Papers by Mehera San Roque
Australian Journal of Forensic Sciences, 2015
The paper is a submission of Australian criminal procedure and evidence academics opposing the NS... more The paper is a submission of Australian criminal procedure and evidence academics opposing the NSW Government's proposed changes to the right to silence. These changes (later implemented) allow an adverse inference to be drawn from a suspect's failure to provide information during police interview. The submission opposes the changes on the grounds that it has not been shown that they are required, and also that they are exceedingly complex and are likely to create practical problems both in the police station and in the courts. The submission notes how similar changes in England are generally viewed as creating more problems than they have solved.
Law Text Culture, 2020
This essay introduces a large and diverse special issue on 'The Acoustics of Justice: Law, Listen... more This essay introduces a large and diverse special issue on 'The Acoustics of Justice: Law, Listening, Sound'. Until recently the acoustic dimensions of law and justice were not a major concern in the academy, either in self-consciously legal scholarship, or elsewhere. Things are changing, as indeed the size of this collection suggests. And our hope is that the work gathered here will go some way to addressing this deficit. Nevertheless, this introduction does not attempt to theorise how. Though the collection was conceived in 2019, it was mostly produced since the arrival of COVID-19. And we are tired. We have been working from home too long; or rather our homes have been 'requisitioned' for work. Our teaching loads have increased and the teaching itself rapidly onlined. All while separated from loved ones and attempting to school or otherwise entertain our kids at home. And we are the lucky ones. This introduction is, in a sense, an anti-introduction, or a non-introduction then: a strategic withdrawal of labour that opens the door onto the collection but offers little in the way of guidance to readers once they step through. Whether that is generous or irresponsible we leave to readers to decide.
Melbourne University Law Review, 2019
The ability to confront witnesses through cross-examination is conventionally understood as the m... more The ability to confront witnesses through cross-examination is conventionally understood as the most powerful means of testing evidence, and one of the most important features of the adversarial trial. Popularly feted, cross-examination was immortalised in John Henry Wigmore’s (1863–1943) famous dictum that it is ‘the greatest legal engine ever invented for the discovery of truth’. Through a detailed review of the cross-examination of a forensic scientist, in the first scientifically-informed challenge to latent fingerprintevidence in Australia, this article offers a more modest assessment of its value. Drawing upon mainstream scientific research and advice, and contrasting scientific knowledge with answers obtained through cross-examination of a latent fingerprint examiner, it illuminates a range of serious and apparently unrecognised limitations with our current procedural arrangements. The article explains the limits of cross-examination and the difficulties trial and appellate j...
This article is a resource for lawyers approaching the cross-examination of forensic scientists (... more This article is a resource for lawyers approaching the cross-examination of forensic scientists (and other expert witnesses). Through a series of examples, it provides information that will assist lawyers to explore the probative value of forensic science evidence, in particular forensic comparison evidence, on the voir dire and at trial. Questions covering a broad range of potential topics and issues, including relevance, the expression of results, codes of conduct, limitations and errors, are supplemented with detailed commentary and references to authoritative reports and research on the validity and reliability of forensic science techniques.
The International Journal of Evidence & Proof, 2010
hat happens to a country under constant surveillance? The recent decision in Atkins v The Queen p... more hat happens to a country under constant surveillance? The recent decision in Atkins v The Queen provides a partial answer. 1 The sheer availability of images seems to be driving decisions about their admissibility and use as identification evidence. Confronted with CCTV recordings associated with criminal activities English courts have been reluctant to restrict their admission or impose limitations on the scope or form of incriminating opinion derived from them. Although the Court of Appeal decision in Atkins v The Queen is concerned primarily with the way in which an opinion derived from CCTV images was expressed, the decision exposes jurisprudential weakness and continuing problems with photo comparison and facial-mapping evidence.
… Journal of Evidence …, 2010
... 13 [2003] 1 Cr App R 21. 14 [2004] EWCA Crim 1639. 15 Dean Atkins and Michael Atkins v The Qu... more ... 13 [2003] 1 Cr App R 21. 14 [2004] EWCA Crim 1639. 15 Dean Atkins and Michael Atkins v The Queen [2009] EWCA Crim 1876 at [13] (italics added). ... See also R v Abnett [2006] EWCA Crim 3320, [2006] All ER 244 at [14], [20]. 16 Compare G. Edmond, 'Pathological Science? ...
