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Articles 151 - 180 of 235
Full-Text Articles in Evidence
Built On Lies: Preliminary Reflections On Evidence Law As An Autopoetic System, Richard O. Lempert
Built On Lies: Preliminary Reflections On Evidence Law As An Autopoetic System, Richard O. Lempert
Articles
This Symposium on Truth and Its Rivals seems most concerned with what one might think of as the "output" side of evidence law that is, whether the rules of evidence enhance the likelihood that trial verdicts will capture the true state of the matter giving rise to the litigation. From this perspective, the legitimate rivals to truth are values that may justify decisions that eclipse the truth. The most obvious examples are rules of privilege, which allow probative information to remain concealed even where it is essential to accurate fact finding.
Economic Analysis Of Evidentiary Law: An Underused Tool, An Underplowed Field (Symposium: The Economics Of Evidentiary Law), Richard D. Friedman
Economic Analysis Of Evidentiary Law: An Underused Tool, An Underplowed Field (Symposium: The Economics Of Evidentiary Law), Richard D. Friedman
Articles
The law and economics movement has had a major impact on many areas of law, but rather little on the law of evidence. This is not to say that there have been no attempts to analyze evidentiary issues through an economic lens,' but such efforts are far more scattered in evidence than in other legal fields, including the closely related one of civil procedure.2 Believing that economics has value for evidentiary analysis, I suggested to the Executive Committee and Advisory Board of the Evidence Section of the Association of American Law Schools ("AALS"), when I was chairman of the section, …
Make-Believe: The Rules Excluding Evidence Of Character And Liability Insurance (Symposium: Truth And Its Rivals: Evidence Reform And The Goals Of Evidence Law), Samuel R. Gross
Articles
Article IV of the Federal Rules of Evidence includes several rules that prohibit the use of specified types of information as evidence of particular propositions. Subsequent remedial measures are inadmissible to prove negligence (but admissible to show ownership, control, et cetera),' settlement offers are inadmissible to prove liability (but admissible to show bias or prejudice, or for other purposes),2 and so forth. Any exclusion of relevant evidence involves some distortion of reality in the sense that the picture presented to the trier of fact includes less information than the available total. That will be true whether the evidence is kept …
Lost Lives: Miscarriages Of Justice In Capital Cases, Samuel R. Gross
Lost Lives: Miscarriages Of Justice In Capital Cases, Samuel R. Gross
Articles
One of the longstanding complaints against the death penalty is that it "distort[s] the course of the criminal law."' Capital prosecutions are expensive and complicated; they draw sensational attention from the press; they are litigated-before, during, and after trial-at greater length and depth than other felonies; they generate more intense emotions, for and against; they last longer and live in memory. There is no dispute about these effects, only about their significance. To opponents of the death penalty, they range from minor to severe faults; to proponents, from tolerable costs to major virtues. ntil recently, however, the conviction of innocent …
Truth And Its Rivals In The Law Of Hearsay And Confrontation (Symposium: Truth And Its Rivals: Evidence Reform And The Goals Of Evidence Law)." , Richard D. Friedman
Truth And Its Rivals In The Law Of Hearsay And Confrontation (Symposium: Truth And Its Rivals: Evidence Reform And The Goals Of Evidence Law)." , Richard D. Friedman
Articles
In this paper, I will look at the problem of hearsay and confrontation through the lens offered by this symposium's theme of "truth and its rivals." I will ask: To what extent does the law of hearsay and confrontation aspire to achieve the goal of truth in litigation? To what extent does it, or should it, seek to achieve other goals, or to satisfy other constraints on the litigation system? And, given the ends that it seeks to achieve, what should the shape of the law in this area be? My principal conclusions are as follows: In most settings, the …
Confrontation: The Search For Basic Principles, Richard D. Friedman
Confrontation: The Search For Basic Principles, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
