These include some form of circumscribed and standardized testimony. But the Academy report is short on the specifics of the testimony that would be legally and professionally allowable. This essay outlines possible types of testimony that might harmonize the testimony of criminalists with the actual state of forensic science. It does …
Will History Be Servitude?: The Nas Report On Forensic Science And The Rule Of The Judiciary, Jane Moriarty
Will History Be Servitude?: The Nas Report On Forensic Science And The Rule Of The Judiciary, Jane Moriarty
Jane Campbell Moriarty
For several decades, the prosecution and its witnesses have maintained that despite little research and virtually no standards, they can match a fingerprint, handwriting, bullet and bullet cartridge, hair, dental imprint, footprint, tire track, or even a lip print to its unique source (collectively, “individualization evidence”). Not only can they match it, they claim, they can do so often without any error rate. In the last few decades, with the help of lawyers and academics, litigants have challenged the underlying reliability of individualization evidence. Scholars in various disciplines have written about the startling state of individualization evidence, including its lack …