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scotkaz · Joined: 28 Aug 2008 Posts: 527

Wonder if this will happen here too?

Judges given new power to test credibility of specialists who testify in court cases
By Robert Verkaik, Law Editor, The Independent, Tuesday, 7 April 2009
http://tinyurl.com/c5lpkm

Scientists, doctors and other experts are to be stopped from giving misleading evidence in court after a series of miscarriages of justice involving unreliable testimony, under proposals published today.

Tough new rules will give judges greater powers to test the credibility of experts and, where necessary, exclude their evidence from juries.

The move follows a number of high-profile cases in which expert evidence has led to the wrongful conviction of innocent people.

Under proposals published by the Government's law advisory body, judges would have a "gate-keeping" role to stop "untrustworthy" evidence being heard in court.

The most troubling case in recent years was that of solicitor Sally Clark who was convicted of murdering her two infant sons after a jury heard that the chances of the babies dying natural deaths was one in 73 million.

That statistic was later shown to have "grossly" misrepresented the chance of two sudden deaths within the same family from unexplained but natural causes. Sally Clark had her convictions quashed by the Court of Appeal in 2003 but never recovered from her ordeal and was found dead at her home in 2007

The Law Commission of England and Wales, which publishes its consultation paper today, sets out a number of preliminary proposals to prevent a repeat of cases like that of Sally Clark.

The commissioners say: "More worrying still, it may be that the examples given represent the tip of a larger iceberg. It has been said that much other forensic scientific evidence relied on in criminal proceedings has not been properly validated, which suggests there is at least a significant risk that some evidence is not sufficiently reliable to be admitted."

They point to "several recent cases" which suggest there is a real, ongoing problem which demands an urgent solution: "It would appear expert evidence is sometimes admitted too readily and that, notwithstanding a number of successful and highly publicised appeals concerning the reliability of expert opinion evidence, there continues to be a pressing danger of wrongful convictions."

Some so-called experts have also turned out to be acting fraudulently.

Notorious examples of fraudulent "expert" witnesses who have been convicted in recent years include Godwin Onubogu (a bogus medical doctor, convicted in 1998), Barian Baluchi (a bogus psychiatrist, convicted in 2005) and Gene Morrison (a bogus psychologist, convicted in 2007).

Professor Jeremy Horder, the commissioner leading the project, said: "The parties in criminal trials are relying increasingly on the evidence of expert witnesses. Expert evidence, particularly scientific evidence, can have a very persuasive effect on juries.

"It is vital that such evidence should be used only if it provides a sound basis for determining a defendant's guilt or innocence.

"There have been miscarriages of justice in recent years where prosecution expert evidence of doubtful reliability has been placed before Crown Court juries.

"There may also have been unwarranted acquittals attributable to such evidence. We want to ensure the criminal courts have the means to authenticate expert evidence and be satisfied the information before them is sound."

One of the Law Commission's suggestions, although not a formal proposal, is for a court-appointed assessor to help the judge establish the reliability of and credibility of the expert testimony.
Another would see the establishment of a regulatory framework for expert witnesses.
Source for this message:
The Independent, Tuesday, 7 April 2009

Lydia · Joined: 06 Nov 2008 Posts: 82

As a mum who lost two children one as a baby and one as an adult I tried very hard to understand how Sally Clark and the others must have felt.

The devastation of losing a child, the guilt wondering if you could have done more to save them, the empty arms. Along comes a police officer and states they believe you actually deliberately killed this child. These women must have felt they were in some kind of terrible terrible nightmare.

If your child is ill at least you have some warning of death, these women had none.

It is not just mothers who have faced these situations, men have found themselves in prison because of the “expert witness”.

This is probably the best news for the justice system in a long time.

Scotland needs this as a matter of urgency.
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We are the parents in Scotland denied justice for our children who had illegal post mortem's or had organs removed illegally at post mortem.

Iain McKie · Joined: 08 May 2007 Posts: 263 Location: Ayr, Scotland.

This material is well worth a read as are the current forum debates on expert evidence.

At last - in England and Wales at least - the authorities are becoming alert to a string of injustices, of which Sally Clark's was arguably the worst, where courts and others have accepted expert evidence as infallible.

This challenge is long overdue in Scotland as the Crown Office, Faculty of Advocates, Law Society and the Scottish Police Services Authority (SPSA - who are responsible for the provision of forensic services) all refuse to act even when prompted to do so.

Their recent refusal to do anything about the three ex-SCRO fingerprint experts in the SPSA who continue to prepare and give court evidence despite their refusing to admit the two wrong identifications in the Marion Ross case highlights the issue. In addition other SCRO experts and those who supported them can continue to call themselves ‘independent experts’ and sell their potentially flawed conclusions to the highest bidder.

During the coming Fingerprint Inquiry I will be pushing for these organisations to be called to account for their failures in this respect and I certainly hope that the Inquiry will recommend much more effective supervision and control of all forensic experts.

To make matters worse the Council for the Registration of Forensic Practitioners (CRFP), the major UK organisation charged with accrediting forensic experts, has recently folded when two police forces withdrew funding.

Lydia · Joined: 06 Nov 2008 Posts: 82

Sally Clarke and others suffered from a "feeling" within the world of pathology that not all cot deaths were genuine and that all that was needed was more research to prove that parents were killers.

No proof, no positive tests and I can assure you this "feeling" still exists.

They wait to be the first pathologist to find something like the parents making baby formula too strong which in some cases killed the babies or something to make them famous.

Within different areas of criminal pathology I wonder how many people have gone to prison because "experts" have decided they were guilty and look for some way to justify this feeling.

If this enquiry changes the future in Scotland and saves even one more person the guilty verdict when they are not guilty then I say let it happen soon.

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We are the parents in Scotland denied justice for our children who had illegal post mortem's or had organs removed illegally at post mortem.