Slashdot Mirror
Prosecutor Loses Case For Citing Wikipedia
Hugh Pickens writes "The Philippine Daily Inquirer reports on a recent case where the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) lost an appeal after seeking to impeach the testimony of a defendant's expert witness by citing an article from Wikipedia. In her brief, the defendant said 'the authority, alluded to by oppositor-appellant, the "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Health Disorders DSM-IV-TR," was taken from an Internet website commonly known as Wikipedia,' and argued that Wikipedia itself contains a disclaimer saying it 'makes no guarantee of validity.' The court in finding for the defendant said in its decision that it found 'incredible ... if not a haphazard attempt, on the part of the (OSG) to impeach an expert witness, with, as pointed out by (the defendant) unreliable information. This is certainly unacceptable evidence, nothing short of a mere allegation totally unsupported by authority.'"
who was actually correct about the facts of the matter?
sight unseen, i bet Wikipedia.
"If still these truths be held to be
Self evident."
-Edna St. Vincent Millay
but I wouldn't cite it in court! What a moron.
It's crowdsourced knowledge, which is likely correct in many cases but is still subject to errors and abuse from bored teenagers and people with an agenda.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.
While the Wikipedia site is *likely* to be true. Likely to have been written by an expert and an authority on the subject. There is absolutely no guarantee of it's verity or authority.
For legal argument, the site would be an excellent place to start. It is easy to search, and the articles are written in quick scannable ways which would make research fast and quick. BUT, that research should *LEAD* to legally sound authority and more complete argument on any topic.
It would be horrible, horrible for the law to place Wikipedia on the pedestal of authority, and it would be bad for the public which wikipedia only exists because of its structure.
The judge proclaimed "[citation needed]"
... firm and I've seen this done, uncontested
I'm not sure what's sadder, that someone I work with has done this, or that the other side doesn't even understand how bad it is...
Yeah, the wording is confusing.
"In her brief, the ex-wife said “the authority, alluded to by oppositor-appellant, the ‘Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Health Disorders DSM-IV-TR,’ was taken from an Internet website commonly known as Wikipedia.”"
It makes it sound as though the DSM only exists in the fairytale land of Wikipedia. Unless he SAID "from this article about the DSM on wikipedia", in which case he's just a dumbass
Your statement is completely true, but the smilie face at the end makes me feel as though you posted it as a joke, or feeling smug, by perhaps implying that following your solution would "cheat" the would-be checkers into believing the otherwise "unreliable" wikipedia information would suddenly become "reliable" by citing it's source instead of the article itself.
In fact, the above statement is exactly how things are supposed to be, no joking or smugness. Wikipedia in and of itself is NOT a realiable source, does NOT try to be a reliable source, does NOT pretend to be a reliable source, and does NOT want anyone assuming it is a reliable source. It's the sources it cites which, depending on the circumstances, MAY constitute a reliable source. This is why any researches is supposed to do EXACTLY what you described, and it is not cheating or circumventing, but the actual legitimate way to do research when using Wikipedia.
No, a print edition would not be better. In order to use evidence to impeach an expert, the evidence must be recognized as more reliable than the expert's own opinion. The only ways to demonstrate this are to have the court independently recognize the inherent authority of the source ("judicial notice", uncommon in this context), or for the expert himself to acknowledge the validity of the source, or to convince the court that your source is more reliable than the expert. No encyclopedia would ever meet these standards. Ever. To even consider that it might is ridiculous.
I am a geek attorney, but not your geek attorney unless you've already retained me. This is not legal advice.
An annulment is not a divorce. A divorce is the dissolution of a marriage, an annulment is a declaration that the marriage was invalid. This has all sorts of legal consequences. From TFA, "In annulment cases, the OSG enters an appearance in court to ensure there is no collusion between husband and wife when they seek to annul their union or to see to it that the nullification of a marriage is based on valid grounds."
If I cited wikipedia as my source for stating that copper's atomic number is 29, why is my source not credible?
You shouldn't need to cite that, it's common knowledge. It's in any elementary chemistry text book.
You don't cite Wikipedia because it's not a primary source. Wikipedia doesn't generate any new knowledge (note WP:NOR) so everything in Wikipedia comes from somewhere else. You should, therefore, quote the somewhere it came from.
Yes, but citing the source generally means you go out and read the source to base your claim on, or at least to verify that the summary is valid. The GP (based on the smiley), is speaking about cheating the system by citing the wikipedia source, without taking that extra step to actually verify for himself that the source validates the article (which isn't always the case on wikipedia, though they try).
The summary is clear as mud, but it sounds like the prosecutors made reference to the DSM. Why refer to the wikipedia article on it? The DSM itself is the authority on psychological disorders. If wiki quoted the DSM correctly, then it is likely correct on the matter. So why did the prosecutor cite wiki, and not the actual authoritative source that wiki cites? Stupid.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton