DamnYankees:
Test results and other such business records are equally admissable by the defendant and the prosecution.

The business record exception applies to the hearsay exclusionary rule. These test results are not records kept in the normal course of business, but made on specific evidence at the request of law enforcement. The business record exception applies to records kept in the normal course of business (e.g. ledgers recording sales and expenditures). The public records and reports exception, which would cover the documents in question, specifically bars such reports from admission under the exception for criminal cases unless asserted against the government.

Such tests would have to be admitted against a defendant as expert testimony, governed by section VII of the federal rules.

DamnYankees: kronicfeld: DamnYankees: And by the way, we sometimes do let people 'testify' without them showing up. It's called an affidavit, and it has its uses.

Yeah, and they're extraordinarily narrow circumstances.

No they aren't. You're usiong the word "extraordinaty" very weirdly.

Just how many criminal cases have contained testimony by affadavit? None that I've seen.

Ryan2065: I've been saying that if the defense wants to question the person who did the lab tests then by all means let them do that, but why require the lab guy to come in and give general information about the results when the defense doesn't even want to question him? It's a waste of resources and you haven't addressed that point yet.

Constitutional rights can be waived. If the prosecution wants to introduce the lab report, and the defense doesn't want to question the lab tech, then the defense can just agree not to object. (There will often be perfectly good reasons for the defense to do this -- for example, if the defense doesn't want the jury to focus on the lab report, and instead wants to focus the jury's attention on other areas of the case.)

And in this day in age, jurors will look for the 00.01% uncertainty in a testimony to let someone off

Have you been in a courtroom lately? "That cop is a nice man, of course that other guy with the long hair is guilty" = justice these days.

Oh man, you TOTALLY GOT ME!

ellesar: You bunch of hippies eschewing the greatness of fewer drug addicts getting prosecuted for breaking the law will change your turn when your famillies end up dead because some drug addict gets off and inevitably escalates his criminal activity to murder. You may not think that smoking pot is all that illegal but its a proven gateway drug to things like herione. All of that leads to stealing which leads to murdering and worse.

Most of those druggers get a benefit from being in jail, they get rehibilitated and taught how not be a drain on society. Now they won't have that, they will jus tprogress to murder as studies have shown. Way to go SCOTUS! You've doomed all the hippies.

2/10

You should have included "hopped up on goofballs" too.

Dead-Guy: I know it's innocent until proven guilty, and this places the burden of DISPROOF on the defense, but isn't that how it is anyways?

Burden of proof is on the prosecution.

You seem to be discounting that there is a process involved in a lab analysis, that is being conducted by a human, which may or may not do his job correctly. If it is in your job description to handle items that are going to be used in criminal cases and that requires you to follow a procedure then yeah we should make sure that the procedure is transparent.

And your other examples are hyperbole. Even if you steal something fake you have still stolen something, it's still a crime. The Constitution one is a real stretch as it is a legal document in and of itself. And you can very obviously challenge various provisions of the constitution if you believe they were applied incorrectly to you.

FTFA:

is not still employed there 18 months later, when the case goes to trial.

Does anybody but me see this as being a huge problem in and of itself? If you are already violating the right for a speedy trial, why should you worry about a little thing like having actual witnesses?

The biggest difference I see is now the lab tech who did the test has to swear under oath and the penalty of perjury that their tests are accurate... rather than simple checking a box on a form and sending it on it's way.

I don't know about you but if I knew there was a chance I would be cross-examined in a court room on my work I would make extra sure it was accurate.

give me doughnuts: Firemarshalbill: give me doughnuts: vertiaset: give me doughnuts


Sorry for the knee-jerk reaction, but I've been in most of the circuit and district courthouses in Kentucky, and far too many of them had the Ten Commandments posted prominently behind the judge. Always got my shorts in a wad whenever I saw it.

Because you are a douche.

ju66l3r: ju66l3r: What's next? The secretary in the precinct who typed up your report has to verify that she didn't misspell someone else's name and that she really did mean to type your name into the arrest warrant?

None of you defending this ruling want to touch that one? Surprising.

Because it's idiotic. What you're talking about would be more in line with a habeas hearing. But in fact, in at least a few rare occaisons, the "I'm not the guy you wanted" defense is raised and in at least one case resulted in a half million dollar settlement after they arrested the wrong guy the second time.

In such an instance, they might well call the person who produced the document to testify that it was in fact the document produced.

But I thought Scalia was an evil conservative politician who always touted the authoritarian Republican party line and later justified it with originalism.

