The CSI Effect

Here is a hypothetical situation.

There has been a murder in the area where you live and eventually they apprehend the suspect. Charges are pressed and eventually you are selected to be a juror in this case.

One lawyer decides to use a forensic animation (like they do in the CSI shows) to recreate the crime and present his facts. The other side has decided to stick with more traditional photos and sketches.

Does the fact that a forensic animation was presented by the one lawyer give him more credibility in your opinion?

I don't necessarily think that just because a lawyer uses forensic animation he is more credible. I think that most of whether or not a lawyer is able to make his case or not would depend upon how well he connected with the jurors, or how much of what he is saying we believe.

There would be some jurors who would probably respond a lot better to crime scenes that have been animated, so that one could actually "see" the crime occuring. Others would just as well have the old fashioned photographs.
I'm not a big technology person, I don't understand how it works and I don't follow well when people explain it to me :shifty:, so I personally would probably be able to understand more from the lawyer who just used the photos.

I chose - I don't know, because the same evidence can either make or

break the case. In most cases police use traditional ways of solving the

case -fingerprints & DNA. And talking to whitnesses.



Technology, of course, helps. Ultimatly it's up to the judge to decide to

either allow this or not. And I'm sure the defendant and his/her attorney

can argue against certain facts. So even if technology is there - evidence

or lack of there of - can make all the difference.

Not sure either way. I think some people would be more willing to believe something presented with newer technology (esp. something visual), but if someone can present the right evidence in the right way, "old methods" would work just as well, if not better, for me. I hope that if I am ever in that situation, that I would look at facts, not technology, to make my decision.

I guess the answer depends on how much the facts agree with the animation. The nice part is that you can see the time-distance relationships that could otherwise be very difficult to imagine, especially when there are several events happening at once.

So, if it is presented in a way that different scenarios were also run to show what could not have happened, then I think it would be more credible to me.

However, if it is just some ficticious story that a lawyer is trying to make up without referencing the facts, then I believe it will have negative impact on the case since it will leave more questions in the jurors' minds.

The alternative CSI effect

I have heard that across the pond that juries are believing that forensics deliver more than they actually do in terms of certainties, because of the CSI show. Could this also cause a drop in the crime rate if people believe from the show that they will always get found out?

Re: The alternative CSI effect

I wish that were the case, but instead I think criminals have become smarter due to watching TV shows like CSI and seeing what kinds of things they need to make sure they do not leave behind. I mean crime seems to be going up here and the cases that go unsolved seem to be more and more because of little evidence.

Re: The alternative CSI effect

I have to admit that I'd probably find the animation more credible just because I have a deeply-ingrained mistrust of people who can't figure out how to turn their computers on. When I go to a doctor's office, I cringe at the manilla folder (folders get lost, hand-written notes are hard to read, easy to spill coffee on, etc). At work, I go ballistic when people leave paper on my desk (send me a freakin' email!). When I'm shopping, I have a lower opinion of the quality of items sold in stores where cashiers key in prices instead of scanning barcodes-- I'm more suspicious of errors, more likely to think the merchandise is 'junk' or 'tchotchke', and heaven forbid they hand-write a receipt or use one of those old-school slidey things on my credit card. I get irked if I can't swipe my debit card.

If first impressions matter, my first impression of a lawyer who used old-style presentations would probably be that he was behind the times, with everything that implies. This would b especially true if the lawyer was for the prosecution. I'd think he was stuck in another, less-enlightened decade.

I'd like to say that I could be swayed with logic and solid evidence, but first blush-- I'm a confessed techno-snob and I'd have more of an affinity with the animated, 'high-tech' presentation. It would probably have to be an amazingly solid case to overcome my knee-jerk reaction.