Kvadas1

Raegan Kvadas

Mrs. DeBock

English 4 Honors

24 March 2017

Essential Question: Should the judicial system improve the standards of criminal courts?

Working Thesis: The judicial system should must improve the standards of criminal courts.

Refined Thesis: The judicial system should determine if trial standards, evidence admissibility

standards, and jury standards need to be improved.

Service Annotated Bibliography

Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. "Criminal Cases." United States Courts. N.p., n.d.

Web. 20 Mar. 2017.

This article provides a basic understanding of how the judicial process works when a

person is being charged for a crime in court. The article explains each step in a court proceeding,

from the initial process to the sentencing after the verdict has been reached. Each step has a

detailed description of what the step is, who is involved with this part of the trial, and the duties

each participating member has. The article also provides examples of various decisions the

defendant has to make, such as pleading guilty in order to have a plea bargain, as well as

different outcomes for each. The majority of cases plead guilty to avoid going to trial. The article

states that it is up to the prosecutor to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.The defendant is not

responsible for proving innocence. This source simplifies the judicial process, making it easy to

understand and explain.

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American Bar Association. "How Courts Work." How Courts Work | Public Education. N.p.,

n.d.

Web. 20 Mar. 2017.

This article provides a brief background on how a jury is formed and what the jury is

responsible for doing. The article explains the different number of jurors for each type of crime,

ranging from six jurors for civil cases to twelve for criminal cases. The judge will explain the

case to the jurors and the lawyers can ask for potentially biased jurors to be removed. The article

continues on to explain the rules that jurors must follow and other guidelines, including the

ability for jurors to leave written questions for the judge to ask if the judge sees fit. Lawyers are

allowed to object to these questions, as if it was normal proceeding. This article explains how a

normal jury is determined and the selection process.

Brewis, Brian and Michael Stockdale. "Admissibility of Low Template DNA Evidence." Journal

of Criminal Law, vol. 77, no. 2, Apr. 2013, p. 115.

In this article, the main focus is on the admissibility of low template DNA evidence,

which is a mixed DNA profile. A mixed DNA profile contains DNA from various sources,

making it difficult to prove the validity of the evidence. In order for the DNA to be admissible,

the court has to be satisfied that it has a reliable scientific background. An expert may be called

in to testify to how accurate and important the low template DNA is, but the testimony might not

be admissible because it is evaluative, not factual. A court has the ability to allow evaluative
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testimony in the trial as long as it is justified. This article provides an example of how scientific

evidence may be unreliable or inconclusive.

Giannelli, Paul C. "Scientific Evidence in Criminal Prosecutions." Brooklyn Law Review, vol.

75, no. 4, Summer2010, pp. 1137-1152.

This article explains the standards and requirements evidence needs to meet in order to be

admitted as evidence. Certain scientific tests, such as handwriting analysis, bite mark analysis, or

trace hiar analysis lack empirical evidence. This makes it hard to prove the validity of the

evidence, which calls the evidences admissibility into question. The evidence must prove to be

probative and accurate. Human error accounts for some mistakes in the trial, whether it is with

interpretation of data or the testing itself. The article provides recommendations for improving

the standards of admissible evidence in court. This article helps to provide a more in depth look

at what scientific evidence is truly admissible or not.

Jackson, Adam. "Admissibility of Fingerprints Taken on an Unauthorised Device." Journal of

Criminal Law, vol. 77, no. 5, Oct. 2013, p. 376.

In this article, multiple cases are presented to explain the circumstances that determine

whether or not a fingerprint obtained from an unauthorized device is admissible or not. Devices

need to be approved by the Secretary of State, but in one major case, the defendants claim that it

was not. The Supreme Court determined that the fingerprint was admissible and the defendants

remained guilty. Judges also have the power to exclude evidence that may be prejudicial instead
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of probative. At the time of the R v Sang Case, the court could not exclude evidence if it was

improperly obtained. This issue was addressed later on. This article included important

information regarding specific cases where fingerprint evidence may not have been admissible,

but it was used anyway. This shows the shortcomings on the judicial system.

Vidmar, Neil. "Expert Evidence, the Adversary System, and the Jury." American Journal of

Public Health, vol. 95, 2005 Supplement 1, pp. 137-143.

This article refutes the statement that juries are not reliable because jurors are influenced

by the testimony of experts. After a judge explains the difference between direct and

circumstantial evidence, the jurors are ready to hear the testimony. Expert testimony is not

supposed to influence the decision of the jurors. It is supposed to provide background

information to the jurors who might have limited knowledge in the specific area the expert is

testifying to. Studies found that jurors do not blindly accept expert testimony as fact. Recordings

show that jurors use personal knowledge about the evidence, as well as collectively share

information to understand what might have happened. Expert testimony does have the potential

to cause jurors to see other pieces of evidence as trivial, forgetting about them entirely. This

article is informative and better explains the way a jury interprets information that is presented in

court.