Lawyers who handle capital cases – those where the death penalty is the potential punishment – know that building ‘the case for life’ is at least as important as defending against a conviction. Most capitally-charged cases are not brought unless the prosecution has strong if not overwhelming evidence of culpability and mens rea, so the
To some lawyers, it is not clear when the duty to correct errors from old cases expires. If you prosecuted a case in 2001, and learn of new evidence in 2017 that casts doubt on the conviction, must you notify anyone? And if you represented someone convicted long ago, or a witness, and now have
It can be argued that the notion of the trial as a “search for the truth” is incompatible with the adversarial system. After all, the adversarial system – except possibly as governed by the ethical commands prosecutors face to “seek justice” – is one based upon zealous representation and the desire of each side to
The April 2017 decision by Attorney General Sessions to not renew the National Commission on Forensic Science (NCFS) was announced as part of what he claimed would be efforts to “advance forensic science and help combat the rise in violent crime.” Whatever the Department of Justice has in mind for combatting a putative rise in
Witness memories, however flawed or imprecise, are often the core evidence at trial. Yet anyone who studies memory knows that recollection of event gist (“I’ll never forget being robbed”) may be long-lasting but accurate recall of event detail fades within hours, or at most a day, after the occurrence. This is shown in what
The return of death sentences by the jury was inevitable in the case of Dylann Roof, who was on trial for killing nine black churchgoers during a Bible study in Charleston, S.C. But no one – fan or foe of capital punishment – should take comfort in how this came about; and an understanding
What does the President of the United States have to do with forensic science? Answering that could take one, indirectly, back to Abraham Lincoln, who signed the legislation that led to the creation of the National Academy of Sciences. The NAS, in 2009, issued a report that called into question the validity and precision