The Sixth Amendment to the Constitution guarantees the accused in a criminal prosecution the right "to be confronted with the Witnesses against him."' The Confrontation Clause clearly applies to those witnesses who testify against the accused at trial. Moreover, it is clear enough that confrontation ordinarily includes the accused's right to have those witnesses brought "face-toface," in the time-honored phrase, when they testify.2 But confrontation is much more than this "face-to-face" right. It also comprehends the right to have witnesses give their testimony under oath and to subject them to crossexamination. 3 Indeed, the Supreme Court has treated the accused's …
Of Flutes, Oboes And The As If World Of Evidence Law, Richard O. Lempert
Of Flutes, Oboes And The As If World Of Evidence Law, Richard O. Lempert
Articles
Reading Allen's article, I am reminded of a cold war parable I heard during the 1960s. It concerned a flute and an oboe who joined an orchestra one year and immediately set to quarrelling. The flute was distressed because whenever it was playing at its lyrical best the oboe would enter. drowning it out. The oboe was affronted because its deepest, most sonorous passages were invariably ruined by the high-pitched flute butting in. When the orchestra split up for the summer and these quarrelsome instruments went their separate ways, the flute, as it angrily contemplated the oboe, found itself stretching …
After The Dna Wars: Skirmishing With Nrc Ii, Richard O. Lempert
After The Dna Wars: Skirmishing With Nrc Ii, Richard O. Lempert
Articles
This article traces some of the controversies surrounding DNA evidence and argues that although many have been laid to rest by scientific developments confirmed in the National Research Council's second DNA report, there remain several problems which are likely to lead to continued questioning of standard ways prosecutors present DNA evidence. Although much about the report is to be commended, it falls short in several ways, the most important of which is in its support for presenting random match probabilities independent of plausible error rates. The article argues that although one can sympathize with the NRC committee's decision as an …
House Rules: Is A Supermajority Requirement For Tax Hikes Constitutional?, John O. Mcginnis, Michael B. Rappaport, Susan Low Bloch
House Rules: Is A Supermajority Requirement For Tax Hikes Constitutional?, John O. Mcginnis, Michael B. Rappaport, Susan Low Bloch
Articles
No abstract provided.
Irrelevance, Minimal Relevance, And Meta-Relevance (Response To David Crump), Richard D. Friedman
Irrelevance, Minimal Relevance, And Meta-Relevance (Response To David Crump), Richard D. Friedman
Articles
Professor Crump's analysis runs the full traverse from academic theorizing to practical observation. I will attempt to follow him over the same course, addressing three questions among the congeries that he raises. First, is it true that all evidence satisfies the minimalist definition of relevance? Second, should evidentiary codes include a tighter definition of relevance? Third, how should we assess lawyers' use of evidence that, loosely speaking, is irrelevant?
Answering The Bayesioskeptical Challenge, Richard D. Friedman
Answering The Bayesioskeptical Challenge, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
In recent years, some scholars of evidence, myself among them, have made active use of subjective probability theory - what is sometimes referred to as Bayesianism - in thinking about issues and problems related to the law of evidence. But, at the same time, this use has been challenged to various degrees and in various ways by scholars to whom I shall apply the collective, if somewhat misleading, label of Bayesioskeptics. I present this brief paper to defend this use of probability theory, and to discuss what I believe is its proper role in discourse about evidentiary issues.
Towards A (Bayesian) Convergence?, Richard D. Friedman
Towards A (Bayesian) Convergence?, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
If I understand them correctly, several leading Bayesioskeptics (Allen, Callen, Stein) acknowledge - with varying degrees of specificity and varying degrees of grudgingness - that standard probability theory can be useful as an analytical tool in considering evidentiary doctrines and the probative value of evidentiary items.
