Criminology AC 3.1: Examine information for validity (15 marks)
Validity is the extent to which information of sources is reliable and valid when examining
information, within criminal cases such as: Evidence, which can be in the form of physical,
testimonial and expert; Trial transcripts, giving information of what has been said in the trial;
Media reports, the way they tend to take control of the case and exaggerate events or
defaming suspects/victims; Judgements, which can be court precedents; and Law reports,
giving accounts of why the judge decided that way of sentencing.
Evidence
Evidence is the material placed before a Court for the purpose of assisting a Judge to reach
a decision in the matter. A Judge's decision is limited to the evidence placed before them;
therefore, it is important that a party provide as much relevant valid evidence as possible to
support their case. Physical evidence is normally valid if transferred, stored and analysed
correctly by personnel. The SPS vet the evidence to check that it passes the ‘Evidential test’
of the Full Code Test. The validity of testimonial evidence can be affected by many things
like: mistaken identity (which can be seen in the Innocence Project findings), memory
erosion, leading questions, discussion of events with others (the findings of this can be seen
in the Loftus and Palmer study), weapon focus, and the interpretation of events. With expert
evidence, it is generally regarded as having good validity, as they should be objective and
draw on evidence of years of experience. However, this isn’t guaranteed. Experts can make
mistakes, which could be a concern for their reputation.
Jeremy Bamber- In 1986, Jeremy Bamber, 24, was jailed for life for killing his adoptive
parents, adoptive sister and her 2 six-year-old sons at their farmhouse in Essex. He was
sentenced to a minimum of 25 years, and has never been released, but still protests his
innocence. There is much evidence that has been unearthed since the original trial, to
suggest that the accuracy of the guilty verdict was not valid and that Bamber was innocent.
However, the circumstances, that support a guilty verdict and indicates the conviction was
valid include the key evidence of the silencer. Firstly, it was said Sheila wasn’t the killer after
a silencer was found in the gun cupboard that fit the murder weapon that also contained red
paint or blood. This caused many problems for Bamber, because if the gun had the silencer
on it would have been too big for Sheila to kill herself, suggesting there must have been
another shooter. This was supported by the fact that the blood found in the silencer
contained AK1 enzyme that was found in Sheila’s blood, so she couldn’t have killed herself
and then put the silencer back into the cupboard. This evidence points to a different killer.
This theory was pushed further when Bamber’s ex-girlfriend testified against him, and told
the police that he had said he was going to murder his family by hiring a hitman. However,
the validity of this testimony can be questioned, as she was angry at Bamber at the time
(previously she had tried to smother and kill him). So if she was willing to show this
aggression, it is likely she would false testify, so is overall unreliable. But from this the police
found a motive for Bamber to commit the crime, which links to bias from the police because
if his whole family were dead, he would be the sole inheritor of all money and the house.
This allowed the police to put together a theory together that Bamber could have biked to the
crime scene and back before making the police phone call to avoid detection. This evidence
points to the theory that the conviction against Bamber is valid and that he is guilty. On the
other hand, much evidence points to Bamber being innocent, pointing to his guilty verdict not
being valid. With the circumstances that the police initially believed that Shelia had
committed the murders due to her having schizophrenia and recently being released from
hospital. Shelia believed that her sons were the spawn of the devil, but her schizophrenia
episode was often triggered by the idea of her sons being taken away from her. The day
before the murders, Bamber’s parents told Shelia that she should give custody to them, so
she didn’t have to worry about having to look after them, causing a huge argument according
, to Bamber, meaning that the validity of this testimony can be questioned. A key part of the
trial was a silencer, found by the family. However, upon later inspection of police records it
was discovered that the family found another silencer a month earlier, meaning that two
silencers were found, (nobody was aware which was used or when it was found, so this
evidence was not current and could have been contaminated). The silencer said to be too
big for Shelia to kill herself with was used in court, and it was said to be convenient that the
prosecution only used the silencer that suggests there was another killer. There was also an
issue of how the family found the silencer as the police looked in the gun cupboard after the
crime and no silencers were found, risking contamination of key evidence, weakening the
validity of key information. Upon ballistic testing it was found that there would have been no
need to use a silencer as the murder weapon was a .22 pistol that naturally makes less
noise than other guns. This would be consistent with the idea that Sheila could have shot
herself after moving upstairs without the police hearing the gun go off. Also, the currency of
evidence used in the trial is unknown as, there was red paint/blood found on the silencer that
was said to come from a scratch on the mantle. However, in the original scene of crime
photos, the photographer didn’t notice the scratch on the mantelpiece and there was no
debris on the floor. Suggesting the scratch was put there after the crime occurred, pointing to
Shelia as the killer. Ultimately there is a lot of evidence on this case, indicating the verdict
reached was invalid. From Sheila’s unpredictable mental state, contradicting police reports
and inaccurate evidence from the silencer, it is to be questioned whether Jeremy Bamber
shouldn’t have actually been found guilty and whether under the circumstances the case has
validity.
