Hittrafficer.com

We all know that DNA plays a critical role in a criminal trial thanks to the things we’ve learned watching court room dramas on television. Nobody, however, really talks about the witnesses testifying on such evidence.

A trial is actually a fairly simple procedure. The law sets for the elements that must be proved. The parties then argue their sides of each issue. Problems arise, however, when the subjects being argued over get complex.

When things get complex, expert witnesses are introduced to a trial. They have one duty. They must explain complicated things in simple terms you and I can understand if we are on the jury. A few examples will help.

Let’s assume we have a case involving a traffic accident. The sides might argue who was at fault. Experts might be called to testify in regard to the speed of the cars at the time of the accident, which had right of way and so on.

As we’ve all seen on television, experts play an important role in criminal cases. They testify regarding evidence and what it shows. The classic example is DNA evidence wherein the identity of a person is associated with the evidence offered.

While experts play critical roles in lawsuits of all types, they don’t always have the impact you might expect. Why? Well, experts tend to cancel each other out if lawyers aren’t careful. One case in particular showed how this can happen.

The battle of experts in the Simpson trial was classic. The prosecution experts testified Simpson’s DNA was on various evidence, but the defense testified nobody could say how it got there. The jury ignored the DNA and acquitted him.

In more and more cases, a battle of the expert is what ultimately occurs. The jury ends up either believing one or just ignoring both sides. This somewhat defeats the purpose of having experts if you think about it.

The role played by an expert in a trial is still critical even where the testimony of multiple experts may confuse things a bit. Some issues are simply to complex to address in any other way.