Where are all the vitriolic Fark "progressives" who constantly paint him that way to be found in light of this decision and the school strip search case?

Maybe there's a little more involved, hmmm?

huntercr: NuttierThanEver: Just another example of how the legal system continues to fark it up when dealing with science.

I think you might be trolling, but that's pretty naive... requiring a lab scientist to be in the courtroom makes it so that counsel can be given the opportunity to question/understand the limits of the science, and how just much the evidence proves or doesn't prove.

If the gloves don't fit, you must acquit.

Etc etc...

Yeah, that is what is called Circumstantial Evidence and any idiot lawyer would point that out.

So yeah, put the CSI's on the stand, that's not a problem. Just expect to either A) higher more scientists & increase taxes or B) let more cases slide. As long as they are only putting the scientists on the stands and not the science, this hopefully won't change things too much.

Can'tLetYouDoThatStarFox: Maybe there's a little more involved, hmmm?

Sounds like the old guy is suffering from Troll's Remorse, or maybe trying to make a cooler spot in the afterlife to me.

vertiaset: I suspect, based on your posts, that it is a combination of both.

STAR TREK AND THE GOSPEL HAVE NO PLACE IN THIS SERIOUS THREAD ABOUT THE SCOTUS!!!!


ChadM89: Oh man, you TOTALLY GOT ME!

Balls.

lab tech : scientist :: taxi driver : automotive engineer

dragyne: Loreweaver: Oh, I used the wrong analogy.

Thanks to this ruling, the nurse that administered the rape kit to the victim will now be required to testify, so the defense can accuse her of tainting the evidence. The tech that processed the kit will be required to testify, so the defense can accuse them of tainting the evidence. The receptionist that signed-in the patient will be required to testify, so the defense can accuse him/her of lying about the victim arriving at the hospital...

And if even one of these people don't/can't testify, the case is automatically dismissed. Because everyone knows that these random doctors, nurses, techs, and hospital receptionists all have a grudge against the defendent...

Administering a rape kit and analying it the contents are two different things on different spectrums of the process. If there was a mistake in administering a rape kit the nurse could already be called in for testimony. A lot of evidence in rape trails gets called into question things like how the clothing was stored, where clothing was stored, etc. The nurse previous to now would be more exposed because if there was any discrepency it would be the nurses fault and not the labs fault because the results were always taken as fact.

And prior to this ruling, the prosecution already had to provide proper documentation (via affidavit, documentation accompanying each step of the process, etc.) to show the evidence was collected and processed properly.

Now, the prosecutor must call to the stand anyone and everyone who even looked at the evidence to validate the evidence, even though the defense has not questioned the validity of the evidence...

Prosecutor: "This is a boat."
Defense: "We concur that is a boat."
SCOTUS: "The procecutor must first prove that is a boat before the defense may concur that it is a boat."

I support this ruling.

The Bill of Rights was put in place to protect individual liberties, not to make life easier for law enforcement and prosecutors.

If the Founders had cared more about law enforcement than liberty, they wouldn't have added the Bill of Rights in the first place.

zelet: Devin172:
You failed to read my post. I was raised in the country. I've been to court as defendant, witness, and juror. I'm also capable of reading your posts and as I've said proper staffing is a burden for the government. "It's expensive & we can't afford to" aren't valid excuses for waiving a persons rights.

I read your post. But I've been to courthouses with almost zero staff and no professional prosecutor. I've had to inform the prosecutor about current statute of limitations and another aspect of the law that could have seriously negatively affected his case.

I agree that proper staffing is a burden on the government but in republican states like mine if you even mention a tax increase you are voted out.

The system is broken and the way to fix it isn't to break it more. The previous method balanced the needs of the defendant and the needs of the state. The tech's report and method is available at the prelim and if it went to trial the tech is personally available to be cross examined. Now, the tech has to show up twice. Redundant and it doesn't help the accused.

It most certainly helps the accused if the tests the prosecution are relying on are found to be flawed during pre-trial hearings. How is that not a good thing?

I also have a problem with the concept of "balancing" the needs of the defendant and the state.

/Used to be a criminal defense investigator, am happy to see individual rights affirmed by the court.

KickahaOta: Ryan2065: I've been saying that if the defense wants to question the person who did the lab tests then by all means let them do that, but why require the lab guy to come in and give general information about the results when the defense doesn't even want to question him? It's a waste of resources and you haven't addressed that point yet.

