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Ohio Court Admits Lie Detector Tests As Evidence

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the good-enough-for-maury dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Last month, an Ohio court set a new precedent by allowing polygraph test results to be entered as evidence in a criminal trial. Do lie detectors really belong in the court room? AntiPolygraph.org critiques the polygraph evidence from the this precedential case (Ohio v. Sharma)."

3 of 198 comments (clear)

  1. Lie Dectectors will persist... by bossesjoe · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...as long as people are still searching for some magical way to get the truth out of somebody. Won't happen short of the next fifty years of neurological research.

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    There is no replacement for displacement.
  2. Weight vs admissibility by deblau · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Getting evidence admitted is one thing, but getting a jury to believe it or give it any weight or credibility is something else entirely.

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    This post expresses my opinion, not that of my employer. And yes, IAAL.
    1. Re:Weight vs admissibility by Elemenope · · Score: 5, Insightful

      That's fantastic! That means only people who can't afford better lawyers than the schmucks on TV will be imprisoned, and who cares about them, anyway?

      But, to lose the sarcasm for a moment, most defendant protections in criminal law were developed so as to defend even the indigent, since they are the most vulnerable to unfairness seeing as how their lawyers either suck or are overworked (or both). If a method of obtaining evidence is bad enough that a decently trained lawyer can demonstrate its utter ridiculousness, it does not belong in a courtroom in the first place. The competence of the defendant's lawyer should not be depended upon as the single fail-safe employed to determine whether a person should be deprived of their freedom.

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      All the techniques ever used to make men moral have been themselves thoroughly immoral... (Nietzsche)