Judges are terrible at distinguishing good science from bad. It’s time we stopped asking them to do it.

If you’ve been reading The Watch for a while, the headline above won’t surprise you. But a new law review article by Paul Giannelli, a professor emeritus at Case Western University Law School, shows just how terrible the courts have really been on the issue.

Judges are terrible at distinguishing good science from bad. It’s time we stopped asking them to do it. IStock_28879446_LARGE1472507401

Judges are terrible at distinguishing good science from bad. It’s time we stopped asking them to do it. IStock_28879446_LARGE1472507401

Giannelli, who served on President Barack Obama’s now-disbanded National Commission on Forensic Science, looks at how six forensic fields for which there is little to no supporting scientific research (or in some cases, that scientific research has discredited) — bite-mark comparison, arson, microscopic hair analysis, firearms and toolmark analysis, fingerprint analysis, comparative bullet-lead analysis. These fields vary in scientific credibility and probative value from little to none (bite-mark comparison and bullet-lead analysis) to possibly valuable, though the extent of which is still unproven (fingerprint analysis).

Giannelli’s article sums up the dearth of scientific research in each of these fields, then comments on how the courts have handled challenges to their use in criminal trials. We’ve discussed the story of bite-mark evidence here on numerous occasions. It is arguably the least scientifically credible field of forensics still used, and yet to this day, not a single court in the United States has upheld a challenge to keep it out of evidence. But the courts haven’t done much better with the other fields.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2017/09/28/judges-are-terrible-at-distinguishing-good-science-from-bad-its-time-we-stopped-asking-them-to-do-it/

Judges are terrible at distinguishing good science from bad. It’s time we stopped asking them to do it.

Judges are terrible at distinguishing good science from bad. It’s time we stopped asking them to do it.

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