Constitutional rights can be waived. If the prosecution wants to introduce the lab report, and the defense doesn't want to question the lab tech, then the defense can just agree not to object. (There will often be perfectly good reasons for the defense to do this -- for example, if the defense doesn't want the jury to focus on the lab report, and instead wants to focus the jury's attention on other areas of the case.)

Ah, but here is my problem. If the defense just wants to question a general expert on things like this, they can either pay for one or force the lab tech to come to the trial and give general information that almost anyone in that field could of answered. I highly doubt they are going to be willing to pay for one when they can get one for free at the expense of the state.

SpectroBoy: ellesar: You bunch of hippies eschewing the greatness of fewer drug addicts getting prosecuted for breaking the law will change your turn when your famillies end up dead because some drug addict gets off and inevitably escalates his criminal activity to murder. You may not think that smoking pot is all that illegal but its a proven gateway drug to things like herione. All of that leads to stealing which leads to murdering and worse.

Most of those druggers get a benefit from being in jail, they get rehibilitated and taught how not be a drain on society. Now they won't have that, they will jus tprogress to murder as studies have shown. Way to go SCOTUS! You've doomed all the hippies.

Not bad. You stayed in character and seemed to be making a point of sorts. I give it a 7/10 on the trollometer.


You can dismiss this all you like, but claiming I'm trolling is a cheesey way to avoid the points I'm making. Its not that hard to understand.

This is like raising a kid. When you let the kid get away scott free when he does small things, you end up having to beat them silly when they do buig things. Because of your inaction, it will happen, its only a matter of time before they progress to something really really bad. Then whos fault is it? Yours because you could've nipped it in the bud early on.

Same deal here. Guys starting smoking pot, which leads to Meth, which leads to coke, herione, silly smack, jenk'em, etc. Then as their habit grows, their ability to gather the resources to provide for their habit is diminished. So they start stealing which leads to murder. Now if they are stopped early on, they get the help they need and don't progress to the really bad stuff.

Now I don't think they are gonna skemp on big crime trials like murder, prostitution, child porn, etc. But because these dregs on society weren't stopped while doing their gateway behavior, you will end upwith more people doing the gradn-daddy crimes and it won't be all their fault anymoer cause no one helped them. I'm sure the fact that the DA will go all out to prosecute your familties killer will be of gerat comfort to you, especially when you realize that it couldve been stopped early on.

ellesar: Guys starting smoking pot, which leads to Meth

Pffft...hahahaha!!!

Oh, I'm sorry, you were being serious.

NuttierThanEver: benlonghair: NuttierThanEver: Just another example of how the legal system continues to fark it up when dealing with science.

What? This is a great ruling. Instead of juries being told that "this is science, that makes it true," defense attorneys can cross examine the tech who will explain that these tests aren't necessarily perfect.

You can present the data on the sensitivity and specificity of a test and then present data that sheds light on the risks of false positives of any tests without having to demand that the tech who put the test in a machine 1000 miles away be present to question directly. You want to cross examine the tech that collected the samples? Fine, that makes sense.
But demanding to have a lab tech be present just explain that it was he that but chemical A into beaker B and then hit the switch on the PCR machine is just assinine.

this.

/scientist
//farking up a PCR right now.

Loreweaver: Now, the prosecutor must call to the stand anyone and everyone who even looked at the evidence to validate the evidence, even though the defense has not questioned the validity of the evidence...

Prosecutor: "This is a boat."
Defense: "We concur that is a boat."
SCOTUS: "The procecutor must first prove that is a boat before the defense may concur that it is a boat."

You are wrong, and you are so far wrong that you are either trolling or just way out of your depth.

If the prosecution and the defense both stipulate that this is a boat, then it is a boat. There's not even any need for evidence of the existence of the boat, let alone testimony about the boat.

Loreweaver: Oh, another thing the people defending this ruling missed:

Prior to this ruling, the defendent has ALWAYS had the right to challenge evidence, by calling a tech involved in the investigation to testify. Prosecutors aren't the only ones allowed to call witnesses in a trial, a fact I am certain most here have forgotten!

You know, that whole thing about calling a witness to refute evidence? However, if the defendent does not make the effort to exercise that right, it's their own damn fault.

All this ruling does is delay trial dates and makes trying cases prohibitively expensive.

If I'm accused of a crime, I want every chance I can get to challenge any evidence presented against me. If I can get evidence, bogus or otherwise, thrown out before a trial begins, then all the better. I will not be concerned in the least how much it's costing the state to bring me to trial. My main concern will be with defending myself, quite possibly at great expense to myself for my own lawyer(s). I would never consider passing up the chance to challenge any and all evidence against me at all phases of the process simply because that would be a cheaper option for the prosecution.

