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Tuesday, September 20th, 2016

White House Report: “Forensic Science in Criminal Courts: Ensuring Scientific Validity of Feature Comparison Methods.”

The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology today released a report entitled “Forensic Science in Criminal Courts: Ensuring Scientific Validity of Feature Comparison Methods.”  You can access the report here.  According to a White House press release, “the study aims to help close the gaps for a number of ‘feature-comparison’ methods — specifically, methods for comparing DNA samples, bitemarks, latent fingerprints, firearm marks, footwear, and hair.”  The report contains a number of recommendations directed at the FBI Laboratory, the Attorney General, and the judiciary as well as the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP).

In cases with feature comparison evidence that was not gathered and evaluated as recommended in the report, the report may support the exclusion of the evidence or provide a fruitful area of cross examination.  It should also help limit the opinions …

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Categories: DNA, expert witnesses, firearms

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Categories: DNA, expert witnesses, firearms

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Tuesday, May 10th, 2016

Judge Rakoff Rejects Proposed Handwriting Expert Testimony

In an opinion released May 6, in the case Almeciga v. Center for Investigative Reporting, 15-cv-4319, SDNY Judge Jed S. Rakoff granted a defense motion to exclude proposed expert handwriting analysis testimony, holding that “handwriting analysis in general is unlikely to meet the admissibility requirements of Federal Rules of Evidence 702.”  The opinion documents the development of handwriting analysis as a forensic field and its history in the courts before analyzing the Daubert and Kumho Tire factors.  See Opinion, 17-43.  The Court concludes that handwriting analysis “bears none of the indicia of science and suggests, at best, a form of subjective expertise,”  Opinion at 26.  “It remains the case,” the Court explains, “that the methodology has not been subject to adequate testing or peer review, that error rates for the task at hand are unacceptably high, and that the field sorely lacks internal controls and standards” and that “as …

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Tuesday, March 29th, 2016

Woe Betide Those Who Park on the Wrong Side of the Street (and those who produce child pornography)

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No relevant opinions today; two summary orders.

In United States v. Grady, Syracuse police noticed that Grady’s car was parked in violation of the city’s odd/even street parking rules.  They approached the car, shone their flashlights inside and saw, in plain view, a bag of crack cocaine on Grady’s lap.  A loaded gun was also found in the car.

Assuming the officers’ approach of the car constituted a stop, the Court (Jacobs, Hall, Lynch, CJJ) held there was reasonable suspicion given the car’s being parked on the wrong side of the street.  Though a car isn’t “parked” if it’s stopped only to load or unload goods or passengers, the officers observed no such activity and the Court held they watched the car for long enough — 10 seconds — before deciding to approach.  “The officers were not required to conduct surveillance long enough to ‘rule out the possibility of …

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Categories: car stop, child pornography, expert witnesses, Fourth Amendment, reasonable suspicion, substantive reasonableness

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Categories: car stop, child pornography, expert witnesses, Fourth Amendment, reasonable suspicion, substantive reasonableness

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Sunday, October 19th, 2008

Expert Tease

United States v. Mejia, No. 05-2856-cr (2d Cir. October 6, 2008) (Jacobs, Parker, Hall, CJJ)

Here, the improper admission of “officer expert” testimony resulted in a new trial.

Background

The defendants were convicted of participating in two drive-by shootings in connection with their membership in the MS-13 gang. One defendant was sentenced to sixty-three years’ imprisonment, the other to sixty.

A significant portion of the evidence against them, however, came from a New York State Police investigator who testified about the structure and organization of MS-13, as well as its “methods and activities, modes of communication and slang.” It turned out however, the officer’s sources for much of this information were suspect, including reports from other law enforcement officers, custodial statements from other gang members, internet research, and wiretaps that he listened to.

The Court’s Ruling

The court of appeals reversed, finding that much of the officer’s testimony was improper.…

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Categories: Crawford, expert witnesses, hearsay, Uncategorized

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Saturday, September 6th, 2008

A Family Affair

United States v. Yannotti, No. 06-5571-cr (2d Cir. September 4, 2008) (Katzmann, Parker, Raggi, CJJ)

Michael Yannotti was one of several Gambino crime family members accused of multiple violent acts – including extortion, loansharking and murder. After a jury trial, he was convicted of a RICO conspiracy, although the only predicates that the jury could agree that he committed were loansharking activities that had taken place eight years or more before he was indicted. The jury did not reach a verdict on a substantive RICO count, which the district court then dismissed on the ground that the government had failed to prove that Yannotti committed any predicate within the five-year statute of limitations. But the court did not dismiss the conspiracy count and, when it sentenced him, based its findings on conduct that the jury had not agreed that the government had proven. Yannotti received twenty years in prison, the …

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Categories: 1B1.2, expert witnesses, RICO, Uncategorized, wiretaps

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