'The Law Must Respond When Science Changes' (scientificamerican.com)
- Reference: 0175393993
- News link: https://yro.slashdot.org/story/24/11/04/168249/the-law-must-respond-when-science-changes
- Source link: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-law-must-respond-when-science-changes/
Scientific understanding in criminal justice has repeatedly proven wrong. Texas executed Cameron Todd Willingham in 2004 based on [3]invalidated arson science . The FBI found errors in [4]90% of their reviewed hair analysis cases . Courts still accept bite mark evidence despite experts failing to distinguish human from animal bites. The legal system fails in two critical ways, the story argues: Judges don't properly screen out bad science despite their "gatekeeper" role established in Daubert v. Merrell Dow, and courts resist reopening cases when scientific understanding changes.
While some states like Texas and California have laws allowing appeals based on updated science, implementation remains weak. Roberson has spent 20 years on death row and the Menendez brothers 28 years in prison while courts drag their feet on reviewing their cases with current scientific knowledge. The piece argues that constitutional due process requires allowing convicts to challenge their cases when the science underlying their convictions proves faulty. The system can reform by enforcing stricter scientific evidence standards and creating clear paths to challenge convictions based on outdated science.
[1] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-law-must-respond-when-science-changes/
[2] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/shaken-baby-syndrome-has-been-discredited-why-is-robert-roberson-still-on/
[3] https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/09/07/trial-by-fire
[4] https://www.fbi.gov/news/press-releases/fbi-testimony-on-microscopic-hair-analysis-contained-errors-in-at-least-90-percent-of-cases-in-ongoing-review
Courts only want finalty, not justice. (Score:1)
Judges and courts are only interested in finality, not justice or facts.
Meanwhile, too many prosecutors are only interested in "winning", despite the facts.
The police are not on your side: they are only on their own side -- this may result in the police helping you, but that only happens when they think it will ultimately benefit them.
Listen to a few episodes of the "Wrongful Conviction" podcast and you will develop a deep cynicism about justice in the USA.
[1]https://lavaforgood.com/with-j... [lavaforgood.com]
There are many ca
[1] https://lavaforgood.com/with-jason-flom/
Re: (Score:2)
The judiciary in most countries is reluctant to accept that mistakes have been made, even when they are fairly clear. It can help if someone else is on the hook for it, like cops lying or coercing a confession, but often it's just some witness who can reasonably claim to have given his expert opinion based on the known science of the day. Some of it is even subjective, like fingerprint matches often are.
Another issue is the assumption that juries don't make mistakes, when they very clearly do. Absent some p
Re: (Score:2)
In civilized countries, unlike the USA, the police are not allowed to lie to people under interrogation. These lies lead to false confessions.
Re: (Score:2)
But you never have to submit to any police interrogations, ever, unlike certain other "civilized" countries.
Re: Courts only want finalty, not justice. (Score:2)
> ever
You actually do. For the extent of time they are allowed to detain you prior to filing charges or releasing you. But all you have to respond with is "Attorney, please."
Re: (Score:2)
Those people are fucking dumb. The -only- thing you say to cops, especially if you're not guilty of anything, is "I will only talk to my attorney ".
Re: (Score:2)
> Those people are fucking dumb. The -only- thing you say to cops, especially if you're not guilty of anything, is "I will only talk to my attorney ".
So what you are saying is that the law should only protect smart, well-educated people?
These lies are often used against naive teenagers. Do they not deserve protection? Do they not deserve fair treatment in the "justice" system? Did you see the interrogation of Brendan Dassey? He had a lawyer, who was useless.
Re: (Score:2)
Ah yes, "justice" for "just me". For all you stupid people, who cares?
Living up to your handle with every post.
Re: (Score:2)
It's the same in the UK, the police can lie in interviews, or apply unreasonable pressure to confess. For the most part they can lie in court as well, and it rarely becomes an issue for them.
Re: (Score:2)
> It's the same in the UK, the police can lie in interviews,
No, they can't. Or at least, lying is strictly limited.
The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 changed things drastically in the UK.