Perhaps it will be more expensive to prosecute, perhaps not if states can develop efficient procedures to accommodate this ruling. To say that this ruling is incorrect on constitutional grounds is one thing, and perhaps you have an argument along these lines. But to say it's incorrect only because states will find it more expensive to prosecute is not valid reasoning. I realize you didn't actually say this ruling is incorrect on constitutional grounds, but you have implied that it is incorrect simply because prosecution will be more expensive for the states. That in itself doesn't make it wrong.

KickahaOta: Marcus Aurelius: Let's hope this puts a nail into the coffin of red light and speed cameras at the same time.

/i call the speed camera as my next witness

This is always brought up in discussions like this. Which is sort of unfortunate, because it's always wrong.

A speed camera is not a witness, any more than the speed limit sign on the highway is a witness, or any more than the radar gun in a patrol car is a witness. A speed camera is a piece of machinery. It is a tool. It has no independent intentions. It does not give testimony. You cannot cross-examine it.

The picture produced by a speed camera is a piece of evidence. You cannot cross-examine the picture either.

If you believe that the speed camera is inaccurate, then there are any number of ways you can present that argument in court. But cross-examining a piece of machinery is not one of those ways.

Okay smart-guy... I think you have to explain to us troglodytes how the printout of a piece of machinery in a lab is different than the image produced by a camera or the output of a velocimeter? Because there is a signature of a lab tech on the piece of paper that certifies his belief in the results of the machine's output? That's the same as someone signing off on the calibration of a speed camera. His belief is based on trusting something beyond his own senses. Unless they have people that swish the blood around in their mouth of which i'm not aware...

Anyone?

kronicfeld: DamnYankees: Scalia's decision makes no sense to me. How is this not a business records exemption?

Even if it were a "business record," which I think is highly dubious, business records aren't magically admissible just because you hold up a document and say "judge, this is a business record." The "record" still has to be authenticated, and the court still has to hear evidence of the things that qualify the document as a business record. Those vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, but generally you need to show - again, through evidence, not mere representations of counsel - that the record was kept in the regular course of business, and that it was in the regular course of business to make that record.

I thought this was covered in the opinion. Business records aren't subject to the business records exception if kept for court/prosecutorial purposes. A test of drugs obtained by police is not really different than a police report in that respect. Neither is admissible under that exception.

Ryan2065: KickahaOta: Ryan2065: I've been saying that if the defense wants to question the person who did the lab tests then by all means let them do that, but why require the lab guy to come in and give general information about the results when the defense doesn't even want to question him? It's a waste of resources and you haven't addressed that point yet.

Constitutional rights can be waived. If the prosecution wants to introduce the lab report, and the defense doesn't want to question the lab tech, then the defense can just agree not to object. (There will often be perfectly good reasons for the defense to do this -- for example, if the defense doesn't want the jury to focus on the lab report, and instead wants to focus the jury's attention on other areas of the case.)

Ah, but here is my problem. If the defense just wants to question a general expert on things like this, they can either pay for one or force the lab tech to come to the trial and give general information that almost anyone in that field could of answered. I highly doubt they are going to be willing to pay for one when they can get one for free at the expense of the state.

I think one of the benefits of questioning the lab tech performing the tests instead of anyone else in the field is that you get to confront someone who could be falsifying results, or has a poor understanding of what they're doing, etc.

Obdicut: I don't believe that all tests require positive and negative controls at the moment, which is a huge problem.

I'm very much outside of the field of forensics, so maybe you could explain this. How would positive and negative controls work in the case of, say, DNA testing? That seems (to my decidedly inexpert mind) a binary thing-- it either matches or doesn't, with extremely high levels of probability. To do controls do you throw in known-different DNA, such as from a chicken, as well as a sample from the suspect?

ellesar: Same deal here. Guys starting smoking pot, which leads to Meth, which leads to coke, herione, silly smack, jenk'em, etc. Then as their habit grows, their ability to gather the resources to provide for their habit is diminished. So they start stealing which leads to murder. Now if they are stopped early on, they get the help they need and don't progress to the really bad stuff.

