Posted on 06/25/2009 9:53:56 AM PDT by Lurking Libertarian
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court said Thursday that criminal defendants have a constitutional right to cross-examine the forensic analysts who prepare laboratory reports on illegal drugs and other evidence used at trial.
The court on Thursday ruled 5-4 for a defendant who was convicted of cocaine trafficking, partly because of crime lab analysis.
Luis Melendez-Diaz challenged lab analysis that confirmed cocaine was in plastic bags found in the car he was riding in. Rather than accept the report, Melendez-Diaz said he should be allowed to question the lab analyst about testing methods, how the evidence was preserved and other issues.
Massachusetts courts rejected his arguments.
Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the high court, said Melendez-Diaz has a constitutional right to confront the lab analyst.
[snip]
The case produced unusual alliances. Scalia attracted the votes of Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, David Souter, John Paul Stevens and Clarence Thomas.
Joining Kennedy in dissent were Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito and Stephen Breyer.
Hmmm, don’t we have a Constitutional right to confront all accusers??? Why isn’t this a 9-0 decision??? Why should a lab rat be exempt from having to defend their accusations???
Seems reasonable to me that one should be able to cross examine the the lab technicians as to procedures. I mean duh.
Now, you say you used the Ajax 9000 flash Spectrometer...is that correct? Why not the Boromir INCLUSIVE all phase Spectrometer? Your honor, is this a technician that knows a ketone from a genome? I think not...
Because Roberts and Alito think the word "conservative" means "the police always win."
Perfectly reasonable line of questioning. They have their experts I have mine.
“Perfectly reasonable line of questioning. They have their experts I have mine.”
Not sure, but I don’t think that this guy was an expert. I haven’t seen anything to indicate it...although, I guess, he might be an expert in cocaine. Advanced warning of testimony by expert witnesses id already covered in discovery. Expert witnesses and rebuttal are already allowed. This is like passing hate crime legislation. We already have the laws on the books for dealing with expert witnesses.
Didn’t any body see My Cousin Vinny?
“This is like passing hate crime legislation. We already have the laws on the books for dealing with expert witnesses.”
Correct, but those that actually performed the testing were not required to be called to court to be questioned about their findings. Of course, every lawyer can find (pay) an “expert” to see things their way.
But, the state of Massivetwoshits said here are the results, you do not have a right to question how they were contrived, who did the testing, etc...
I do not see a problem with having the actual tech answering questions about his findings.
“I do not see a problem with having the actual tech answering questions about his findings.”
Nor do I...but by who? This appears to me to be saying that the defendant gets to directly cross anyone involved...I think the ruling throws open the door to some sort of questioning by the defendant directly, rather than expert on expert, as the law is now structured, which makes sense to me. Just an opinion, but this does not look like a benefit...as far as I can see, this would possibly open the door to endless days of questioning of everyone from the janitor to the lab rats, which might include an untold number of people, by someone who would not necessarily understand the difference between a test tube and a pipettor...that would be in the defendants WORST interests, in my opinion...especially if the defendant is someone who is not as smart as they think they are...(I’m on the defendant’s side on this) by removing the expert testimony protection, you could triple the court’s time, get no benefit and have some very bad results for the defendant...
Here’s the key, if your analysts are spending half of their time being deposed, then you will need twice as many analysts to do the same amount of work.
That’s twice the cost, and YOU are gonna pay for it.
Bringing in the folks from the laboratory is simply going to focus the court for even longer on “what was in the bags” ~ and that is definitely not going to help the perp.
But they aren’t expert witnesses and aren’t questioned as such. That was the guy’s point, some lab says x% of that powder was cocaine but how do we know the lab was right? Do we know they tested the right powder? Do we know their test actually finds cocaine? Do we know the testing equipment was properly cleaned after the previous test? Really all this ruling is doing is making the lab tech part of the expert witness and evidence handling crowd and questionable as such.