[1]https://prismreports.org/2021/... [prismreports.org]
[1] https://prismreports.org/2021/08/30/lying-to-police-suspects-is-banned-in-several-countries-why-is-it-still-legal-in-the-u-s/
Re: (Score:1)
No matter how scientifically valid a tool may be, you cannot trust the government to use it fairly.
And we assume, waaaay too blithely, that there are infallible forensic tools. At best, you're dealing with bayesian odds, not popperian falsifiability.
For example, which of these do you think are scientifically "valid":
fingerprints
dna
tooth mark matching
bullet mark matching
lie detector machines
If you believe one of those is "valid", what evidence would change your mind?
Re: (Score:2)
> Judges and courts are only interested in finality, not justice or facts.
They are interested in following procedure. By following procedure the assumption is that it leads to establishing the "truth". The system assumes that said "truth" is correct and unquestionable as long as procedure has been followed and has very few avenues to challenge an outcome after it has been established.
The assumption that following the procedure leads to the correct outcome is crucial in the legal system since without that assumption it would not be justifiable for the legal system to deprive a per
In many cases never was "science" (Score:2)
The problem is that much of this never was science -- no blind studies, no repeatable research. A high school graduate that spends a decade as a fireman and then attends a one-week course can still become an arson investigator and be allowed to testify at a trial as an expert. This "expert testimony" can result in a person being convicted of murder. We should not consider this person to suddenly be a "scientist" and they should never have been allowed to express their opinions as expert testimony.
Re: (Score:2)
As a jury member potentially fucking someone's life forever I don't want to hear from either of them.
I want facts. Innocent until proven guilty. If the prosecution can't prove beyond a reasonable doubt the person is guilty then I'm defaulting to not guilty. Their experts and scientists can go take a jump in a lake. I'm not voting to ruin someone based on that.
Re: (Score:1)
I had my house burn down due to faulty wiring in a brand new appliance, yet the "investigators" at the fie department spent way, way, way too much time and effort trying to prove that I set the fire intentionally, despite the facts that 1) I was the only one injured in the fire, 2) I had no motive to do so, since I didn't own the house, and my personal possessions, virtually all of which I lost, weren't worth all that much at the time, and 3) the firefighters literally had to drag me bodily out of the hous
It is genuinely horrifying (Score:2)
How there are All these men in positions of power that really really just want to kill people and don't care how they do it and we are all just kind of okay with that.
The problem here isn't changing law with changing science The problem here is these prosecutors and the governor just really want to murder this guy for the sake of murdering him. I don't know if it's because it plays well with the tough on crime crowd or if they just have some kind of sick kink but the evidence in this guy's case is so o
Re: (Score:1)
They need to end plea deals. If you think someone is guilty, take them to trial.
And every forensic lab should have a random 10% of their requests be secret tests of their honesty. Put the liars in jail, and have their default answer be "we can't tell".
When we build a system of incentives that doesn't punish bad behavior, you will get more and more bad behavior. Before they take away qualified immunity from beat cops, they should take it away from government prosecutors.
No, poverty and crime aren't correlated (Score:2)
This is an idea that is widely asserted by many, but the evidence just isn't there. Crime levels 100 years ago in settled communities were far lower, and poverty was far worse, than it is today. Crime rates, on the whole, have been rising consistently since then, with unexplained drops in recent years. Despite this the idea of better material provision for the poor as THE SOLUTION persists, as you demonstrate.
What we need is stable families and communities where people have hope for the future as well as st
Cameron Todd Willingham is not the best example (Score:2)
From what I remember in the Cameron Todd Willingham case, experts testified that the arson science used to convict him was outdated even at the time of his conviction and not decades later when arson science had evolved. The case is a better example of political meddling. Governor Rick Perry used his power to ensure the conviction stood by replacing members of Texas Forensic Science Commission days before it was scheduled to meet about the Willingham case. The commission subsequently cancelled all meetings
Our justice system is just a legal industry (Score:2)
and it is classist and corrupt to boot, indeed, justice for sale is no justice at all. When our jails are full of poor people and rich people are above our laws, there is no hope for any justice at all. This is a pay to play economy, where the rich rule the roost, welcome to our plutocracy.