Now I don't think they are gonna skemp on big crime trials like murder, prostitution, child porn, etc. But because these dregs on society weren't stopped while doing their gateway behavior, you will end upwith more people doing the gradn-daddy crimes and it won't be all their fault anymoer cause no one helped them. I'm sure the fact that the DA will go all out to prosecute your familties killer will be of gerat comfort to you, especially when you realize that it couldve been stopped early on.

Blah, blah, blah.

Trolling reasons:

-Gateway argument is old and busted, you can't be serious
-Legalizing pot beats any tertiary gateway argumnets as you remove the criminal element.
-Incendiary and emotional rhetoric
-Blanket, unsupported statements (hippies, dregs, etc.)
-Hyperbole ("murder your family")
-Ignoring the studies that show that prison makes addicts worse, not better
-Implying supporting a zero-tolerance fascist police state

Shut up, troll.

Ryan2065: Dracolich: Nah, it's not about the details of that sample in particular unless it's of particularly strange nature. It's about:
-how those tests are conducted
-what the uncertainty of the test is
-what things lead to false positives
-who accredited their expertise

I'm going to ignore your first three points since they don't actually go against what I've said and just look at the last one. You are saying that the lab tech needs to travel, sometimes 10 hours to go to one trial just to talk about the training he received? Can't they just explain and if the defense still wants to question him, then have him do the drive?

Dracolich: Unfortunately, because of that conflict of interest thing several people have mentioned, it may even be just to get them under oath so that they had no incentives to falsify their results.

I thought we already had laws against falsifying evidence. But I'm sure the people willing to break those laws would just hate to break perjury laws and would love to bring charges against themselves and lose their job. That's what logically would happen...

Dracolich: Like I said before though, lawyers shouldn't be presenting a single number from a test. It's a distribution of where the answer might be and there had better be someone who knows about it to explain it, and this may as well be the person who did the test because there are other questions they should answer.

I've been saying that if the defense wants to question the person who did the lab tests then by all means let them do that, but why require the lab guy to come in and give general information about the results when the defense doesn't even want to question him? It's a waste of resources and you haven't addressed that point yet.

Yes, it's probably a waste of resources ultimately, but pragmatism isn't really the point in justice. Pragmatism can get nasty very quickly just because something "worked."

First off, they should be there because of the reasons in JefferyScott's comments.

They should also be there because the results aren't evidence in the same context that a murder weapon or a signed contract are evidence. The data requires interpretation.

Furthermore, the sample itself was the evidence. The evidence was looked over by the technician who formed a conclusion about it and then made an accusation by the very act of interpretation of those results. Labs often find things to be inconclusive, so he must justify why his results are not. Analytical chemistry isn't as easy as just loading things into a GC, doing an nmr test, or running things through spectroscopy. Sure it gets a number, but the person is saying what they think the results mean and there are many cases where their first guesses have been wrong. To sum this one up, it's because there are jumps between the evidence, results, and conclusions which only the person coming to those conclusions can answer.

Easy example of this: test a shows heroine in the bloodstream. Sample 1 tests positive for test a. The logical conclusion here is that there is no logical conclusion. To say that there's been heroine use violates the correlation/causation thing. You need a person at this point to clarify why they don't think it could be anything else like poppy seeds in food that they ate. This person could be wrong. It happens a lot with chemical testing, and new tests replace old ones all the time because it's very difficult to find a perfect test for organic compounds.

Didn't proofread it, but let me know if this clears anything up.

sweetmelissa31: I am so confused. Why would Scalia and Thomas support this? I agree with the opinion, but it seems unlike them.


That's because you view things through a political lens. Scalia and Thomas also dissented in the Connecticut eminent domain case as well as in many cases in which individual liberty is the pre-eminent concern because they tend to be strict constructionalists. That is, they read the constitution as written, weigh it against the laws that the states produce and which must comply with the constitution and they issue judgements and opinions from that. They don't do a lot of "legislating from the bench".

In this case, lots of folks on the left think they did a great job...but only because of the issue they happen to agree on. If it were an issue they don't agree on then they're back to being asinine, right-wing nutjobs when in fact they likely did their job the exact same way...they strictly construed the constitution and the wording of the law(s) being contests by the plaintiffs and respondents.

They didn't change. The subject they ruled on did. It's sad that so many are so myopic as to not see that SCOTUS justices are SUPPOSED to do with these two do all the time.

Ah well. Good decision I suppose although it will create backlogs in courts until/unless the states properly fund their scientific resources. That is, if the states want to jail people on the basis of science, that science has to be as answerable to defense efforts as other types of evidence. States cannot expect to be able to declare "case closed" simply because someone gets up and says "it's science, it's irrefutable".