Confrontation And The Definition Of Chutzpa, Richard D. Friedman
Confrontation And The Definition Of Chutzpa, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
You may know the standard illustration of chutzpa - the man who kills both his parents and then begs the sentencing court to have mercy on an orphan. In this article, I discuss a case of chutzpa that is nearly as outlandish - the criminal defendant who, having rendered his victim unavailable to testify, contends that evidence of the victim's statement should not be admitted against him because to do so would violate his right to confront her. I contend that in a case like this the defendant should be deemed to have forfeited the confrontation right. On the same …
Dealing With Evidentiary Deficiency, Richard D. Friedman
Dealing With Evidentiary Deficiency, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
Lack of information distorts litigation. Claims or defenses that a party might prove easily, or that might even be undisputed, in a world of perfect information can be difficult or impossible to prove in the real world of imperfect information. Some information deficiencies are inevitable, at least in the sense that we could not eliminate them without incurring undue social costs. In some cases, however, a person's conduct may have caused the deficiency. More generally, the person may have had available a reasonable alternative course of conduct that would have eliminated, or at least mitigated, the deficiency. Ariel Porat and …
Crime, Politics, And Race (Symposium: Justice And The Criminal Justice Process), Samuel R. Gross
Crime, Politics, And Race (Symposium: Justice And The Criminal Justice Process), Samuel R. Gross
Articles
The biggest problem with the criminal justice system is that too many crimes are committed-too many rapes, too many murders, too many robberies; too much violence that inflicts an untold amount of suffering and destruction on too many people. If that seems obvious, what follows should be equally obvious. The most important step to take to solve the problems of the criminal justice system is to reduce the number of crimes that are committed: to prevent crimes. The best thing we can do to help the victims of crime is to keep them from becoming victims in the first place. …
The Risks Of Death: Why Erroneous Convictions Are Common In Capital Cases (Symposium: The New York Death Penalty In Context), Samuel R. Gross
The Risks Of Death: Why Erroneous Convictions Are Common In Capital Cases (Symposium: The New York Death Penalty In Context), Samuel R. Gross
Articles
As the Supreme Court has said, time and again, death is different: It is "different in kind from any other punishment imposed under our system of criminal justice;"1 it "differs more from life imprisonment than a 100-year sentence differs from one of only a year or two;"' 2 and so forth. Traditionally, this observation has justified special procedural protections for capital defendants. Justice Harlan put it nicely nearly forty years ago: "I do not concede that whatever process is 'due' an offender faced with a fine or a prison sentence necessarily satisfies the requirements of the Constitution in a capital …
What About The Children? Are Family Lawyers The Same (Ethically) As Criminal Lawyers? A Morality Play, Robert H. Aronson
What About The Children? Are Family Lawyers The Same (Ethically) As Criminal Lawyers? A Morality Play, Robert H. Aronson
Articles
A fictional account of a lawyer, representing a woman in a divorce case, who learns from her client that her live-in boyfriend has hit her and her five-year-old daughter. Is her ethical duty to protect the child greater than her responsibility to maintain the attorney-client privilege. She discusses the matter with two evidence professors in search of a solution.
Confrontation And The Utility Of Rules, Richard D. Friedman, Ronald J. Allen, Alex Stein, Roger C. Park, Margaret A. Berger, Nancy J. King, John Jackson, Eleanor Swift, Craig R. Callen, Eileen A. Scallen
Confrontation And The Utility Of Rules, Richard D. Friedman, Ronald J. Allen, Alex Stein, Roger C. Park, Margaret A. Berger, Nancy J. King, John Jackson, Eleanor Swift, Craig R. Callen, Eileen A. Scallen
Articles
There is a good reason why evidence scholars continue to be fascinated and perplexed, and some courts continue at least to be perplexed, by the types of evidence that tend to be lumped together misleadingly under the headings nonassertive conduct or implied assertions. Evidence of this sort highlights a paradox of the prevailing law of hearsay. I believe that this paradox cannot be resolved without fundamentally transforming the structure of that law. Thus, while I agree - within the current framework - with many of the insights so ably stated in this Symposium, I think evidence scholars must devote their …
Probability And Proof In State V. Skipper: An Internet Exchange, Ronald J. Allen, David J. Balding, Peter Donnelly, Richard D. Friedman, David H. Kaye, Lewis Henry Larue, Roger C. Park, Bernard Robertson, Alexander Stein
Probability And Proof In State V. Skipper: An Internet Exchange, Ronald J. Allen, David J. Balding, Peter Donnelly, Richard D. Friedman, David H. Kaye, Lewis Henry Larue, Roger C. Park, Bernard Robertson, Alexander Stein
Articles
This is not a conventional article. It is an edited version of messages sent to an Internet discussion list. The listings begin with the mention of a recent opinion of the Connecticut Supreme Court, parts of which are reproduced below. The listings soon move to broader issues concerning probability and other formal systems, their limitations, and their uses either in court or as devices for understanding legal proof.