Sally Clark- Sally Clark was convicted of the murder of her first two children in 1999. The
circumstances of this were the death of her first child, aged just under 3 months, that was
originally treated as natural causes, or sudden infant death syndrome. But when her second
child died a year later, it was treated as suspicious. When a home office pathologist revisited
the first death, he deemed it suspicious too, so there could have been a level of bias brought
into this opinion. Sir Roy Meadows evidence lacks validity and led to what was considered a
miscarriage of justice due to his ‘simply astonishing’ mistakes with regards to the statistical
evidence, claiming there was 1 in 73 million chances of two children in the same household,
dying of natural causes at their age. However, this statistical evidence was not accurate so
isn’t valid, and instead it was his opinion; but the jury accepted his evidence because he was
the medical expert, so they assumed his opinion was valid, reliable and trustworthy. This
shows that a level of bias was brought into the verdict in trusting an opinion of an expert, and
not accurate current evidence; showing how the verdict reached was not valid and Clark was
in fact innocent. Sally Clark was released from prison after three years, following an appeal
hearing that deemed her conviction to be unsafe. In this case the use of expert testimony
was extremely invalid due to its inaccuracy and the weight it held in front of a jury. The court
now says that in the future no prosecutions should be brought when medical experts are in
dispute and there is no other cogent evidence. Emphasising how they can’t be trusted as the
courts will now not solely except them.
The piece of information that can be tested for validity is eye witness testimony (EWT). The
use of EWT to provide evidence may lack validity because it relies entirely on memory recall
which can have its faults. The impact of this miscarriage of justice where someone is falsely
charged. Memory can be affected by different factors such as stress, pressure, confusion,
the environment and alcohol/drugs. An eyewitness may also be influence, for example by
leading questions or post event discussion with others. Unconscious transference can also
mean the eye witness makes mistakes therefore they are invalid. This was seen in the case
of Ronald Cotton who was falsely imprisoned for 10 years.
Trial Transcripts
Validity is the extent to which information of sources is reliable and valid when examining
information, within criminal cases such as: Evidence, which can be in the form of physical,
testimonial and expert; Trial transcripts, giving information of what has been said in the trial;
Media reports, the way they tend to take control of the case and exaggerate events or
defaming suspects/victims; Judgements, which can be court precedents; and Law reports,
giving accounts of why the judge decided that way of sentencing.
Evidence
Evidence is the material placed before a Court for the purpose of assisting a Judge to reach
a decision in the matter. A Judge's decision is limited to the evidence placed before them;
therefore, it is important that a party provide as much relevant valid evidence as possible to
support their case. Physical evidence is normally valid if transferred, stored and analysed
correctly by personnel. The SPS vet the evidence to check that it passes the ‘Evidential test’
of the Full Code Test. The validity of testimonial evidence can be affected by many things
like: mistaken identity (which can be seen in the Innocence Project findings), memory
erosion, leading questions, discussion of events with others (the findings of this can be seen
in the Loftus and Palmer study), weapon focus, and the interpretation of events. With expert
evidence, it is generally regarded as having good validity, as they should be objective and
draw on evidence of years of experience. However, this isn’t guaranteed. Experts can make
mistakes, which could be a concern for their reputation.
Jeremy Bamber- In 1986, Jeremy Bamber, 24, was jailed for life for killing his adoptive
parents, adoptive sister and her 2 six-year-old sons at their farmhouse in Essex. He was
sentenced to a minimum of 25 years, and has never been released, but still protests his
innocence. There is much evidence that has been unearthed since the original trial, to
suggest that the accuracy of the guilty verdict was not valid and that Bamber was innocent.
However, the circumstances, that support a guilty verdict and indicates the conviction was
valid include the key evidence of the silencer. Firstly, it was said Sheila wasn’t the killer after
a silencer was found in the gun cupboard that fit the murder weapon that also contained red
paint or blood. This caused many problems for Bamber, because if the gun had the silencer
on it would have been too big for Sheila to kill herself, suggesting there must have been
another shooter. This was supported by the fact that the blood found in the silencer
contained AK1 enzyme that was found in Sheila’s blood, so she couldn’t have killed herself
and then put the silencer back into the cupboard. This evidence points to a different killer.