Interesting parallels to the current global warming debate in that sense, I suppose.

FTFA - Legal experts and prosecutors are concerned about the results of last month's U.S. Supreme Court ruling that requires lab analysts to be in court to testify about their tests. Lab sheets that identify a substance as a narcotic or breath-test printouts describing a suspect's blood-alcohol level are no longer sufficient evidence, the court ruled. A person must be in court to talk about the test results.

I can see the point here. The lab guy could explain how and why they came to the conclusions they did without the "filter" of the lawyers who may or may not know what they're talking about.

Loreweaver Nurses are already required to testify in rape cases. You are being overly obtuse to fit your point and taking a broad interpertation of the ruling.

The prosecution doesn't have to do anything if they do not use the particular testimony. If the Defense agrees on principle of certain facts they do not need to bring forth evidence.

The ruling says nothing of your example. That is really comparing apples and oranges.

scientists in the MY courtroom?

It's more likely than you think.

Where does it end?

DA: You are accused of having murdered the victim.
Defense: Prove it.
DA: We have your motive based on what your conspirator said.
Defense: Prove it.
Conspirator: You told me we'd be rich.
DA: See, and we know you were in that alley that night.
Defense: Prove it.
DA: Here's a video tape of you entering the alley at the time of the murder. We also have DNA evidence from blood on your shoe matching the victim.
Defense: Prove it.
DA: Here's the test result matching the sample from your shoe to a sample from the victim.
Defense: Prove it.
DA: Here's the tech.
Tech: It's you, dude, see how all this here matches identically?
Defense: Prove it.
Tech: Prove what? I got blood from the cops and the morgue. It's all in the report, didn't you even read the report?
Defense: Prove it.
Tech: Fine, here's a picture taken of the cops and the morgue handing me the blood samples and a picture of me using those same samples in the analysis.
Defense: Prove it.
Tech: Do you think I photoshopped the pictures? What do you want from me!?


Sorry there was corruption in Houston. But this goes into the realm of stupid instead of dealing directly with those cases where the lab is corrupt. "The State" is your accuser...but every other citizen in the state gets to be represented by the district attorney and doesn't have to show up to point their finger at you. The tech should be exempt in the same way by being represented by the DA. If you don't like it, then push to have the labs be part of the court system and not a part of the state's offices.

brukmann: KickahaOta: Marcus Aurelius: Let's hope this puts a nail into the coffin of red light and speed cameras at the same time.

/i call the speed camera as my next witness

This is always brought up in discussions like this. Which is sort of unfortunate, because it's always wrong.

A speed camera is not a witness, any more than the speed limit sign on the highway is a witness, or any more than the radar gun in a patrol car is a witness. A speed camera is a piece of machinery. It is a tool. It has no independent intentions. It does not give testimony. You cannot cross-examine it.

The picture produced by a speed camera is a piece of evidence. You cannot cross-examine the picture either.

If you believe that the speed camera is inaccurate, then there are any number of ways you can present that argument in court. But cross-examining a piece of machinery is not one of those ways.

Okay smart-guy... I think you have to explain to us troglodytes how the printout of a piece of machinery in a lab is different than the image produced by a camera or the output of a velocimeter? Because there is a signature of a lab tech on the piece of paper that certifies his belief in the results of the machine's output? That's the same as someone signing off on the calibration of a speed camera. His belief is based on trusting something beyond his own senses. Unless they have people that swish the blood around in their mouth of which i'm not aware...

Anyone?

I'm gonna take a swing at this:

The evidence produced by a lab is affected by the person carrying out the procedure. The evidence produced by a camera is automated and should produce identical results each time.

However, maybe you could argue about how soon the light goes from yellow to red versus other intersections and call in whoever programs them and cross-examines them?

I didnt read all the posts so this might have been said already.

Just set up Skype in these rural locations at the labs and the courthouses and let them testify that way. Saves the state money from the wear and tear on the cars and also the wasted time traveling.

Problem solved...think I can bill these states?

When murderers start walking because some lab tech breaks down on the stand and gets his words twisted by a slimy defense attorney and a more-god-than-science jury sees "reasonable doubt" in the testimony, you'll all be sorry.

You all play the victim now, because it behooves you to treat "The State" as plaintiff as an uncaring machine that needs to be stopped from running over the innocent. When it's the guilty that start trampling your right to contain their vile activities from the rest of civilized society and you realize that "The State" is just as much YOU as the defendant, you're going to question how you ever thought making scientists take the stand was a good thing.