Social Science Research Network, 2020
This essay introduces a large and diverse special issue on 'The Acoustics of Justice: Law... more This essay introduces a large and diverse special issue on 'The Acoustics of Justice: Law, Listening, Sound'. Until recently the acoustic dimensions of law and justice were not a major concern in the academy, either in self-consciously legal scholarship, or elsewhere. Things are changing, as indeed the size of this collection suggests. And our hope is that the work gathered here will go some way to addressing this deficit. Nevertheless, this introduction does not attempt to theorise how. Though the collection was conceived in 2019, it was mostly produced since the arrival of COVID-19. And we are tired. We have been working from home too long; or rather our homes have been 'requisitioned' for work. Our teaching loads have increased and the teaching itself rapidly onlined. All while separated from loved ones and attempting to school or otherwise entertain our kids at home. And we are the lucky ones. This introduction is, in a sense, an anti-introduction, or a non-introduction then: a strategic withdrawal of labour that opens the door onto the collection but offers little in the way of guidance to readers once they step through. Whether that is generous or irresponsible we leave to readers to decide.
Sydney Law Review, 2014
On 16 December 2005 the High Court granted the Minister for Immigration, Multicultural and Indige... more On 16 December 2005 the High Court granted the Minister for Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs special leave to appeal from a decision of the Full Court of the Federal Court, QAAH of 2004 v Minister for Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs ( ...
... Leigh Leigh's case is not unique. Janine Balding and Anita Cobby are other p... more ... Leigh Leigh's case is not unique. Janine Balding and Anita Cobby are other public victims of the extremes of a male culture which sanctions objectifying women. In many homes, in playgrounds, in advertisements and in media stories women are treated as things, not people. ...
Sydney Law Review, 2011
Over the last two decades there has been significant growth in the number of cases involving voic... more Over the last two decades there has been significant growth in the number of cases involving voice comparison and identification evidence based on audio surveillance technologies. Courts have generally been open to this evidence, as well as allowing juries to undertake their own comparisons. Overall, decisions on the admissibility of this evidence feature a strong resistance to attempts to require some assessment of the reliability of voice comparisons and an over-reliance on traditional features of the adversarial trial, including directions and warnings, to expose and address weaknesses in this evidence. This article focuses on two cases where the jury was invited to compare voices speaking across two different languages. Drawing on empirical research concerned with the validity and reliability of lay voice comparison, this article outlines the dangers associated with juries engaging in cross-lingual voice identification and comparison. It argues that if courts are to take serious...
Sydney Law Review, 2014
This article commences a feminist critique of the unjust enrichment liability model that is infor... more This article commences a feminist critique of the unjust enrichment liability model that is informed by a modern taxonomic approach to private law. Together with other legal categories — such as contract, tort, and equity — unjust enrichment is an independent source of rights and obligations. However, unlike areas of private law that have been the subject of sustained feminist analysis and critique, there has been little attention paid to understanding the pattern and impact of gender in unjust enrichment reasoning. This article offers some first steps towards filling that gap. We explore the concept of enrichment, evaluating from a feminist perspective how the tests of enrichment are constructed and applied, paying particular attention to the ways in which unjust enrichment responds to the provision of domestic services and care. Our tentative conclusion is that the gendered norms that operate in other areas of private law, such as torts, do not manifest in unjust enrichment in the...
PLoS ONE, 2021
Automatic facial recognition technology (AFR) is increasingly used in criminal justice systems ar... more Automatic facial recognition technology (AFR) is increasingly used in criminal justice systems around the world, yet to date there has not been an international survey of public attitudes toward its use. In Study 1, we ran focus groups in the UK, Australia and China (countries at different stages of adopting AFR) and in Study 2 we collected data from over 3,000 participants in the UK, Australia and the USA using a questionnaire investigating attitudes towards AFR use in criminal justice systems. Our results showed that although overall participants were aligned in their attitudes and reasoning behind them, there were some key differences across countries. People in the USA were more accepting of tracking citizens, more accepting of private companies’ use of AFR, and less trusting of the police using AFR than people in the UK and Australia. Our results showed that support for the use of AFR depends greatly on what the technology is used for and who it is used by. We recommend vendors...
All Australian jurisdictions regulate the admission of expert opinion evidence. The rules focus o... more All Australian jurisdictions regulate the admission of expert opinion evidence. The rules focus on ‘specialised knowledge’, the existence of a ‘field’, and ‘training, study or experience’.[footnote* In most Australian jurisdictions the admission of expert opinion evidence is governed by s 79 of the Uniform Evidence Law (‘UEL’): see Evidence Act 1995 (Cth); Evidence Act 2011 (ACT); Evidence Act 1995 (NSW); Evidence Act 2001 (Tas); Evidence Act 2008 (Vic); Evidence Act 2004 (NI); Evidence (National Uniform Legislation) Act 2011 (NT). The common law continues in Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia. See Kristy Martire and Gary Edmond, ‘Rethinking Expert Opinion Evidence’ (2017) 40 Melbourne University Law Review 967; Gary Edmond and Kristy Martire, ‘Knowing Experts? Section 79, Forensic Science Evidence and the Limits of “Training, Study or Experience”’ in Andrew Roberts and Jeremy Gans (eds), Critical Perspectives on the Uniform Evidence Law (Federation Press, 2017) 80.] ...
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Papers by Mehera San Roque