CSI effects on jury reasoning and verdicts

Jane Goodman-Delahunty, David Tait

Research output: Chapter in Book / Conference PaperChapter

Abstract

Starting in the 1980s, around the globe, the demand for analysis of forensic trace evidence and the presentation by the prosecution of forensic scientific evidence in criminal trials has increased exponentially. A recent field study of uses of expert evidence in 55 criminal trials in Australia revealed that forensic scientific evidence was the most frequently introduced form of expertise. In 70% of the criminal trials in that study, the experts to whom jurors were exposed were forensic scientists, primarily DNA profiling or digital experts, and those who were experts in ballistics, ingerprints or blood spatter. One leading New South Wales prosecutor, Mark Tedeschi, has attributed the increasingly protracted length of many criminal trials to jury expectations that scientific evidence will be available — a form of the “CSI factor.” In line with the trend observed in the above-mentioned field study, in the case he was prosecuting at the time, seven different categories of forensic scientific expert evidence were admitted: DNA profiling evidence, blood spatter evidence, fingerprints, shoe prints, forensic pathology, rope transfers and forensic locksmith evidence. A relatively small proportion of the jury trials in the field study sample, one third, involved contested expert evidence, or a battle of experts, when the defence called its own rebuttal expert to oppose the expert evidence proffered by the Crown. Accordingly, most of the experts who testified before juries performed most of their work on behalf of the prosecution; less than one-third appeared on behalf of the defence. The observed trend was that in most criminal trials, expert witnesses appeared only in support of the prosecution, and the prosecution called multiple expert witnesses in a single case. This trend raises a dilemma for defence counsel as to when it is to their benefit to appoint a rebuttal defence expert. In Chapters 10 and 11, the results of Studies One and Two demonstrated that when the defence calls an independent expert to rebut the opinions of the prosecution expert, this does not necessarily nullify or neutralise the evidence of the prosecution expert.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationJuries, Science and Popular Culture in the Age of Terror: The Case of the Sydney Bomber
EditorsDavid Tait, Jane Goodman-Delahunty
Place of PublicationU.K.
PublisherPalgrave Macmillan
Pages217-233
Number of pages17
ISBN (Electronic)9781137554758
ISBN (Print)9781137554741
Publication statusPublished - 2016

Keywords

  • juries
  • forensic sciences
  • popular culture

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'CSI effects on jury reasoning and verdicts'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this