Dracolich:

I know we're talking about lawyers here, and they're not as a whole the brightest bulbs in the room, but what's the difference between swearing an oath 100 miles away vs swearing it right in the courtroom? Is it so the judge can make sure you don't have your fingers crossed behind your back? There's no material difference between situations.

Obdicut: I'd say that in addition to it being double-blind on the lab's side, it would be great if the police did not actually know which lab was performing the analysis. If the samples were sent to a chain-of-evidence-preserving oversight board, who randomly assigned it to a qualified lab. That way the incentive for fraud (for reasons other than incompetence or idiocy) drops away, and you can compare labs to each other well.

For that matter, perhaps even a "board" isn't needed. After all, we're talking about random assignments. A human isn't needed for that. How about this:

1) Investigators decide that a certain test is needed on certain evidence.
2) Investigator requests tests from an central assignment computer. S/he says, "I need this test", the computer picks a qualified lab, and simultaneously assigns a serial case ID to it.
3) Just the evidence, without identifying information other than the assigned ID, is sent to a central distributor to be sent to a lab. The central distributor has instructions, "send case ID XXXXXXX to lab Y". This keeps the requester from knowing what lab it was sent to and removes even the possibility of undue influence.
4) The lab answers a request such as, "To what degree of confidence does sample A match sample B"?
5) The lab enters relevant answers, data and documentation into the computer under the case number, which alerts the requester that the test is finished.
6) Profit!

Any step in the process should be available to a judge, however, and eventually to the defense.

griffer: ellesar: Same deal here. Guys starting smoking pot, which leads to Meth, which leads to coke, herione, silly smack, jenk'em, etc. Then as their habit grows, their ability to gather the resources to provide for their habit is diminished. So they start stealing which leads to murder. Now if they are stopped early on, they get the help they need and don't progress to the really bad stuff.

Now I don't think they are gonna skemp on big crime trials like murder, prostitution, child porn, etc. But because these dregs on society weren't stopped while doing their gateway behavior, you will end upwith more people doing the gradn-daddy crimes and it won't be all their fault anymoer cause no one helped them. I'm sure the fact that the DA will go all out to prosecute your familties killer will be of gerat comfort to you, especially when you realize that it couldve been stopped early on.

Blah, blah, blah.

Trolling reasons:

-Gateway argument is old and busted, you can't be serious
-Legalizing pot beats any tertiary gateway argumnets as you remove the criminal element.
-Incendiary and emotional rhetoric
-Blanket, unsupported statements (hippies, dregs, etc.)
-Hyperbole ("murder your family")
-Ignoring the studies that show that prison makes addicts worse, not better
-Implying supporting a zero-tolerance fascist police state

Shut up, troll.


Well guess you are proof of what pot does to your brain. Random stupidity quoted in bullet form FTW!

EVerything I said is supported by life...

SchlingFocker: DamnYankees: It's a good argument. I'm not fully decided on this issue, so I need to think about it more.

If this helps at all, consider the idea of an independent federal body that conducts random spot checks of labs, retesting random samples and auditing chains of custody.

It removes the "black-box" aspect from the crime labs, but it doesn't place an undue burden on the crime labs to constantly send their lab guys to trials.


I've always felt that whenever DNA evidence is presented at a trial resulting in a felony conviction that there should be an immediate mandatory 3rd party test of that evidence to confirm it's findings.

If you're going to rely on the results of one test and those results could spell long imprisonment or death for the accused, a second test shouldn't be that much of an imposition. That, and if the 3rd party test is done and it confirms the original test's findings, there ought not to be an appeal avenue thereafter based on the scientific evidence.

fnorgby: is that just me, or can you all sort of hear Ode to Joy off in the distance?

"enjoy the right to be confronted with the witnesses against them" is enough for me. The fact that it means fewer potheads going to jail is just the sweet, delicious icing.

Exactly... Hopefully this will force the courts to prioritize cases and throw the nonsense out.

ju66l3r: When murderers start walking because some lab tech breaks down on the stand and gets his words twisted by a slimy defense attorney and a more-god-than-science jury sees "reasonable doubt" in the testimony, you'll all be sorry.

You all play the victim now, because it behooves you to treat "The State" as plaintiff as an uncaring machine that needs to be stopped from running over the innocent. When it's the guilty that start trampling your right to contain their vile activities from the rest of civilized society and you realize that "The State" is just as much YOU as the defendant, you're going to question how you ever thought making scientists take the stand was a good thing.