I have a simple rule when dealing with LEO: say as little as possible and ask for a lawyer. If a ignorant defendant decides he wants to cross examine a tech without knowledge, then he is already screwing up and I have no mercy for ignorant people! So let him fail and I am all for giving him additional tools with which to fail!
Now, sometimes, like down here in Houston, the crime lab is so bad that it NEEDS an enema! They started losing cases left and right on appeals because the lab was misplacing evidence, crossing evidence, etc... Finally, someone came forward and admitted this! Had the techs been called to court, then they would have had to admit to having lost evidence, crossing evidence, etc...
If getting an innocent person off of charges takes four years, then I am ALL for the extra time! And as you said, most career criminals are NOT going to pull this because it might/probably will backfire unless they KNOW better.
Do we know the testing equipment was properly cleaned after the previous test? Really all this ruling is doing is making the lab tech part of the expert witness and evidence handling crowd and questionable as such.
It is not the why but the who...the defendant has the right to have an expert do all of this...why make it possible for the defendant to do it too? As to the testing properly, what do the lab rats need to do to prove it was done properly? This is why the legal system is such a nightmare...there is too much duplication of law...which was Roberts’ opinion, I believe...and putting a defendant NOT an expert up against an expert makes no sense...
http://www.policeone.com/investigations/articles/122113-Report-criticizes-Houston-crime-lab/
4 Supreme Court justices have apparently never heard of the Houston Police Crime Lab scandal.
They need to be able to do the same thing the cops needs to be able to do, show the evidence chain, that it was properly handled and utilized. They probably already do all the annoying paperwork anyway, now they’re just going to have to present it. It’s not putting the defendant against anybody, it’s questioning the veracity of the presented evidence rather than taking lab results as established guaranteed truth. Remember our system is supposed to be innocent until proven guilty, we err on the side of freeing people. Lab results should be questionable, and in order to question the lab results you need to be able to question the guys who did the work.
We should not be compelled to blindly accept as undisputable fact the results of anything. Most of these labs were set up to provide evidence to generate convictions. Political and prosecutor influence in them is strong. I have a problem with that. Lessons learned from the poor procedures at the FBI Crime Lab should not be forgotten.
If you need a better example of this, our state can give you one. We used to have a head forensic examiner named Fred Zain. His tests convicted hundreds of people. The problem was, he didn’t even have a college degree. Most of tests and testimony were just made up. They were specifically tailored to generate convictions. Prosecutors loved him and specifically requested him to provide testimony at trial. Hundreds of people were sentenced to hard prison time based on contrived testimony. Some were sentenced to life terms when the real forensic evidence actually exonerated them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Zain
If getting an innocent person off of charges takes four years, then I am ALL for the extra time! And as you said, most career criminals are NOT going to pull this because it might/probably will backfire unless they KNOW better.
But you won’t be all for it when you have an extra 5,000 criminals out on bail committing crimes while waiting for day 15,200 of a trial to get him off a charge that may or may not be all that serious anyway, or when they turn loose 2,000 prisoners because of overcrowding...I am not saying they never make a mistake, but at some point you need to make an assumption of competence until the person is proven otherwise...yes, there might be mistakes...I know...but the wheels of justice grind slowly, as they say and too much more and they will halt...the reason they typically don’t want people defending themselves is for time reasons, procedural issues, etc...the backlog in courts is just as lethal at times, by the number of repeat offenses committed while out on another beef...
“We should not be compelled to blindly accept as undisputable fact the results of anything. Most of these labs were set up to provide evidence to generate convictions.”
I’m sorry, I do not have that dark a view of the system...
I have a simple rule when dealing with LEO: say as little as possible and ask for a lawyer.
I’ve been lucky; not too much experience, but you can bet your ass I would never try to show someone in a courtroom how smart I was...the last words of a fool; “I don’t need a GD lawyer, I didn’t do anything.”
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