Re: (Score:2)
> our jails are full of poor people and rich people are above our laws,
When you're a rich star, you can grab the justice system by the
What really chaps my hide is that the rich get golden parachutes for fucking up. Defenders of plutocracy like to talk about the motivational power of money to produce efficiency & invention, but if you get a golden gift basket when you cheat, the "motivation" is clearly F'd up.
Another example is product liability (Score:2)
Lawyers argue that a product is either safe or unsafe, an absolute binary choice
Reality is never simple and binary
Law vs Science (Score:2)
The duality here isn't a duality, it is a misnomer of purpose.
There ought to be NO law that depends on science. For a law that is based on science is destined to be changed when science ("settled science") changes.
Laws ought to be written for purpose, and when those purposes fail, or the law itself fails, the laws are automatically nullified. How many stupid laws are still on the books, because they were short sighted and limited?
I cringe every time someone says "There ought to be a law", because someone do
Trauma is subjective (Score:1)
I will also point out that Trauma is subjective and so must be separated from law. Just because you had trauma in your life is no excuse for your own actions in any definitive way. Some trauma is very real and deep, like obtained by many of our Veterans in War. Some trauma is deserved: such as getting arrested for your own selfish actions. Some amount of trauma is normal growing up from accidents and poor choices. But a great amount of trauma is completely bogus self created snowflake mental stuff. Case
Need to stop "expert shopping" (Score:2)
Expert shopping is where one side or the other cherry-picks experts to fit their target result. The other side may not have the money or time to find a counter expert.
I'm not entirely sure how to prevent it, though. Perhaps require a review by at least 3 random experts rather than a hand-selected expert. Let the court manage the selection via a group independent of the judge on the case.
Past trauma isn't an excuse (Score:1)
Literally millions of people have faced terrible childhoods, war, watching their families murdered, raped, had it happen to them etc. and they don't turn out to be piece of shit murdering criminals. Using the childhood trauma excuse is bullshit.
Re: (Score:2)
The issue wasn't whether they killed their parents, the issue was whether the killing was justified. If the case was tried today, it might be considered justified. That's why the case is being re-examined.
Re: (Score:2)
They murdered their parents for cash. They're lucky they only got life insurance prison.
Too bad we can't put the parents on the stand for the alleged abuse. Being that they got blasted with shotguns n all.
Re: huh? (Score:2)
I get why they killed their dad. Alleged abuse and all that. But why did they kill their mom?
Re: (Score:2)
Because they couldn't get away with killing their dad in front of their mom and leaving her alive to testify. They didn't even dispute that.
Re: huh? (Score:2)
Is there another Kyle Rittenhouse that wasn't acquitted? You obviously didn't watch any of that trial. The chased him, started beating him, and pointed a gun at him. The verdict was the obvious outcome.
Re: (Score:2)
Way to entire the situation half way through. Kyle Rittenhouse was acquitted of the crimes for which he was charged, he was not acquitted of every possible crime.
Re: (Score:2)
" If the case was tried today, it might be considered justified."
Based entirely on what the murderers claimed happened to them previously? It "might be", but why would trying the case today matter?
The question is not whether they were guilty, but rather if their sentence was appropriate. NO WAY would their crime be considered "justified" today.
Re: (Score:2)
I am a firm believer in vigilante justice. However, at the same time I understand it isn't true justice. It's vengeance.
Do you really want a legal system based on vengeance?
Re: (Score:2)
"Do you really want a legal system based on vengeance?"
Why bother when a lynching is just as good, right? Good to hear you're a "firm believer" of that, though it's not surprising.
Re: (Score:2)
Lol, great strawman. Good job going way off topic to call me racist based on nothing! You win!
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah the inclusion of that particular case really weakens to good, solid reasons to omit other junk science like bitemark evidence and shell casings. Childhood trauma is terrible, but there is no question what they did is what they did. Maybe that plays a part in their sentencing or treatment plans post conviction, but at no point should they have not been in prison for some long period of time.
Re: (Score:2)
> [...] but at no point should they have not been in prison for some long period of time.
Exactly that's what Science is challenging today. Your opinion might be justified by some very outdated science or no science at all, but archaic revenge ideas.