UK Police Told To Use Wikipedia When Preparing For Court 180
Half-pint HAL tips news of UK prosecution lawyers who are instructing police to study information on Wikipedia when preparing to give expert testimony in court.
"Mike Finn, a weaponry specialist and expert witness in more than 100 cases, told industry magazine Police Review: 'There was one case in a Midlands force where police officers asked me to write a report about a martial art weapon. The material they gave me had been printed out from Wikipedia. The officer in charge told me he was advised by the CPS to use the website to find out about the weapon and he was about to present it in court. I looked at the information and some of it had substance and some of it was completely made up.' Mr. Finn, a former Metropolitan Police and City of London officer and Home Office adviser, added that he has heard of at least three other cases where officers from around the country have been advised by the CPS to look up evidence on Wikipedia."
Re:CPS? (Score:5, Informative)
Crown Prosecution Service (American's can call this a district attorney, they're the prosecution)
Feel free to mod me up.
Ironically, you can look this up at http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/CPS [wiktionary.org]. I also knew this before having to look it up, so I can say it's actually accurate.
Re:what makes this a problem? (Score:3, Informative)
Expert witnesses are rarely asked for book facts. Experts (at least in our courts) are usually asked for their opinion on a specific matter.
Re:They would be better off using snopes.com. (Score:4, Informative)
Citation [snopes.com]
Re:Heh... (Score:2, Informative)
You said:
I find it hard to take seriously anybody who uses the word "testilying".
From TFA:
. . . lying intended to convict the guilty--in particular, lying to evade the consequences of the exclusionary rule -- is so common and so accepted in some jurisdictions that the police themselves have come up with a name for it: "testilying."