Refining Conditional Probative Value, Richard D. Friedman
Refining Conditional Probative Value, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
The subject of conditional relevance, or what I think is better called "conditional probative value," must seem hopelessly ard to many. It continues to engage the attention of evidence scholars, however, because it forms part of the conceptual underpinnings of many parts of evidentiary law. Dale'Nance, one of the most astute evidence scholars of our time, has previously written at length on the subject' and has done so now more briefly in response to an article of mine. I offer an even briefer continuation of the discussion.
Prior Statements Of A Witness: A Nettlesome Corner Of The Hearsay Thicket, Richard D. Friedman
Prior Statements Of A Witness: A Nettlesome Corner Of The Hearsay Thicket, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
In Tome v United States, for the fifth time in eight years, the Supreme Court decided a case presenting the problem of how a child's allegations of sexual abuse should be presented in court. Often the child who charges that an adult abused her is unable to testify at trial, or at least unable to testify effectively under standard procedures. These cases therefore raise intriguing and difficult questions related to the rule against hearsay and to an accused's right under the Sixth Amendment to confront the witnesses against him. One would hardly guess that, however, from the rather arid debate …
The Honest Scientist's Guide To Dna Evidence, Richard O. Lempert
The Honest Scientist's Guide To Dna Evidence, Richard O. Lempert
Articles
The honest scientist recognizes that she herself is a test instrument, and a fallible one at that. Subjectivity inescapably enters into any human endeavor, and should not be denied. DNA testing is rife with subjective elements, no place more so than at the crucial stage of deciding whether a match exists. On the one hand, non-matching extraneous bands may sometimes be properly disregarded and patterns that do not quite meet objective matching criteria may be appropriately regarded as incriminatory matches. On the other hand, band patterns that do meet objective matching criteria may be treated as exonerative depending on how …
The Warren Court And Criminal Justice: A Quarter-Century Retrospective, Yale Kamisar
The Warren Court And Criminal Justice: A Quarter-Century Retrospective, Yale Kamisar
Articles
Many commentators have observed that when we speak of "the Warren Court," we mean the Warren Court that lasted from 1962 (when Arthur Goldberg replaced Felix Frankfurter) to 1969 (when Earl Warren retired). But when we speak of the Warren Court's "revolution" in American criminal procedure we mean the Warren Court that lasted from 1961 (when the landmark case of Mapp v. Ohio was decided) to 1966 or 1967. In its final years, the Warren Court was not the same Court that had handed down Mapp or Miranda v. Arizona.