Exactly! Its a bunch of hippie rhetoric because they want to smoke pot. No one ever started off thinking, "Man I'm gonna end up a big ol junky!". But it happens all the time. Talk about lietting your bias color your perceptions. Typical hipppie nonsense if you ask me.

ellesar: SpectroBoy: ellesar:
You can dismiss this all you like, but claiming I'm trolling is a cheesey way to avoid the points I'm making. Its not that hard to understand.

This is like raising a kid. When you let the kid get away scott free when he does small things, you end up having to beat them silly when they do buig things. Because of your inaction, it will happen, its only a matter of time before they progress to something really really bad. Then whos fault is it? Yours because you could've nipped it in the bud early on.

Same deal here. Guys starting smoking pot, which leads to Meth, which leads to coke, herione, silly smack, jenk'em, etc. Then as their habit grows, their ability to gather the resources to provide for their habit is diminished. So they start stealing which leads to murder. Now if they are stopped early on, they get the help they need and don't progress to the really bad stuff.





The slippery slope/gateway drug argument has never been proven, and for good reason. The connection doesn't exist. If it were true, wouldn't everyone who drank alcohol or ingested nicotine would go through this same process? What does happen more often is that people who are fed this incredibly fallacious logic in place of actual information discount all of it when they find out some of it is untrue. Every year, students are told that smoking marijuana will automatically lead to cocaine, heroin, Satanism, and rampant UFIA. When they smoke marijuana once (as many teenagers do) and discover that these things do not come to pass, why should they trust any of the other information they've been given about drugs and addiction?

Your argument has no real merit - it's spouting the same crap we've been getting since Reefer Madness, and has never come to pass.

(Not to mention that taking a bit more are with your spelling/editing would make you look less like a troll.)

Over simplified ju66l3r

The lab technician is only responsible for testifying that he did the test properly and took all measures of responsibility with the evidence. He may also be called on if he is familiar with the process. That is all

Let me edit that for you

DA: You are accused of having murdered the victim.
Defense: Prove it. (not quilty)
DA: We have your motive based on what your conspirator said.
Defense: Prove it.
Conspirator: You told me we'd be rich.(Defense can Cross Examine Here)
DA: See, and we know you were in that alley that night.
Defense: Prove it.
DA: Here's a video tape of you entering the alley (a likely objection as it doesnt specify where the alley is or time or where the tape came from, Likely you would call to witness the owner of said camera who would go over their normal maintaince practice on the camera.) at the time of the murder. We also have DNA evidence from blood on your shoe matching the victim.
Defense: Prove it. (here is where it got hairy as DNA evidence was accepted as proof as supposed to supporting evidence)
DA: Here's the test result matching the sample from your shoe to a sample from the victim.
Defense: Prove it. (There is a chance of human error here especially if the tech is new or poorly trained this isn't an underhanded request in the name of justice)
DA: Here's the tech.
Tech: It's you, dude, see how all this here matches identically?(Objection, Technician isn't paid to identify the person just that the DNA that was provided to the tech matches)
Defense: Prove it.
(here is where things changed)
DA: here is the chain of custody record (and things go on normally)


The tech is only responsible for making sure that the procedure was administered properly and without bias. There should be no problem with a tech stating this in court and being sent along their way.

Eclectic Hedonist: Dracolich:

I know we're talking about lawyers here, and they're not as a whole the brightest bulbs in the room, but what's the difference between swearing an oath 100 miles away vs swearing it right in the courtroom? Is it so the judge can make sure you don't have your fingers crossed behind your back? There's no material difference between situations.

Agreed. But there must be some reason we're not seeing it... perhaps it has to do with the privacy of the courtroom? Many trials aren't open to the public. It also seems to give resources to the person on the stand during cross examination (their computer, their documents, etc. which the court can't see). It may just be for the sake of transparency in government.

Does anyone on here know more about this one?

ju66l3r: When murderers start walking because some lab tech breaks down on the stand and gets his words twisted by a slimy defense attorney and a more-god-than-science jury sees "reasonable doubt" in the testimony, you'll all be sorry.

You all play the victim now, because it behooves you to treat "The State" as plaintiff as an uncaring machine that needs to be stopped from running over the innocent. When it's the guilty that start trampling your right to contain their vile activities from the rest of civilized society and you realize that "The State" is just as much YOU as the defendant, you're going to question how you ever thought making scientists take the stand was a good thing.

I'd rather let a million murders free than convict an innocent man