This theory was pushed further when Bamber’s ex-girlfriend testified against him, and told
the police that he had said he was going to murder his family by hiring a hitman. However,
the validity of this testimony can be questioned, as she was angry at Bamber at the time
(previously she had tried to smother and kill him). So if she was willing to show this
aggression, it is likely she would false testify, so is overall unreliable. But from this the police
found a motive for Bamber to commit the crime, which links to bias from the police because
if his whole family were dead, he would be the sole inheritor of all money and the house.
This allowed the police to put together a theory together that Bamber could have biked to the
crime scene and back before making the police phone call to avoid detection. This evidence
points to the theory that the conviction against Bamber is valid and that he is guilty. On the
other hand, much evidence points to Bamber being innocent, pointing to his guilty verdict not
being valid. With the circumstances that the police initially believed that Shelia had
committed the murders due to her having schizophrenia and recently being released from
hospital. Shelia believed that her sons were the spawn of the devil, but her schizophrenia
episode was often triggered by the idea of her sons being taken away from her. The day
before the murders, Bamber’s parents told Shelia that she should give custody to them, so
she didn’t have to worry about having to look after them, causing a huge argument according
, to Bamber, meaning that the validity of this testimony can be questioned. A key part of the
trial was a silencer, found by the family. However, upon later inspection of police records it
was discovered that the family found another silencer a month earlier, meaning that two
silencers were found, (nobody was aware which was used or when it was found, so this
evidence was not current and could have been contaminated). The silencer said to be too
big for Shelia to kill herself with was used in court, and it was said to be convenient that the
prosecution only used the silencer that suggests there was another killer. There was also an
issue of how the family found the silencer as the police looked in the gun cupboard after the
crime and no silencers were found, risking contamination of key evidence, weakening the
validity of key information. Upon ballistic testing it was found that there would have been no
need to use a silencer as the murder weapon was a .22 pistol that naturally makes less
noise than other guns. This would be consistent with the idea that Sheila could have shot
herself after moving upstairs without the police hearing the gun go off. Also, the currency of
evidence used in the trial is unknown as, there was red paint/blood found on the silencer that
was said to come from a scratch on the mantle. However, in the original scene of crime
photos, the photographer didn’t notice the scratch on the mantelpiece and there was no
debris on the floor. Suggesting the scratch was put there after the crime occurred, pointing to
Shelia as the killer. Ultimately there is a lot of evidence on this case, indicating the verdict
reached was invalid. From Sheila’s unpredictable mental state, contradicting police reports
and inaccurate evidence from the silencer, it is to be questioned whether Jeremy Bamber
shouldn’t have actually been found guilty and whether under the circumstances the case has
validity.
Sally Clark- Sally Clark was convicted of the murder of her first two children in 1999. The
circumstances of this were the death of her first child, aged just under 3 months, that was
originally treated as natural causes, or sudden infant death syndrome. But when her second
child died a year later, it was treated as suspicious. When a home office pathologist revisited
the first death, he deemed it suspicious too, so there could have been a level of bias brought
into this opinion. Sir Roy Meadows evidence lacks validity and led to what was considered a
miscarriage of justice due to his ‘simply astonishing’ mistakes with regards to the statistical
evidence, claiming there was 1 in 73 million chances of two children in the same household,
dying of natural causes at their age. However, this statistical evidence was not accurate so
isn’t valid, and instead it was his opinion; but the jury accepted his evidence because he was
the medical expert, so they assumed his opinion was valid, reliable and trustworthy. This
shows that a level of bias was brought into the verdict in trusting an opinion of an expert, and
not accurate current evidence; showing how the verdict reached was not valid and Clark was
in fact innocent. Sally Clark was released from prison after three years, following an appeal
hearing that deemed her conviction to be unsafe. In this case the use of expert testimony
was extremely invalid due to its inaccuracy and the weight it held in front of a jury. The court
now says that in the future no prosecutions should be brought when medical experts are in
dispute and there is no other cogent evidence. Emphasising how they can’t be trusted as the
courts will now not solely except them.
The piece of information that can be tested for validity is eye witness testimony (EWT). The
use of EWT to provide evidence may lack validity because it relies entirely on memory recall
which can have its faults. The impact of this miscarriage of justice where someone is falsely
charged. Memory can be affected by different factors such as stress, pressure, confusion,
the environment and alcohol/drugs. An eyewitness may also be influence, for example by
leading questions or post event discussion with others. Unconscious transference can also
mean the eye witness makes mistakes therefore they are invalid. This was seen in the case
of Ronald Cotton who was falsely imprisoned for 10 years.
Trial Transcripts