Conditional Probative Value: Neoclassicism Without Myth, Richard D. Friedman
Conditional Probative Value: Neoclassicism Without Myth, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
The concept of conditional relevance is an essential aspect of the classical model of evidentiary law. Some of the great scholars of evidence have endorsed and shaped it.1 Under Federal Rule of Evidence 104(b) it plays a crucial role in the division of responsibility between judge and jury,2 as well as in the application of the personal knowledge3 and authentication 4 requirements. And the Supreme Court has applied it with great force.5 In recent years, though, the concept has come under attack from several notable scholars. The late Vaughn Ball led the assault, calling the concept a "myth."'6 Peter Tillers, …
Comment: Theory And Practice In Dna Fingerprinting, Richard O. Lempert
Comment: Theory And Practice In Dna Fingerprinting, Richard O. Lempert
Articles
Throughout her useful paper on DNA identification, Professor Roeder properly attends to both theory and practice. Thus she acknowledges the theoretical soundness of certain criticisms that have been made of the standard paradigm used to evaluate DNA random match probabilities but argues that in practice these criticisms matter little. I am thinking here of the arguments that those cautioning against overweighing DNA evidence have made regarding the undeniable existence of population substructure and its potential implications for independence assumptions supporting the application of the product rule and for the use of convenience samples, such as data garnered from no more …
The Marginal Relevance Of Choice Of Law Theory, Stewart E. Sterk
The Marginal Relevance Of Choice Of Law Theory, Stewart E. Sterk
Articles
The article critiques the current state of choice of law theory, arguing that existing methodologies, such as interest analysis and territorial approaches, fail to provide a coherent framework for judicial decision-making. It contends that these theories are overly rigid and do not account for the practical, fact-driven nature of how judges make choices. The author proposes a new test based on expressive similarity to address the complexities of modern copyright disputes, aiming to distinguish between protected expression and unprotected ideas. This approach seeks to balance the protection of creative works with the need to prevent overprotection, which could streamline litigation …
Character Impeachment Evidence: The Asymmetrical Interaction Between Personality And Situation, Richard D. Friedman
Character Impeachment Evidence: The Asymmetrical Interaction Between Personality And Situation, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
In Part I of this Comment, I present a short version of my argument against the admissibility of character impeachment evidence of criminal defendants, showing how the key elements ofthis argument are present in Professor Uviller's own Article. In Part II, I suggest that, notwithstanding Professor Uviller's comments to the contrary, an asymmetrical result-never admitting character evidence to impeach criminal defendants but admitting such evidence in some circumstances to impeach other witnesses- is perfectly reasonable. Finally, in Part III, I contend that Professor Uviller's interesting judicial surveys support the solution I have proposed for the problem of character impeachment evidence.
The Death And Transfiguration Of Frye, Richard D. Friedman
The Death And Transfiguration Of Frye, Richard D. Friedman
Articles
The rule of Frye v. United States was seventy years old, and had long dominated American law on the question of how well established a scientific principle must be for it to provide the basis for expert testimony. Even after the passage of the Federal Rules of Evidence, several of the federal circuits, as well as various states, purported to adhere to Frye's "general acceptance" standard. But now, unanimously, briefly, and with no apparent angst, the United States Supreme Court has held in Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc. that the Frye rule is incompatible with the Federal Rules.
Experts, Stories, And Information, Richard O. Lempert
Experts, Stories, And Information, Richard O. Lempert
Articles
In the infancy of the jury trial, there were no witnesses. The jury was self-informing. Members of the jury were drawn from the community. It was expected that they would know, either firsthand or on the basis of what they had heard, the true facts of any disputed incident, and they were gathered together to say what those facts were. Ronald Allen and Joseph Miller, in their insightful paper, see the ideal of the self-informing jury as very much alive today. Allen and Miller tell us that jurors ideally should experience firsthand the factual information needed to arrive at rational …
The Suspect Population And Dna Identification, Richard O. Lempert
The Suspect Population And Dna Identification, Richard O. Lempert
Articles
Forensic DNA analysis typically proceeds by first determining whether alleles (one of two or more alternative forms of a gene) found in DNA apparently left by the perpetrator of a crime at a crime scene (the "evidence sample") match alleles extracted from a sample of the suspected criminal's blood (the "suspect sample"). If alleles drawn from the two sources match, the next step is to provide information about the probative value of the match by estimating the probability that alleles extracted from the blood of some random individual would have matched the alleles in the evidence sample. Thinking in terms …