Court Issues & Research

Question 1

What are the tests for admissibility that came from R v Moran

Answer 1

Relevance
Necessity in assisting the trier of fact
The absence of any exclusionary rule
A properly qualified expert (reliability of the opinion)

Question 2

What are the criteria for expert witnesses that came from the White Burgess court case?

Answer 2

Impartiality
Independent
Unbiased

Question 3

What does section 657.3 CC allow?

Answer 3

Possible to give evidence by written report and affidavit

Question 4

What are the pre-requisites of S 657.3CC?

Answer 4

Recognized as an expert by court
Notice of intention to opposite side
Need to submit a CV by affidavit or solemn declaration of expert
Expert report

Question 5

What does the party proposing to call an expert witness have to provide?

Answer 5

30 days notice
Name of expert
Area of expertise
Statement of qualification (CV)

Question 6

What are the major cases/reports in relation to fingerprints?

Answer 6

Dauber vs Merrell Dow - civil case - error rates
R v Mohan - admissibility of experts and criteria
McKie - false identification of a print in a homicide
Mayfield - false identification of a print in terrorist attack in Spain
NAS report - standards, bias and human error, and validity of forensic sciences
PCAST - looking to assist courts with determining scientific validity

Question 7

What was the error rate from the FBI/Noblis Study?

Answer 7

0.1% false positive

Question 8

How to explain sufficiency for court?

Answer 8

The amount of detail in agreement exceeds anything I’ve previously seen, or would expect to see between impressions made by different sources, based on my training, knowledge and experience