Essay on Childrens Testimony

Today?s legal system states that children between the ages two to six should not be held liable for criminal actions. There are several developmental characteristics that support this claim. These characteristics come from biological, cognitive, and psychosocial areas. For those who are religious, one can also find spiritual support in Scripture that validates young children cannot reason as older children or adults can. Until a child?s brain matures, it is likely that a child may act impulsively and could commit a crime without reasoning beforehand that he or she

Research shows that the human mind is not like a tape recorder, we neither record events exactly as we see them, nor recall them like a tape that has been rewound. Instead, witness memory is like any other evidence at a crime scene; it must be preserved carefully, or it can be contaminated. A case I would like to mention is the Calvin Willis Case. One night in 1982, three young girls were sleeping alone in a Shreveport, Louisiana home when a man in cowboy boots came into the house and raped the oldest girl, who was Ten years old. When police started to investigate the rape, the three girls all remembered the attack differently. One police report said the Ten year old victim didn’t see her attacker’s face. Another report which wasn’t introduced at trial said she identified Calvin Willis, who lived in the neighbourhood. The girl’s mother testified at trial that neighbours had mentioned Willis’s name when discussing who might have committed the crime. The victim testified that she was shown photos and told to pick the man without a full beard. She testified that she didn’t pick anyone, police said she picked Willis. Willis was convicted by a jury and sentenced to life in prison. In 2003, DNA testing proved Willis’ innocence and he was released. He had served nearly Twenty Two years in prison for a crime he didn’t

Michele Deith said “Children brains are still under developed, then why tired them as an adult in court”. A child being tried as an adult effect their lives in many ways. The message of loss hope builds up in their minds prompting the idea that they can’t make mistakes. Because they fear they will always be tired unfairly. Also, being in prison for a life time for an ignorant mistake will make them more likely to commit more crimes. Crime records as a juvenile holds less than an adult record. Majority of juvenile cases are only classified as minor offensives. While, some cases may be different because of the crime, children should still be recognized for learning and should be held responsible however, not on an adult level.

Factors such as misinformation and eyewitness talk can easily affect the memory of eyewitnesses and therefore affect their testimony_. Evidence which is usually provided during eyewitness memory reports helps to determine the guilt or innocence of a perpetrator in a criminal proceeding_. With the help of many basic psychological and neuroscience studies, it has been indicated that because memory is a reconstructive process it is likely to be influenced and vulnerable to change and misinformation_. Due to memory being vulnerable, any minor memory misrepresentation can have severe consequences when used in the courtroom_. Memory errors when regarding the identification of a perpetrator of a specific crime has been focused on during research

However, factors such as interactions with other witnesses and the influence of media outlets cannot be accounted for. In addition, the small sample size of 13 participants means the results are not as reliable and cannot be generalised to the population at large. One possible factor which may influence the results is that witnesses were within close proximity to the events which transpired which can influence memory as well as not being applicable to many crimes whereby the witnesses only see part of the crime or a shadow of the perpetrator. An alternative explanation would be that flashbulb memory was at work here.

Children being tried as adult’s unfortunately is not a new practice in the U.S. or one that is looked down upon. In the United States there are thousands of underage children that get tried in criminal court each year. Countless of studies show that trying children as adults does not benefit neither the child nor the society. This essay will show that trying a child as an adult is unconstitutional and violates the criminal law conduct. This essay will carful define the terms regarding children in the criminal justice system, to fully understand the situation.

Testimonies from children who have experienced sexual assault can mean the difference between guilty and not guilty verdicts for the defendant. Often times child victims are psychologically and even physically harmed jeopardizing their statements during the trial. There are a number of reasons for children to be unable to give full accounts of what has occurred to them. For the purpose of protecting child victims and making sure they are heard the courts have implemented innovations that make testifying less traumatic for children and allow for a more accurate description of the assault. Hearsay testimonies are one of the innovations that have been shown to give child victims of sexual assault the chance to be fully heard. Victims directly

Jo’ana Meyer is a sociologist at the Rutger’s University who has carried out valuable research on children’s susceptibility to leading and suggestive interviews in the context of court testimony. She has discussed the effects of stress, prompting and imagination on children’s memories and powers of recall. She stresses the importance of Milgram’s research and points out that children are likely to obey authority at an even higher level than the adults in Milgrim’s experiments. Meyer has made important suggestions about ways to interview children that would increase the accuracy of their testimony. (“Meyer’” Inaccuracies in Children’s….).

Things such as how the questions are asked by either prosecutors, or defense attorneys could play a role in if children feel this trauma from testifying again (Ahern, Stolzenberg & Lyon, 2015). However, this was of similar finding on the research that was for allowing children to testify in court as well. The research that supports’ not allowing children to testify is persuasive because it brings up issues of competency and that children are more susceptible to these “bad” practices that investigators and the court personnel use in trying to receive information towards a case (Cashmore & Bussey, 1996). This can be detrimental to having a fair trial if the child is persuaded (even if unintentionally) to say anything but the truth (Cashmore & Bussey, 1996). Another aspect that is persuasive on the side of the opposition is this issue of the confrontation clause that is a right given to defendants from the sixth amendment of the Constitution, and can seemingly be obscured by safeguards of protecting the child who testifies against them (Orcutt et all., 2001). Granted protecting this vulnerable population should be something everyone wants to do, but it seems there are better ways in which to help protect and create less stress for children then just these safeguard techniques studied so far (Quas &

Young offenders are more prone to giving false confessions because they are more used to giving into the pressure of adult supervision. While trying children as adults should be for the purpose of rehabilitation, it is often done for

A child is competent and capable to give sworn evidence, if they have the ability and mental capacity of understanding that they are under a duty to provide truthful evidence. However, this could cause many inconsistencies, as a child in their own particular nature, do not have the full capacity compared to an adult. It was held in the case of MK v R (2014) that questions like ‘do you know why it’s important to tell the truth?’ was considered inadequate to determine whether or not the child has a full understanding of the test found under s 13(3). For this reason, the use of specific and unpretentious terminology is necessary and a must when cross-examining children.

This research paper investigates children’s testimony in judicial proceedings throughout the past few decades. An increase in child abuse allegations in the 1980s resulted in mass allegations throughout the United States. As a result, a child is interviewed by law enforcement and social workers regarding what happened during specific incidents. Tactics to acquire the testimony of the children has been up for debate by the judicial system and psychologists. These tactics include suggestibility, repeated questions, or stereotyping that may alter the testimony of children to accommodate interviewers biases, knowingly and unknowingly, resulting in false arrests and imprisonments. Psychological research has initiated a growing concern

Since the 1970s, the plight of victims in the criminal justice system has become of significant interest and now plays a prominent role in the construction of domestic and international laws. In particular, in 1999, the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act (YJCEA hereafter) radically transformed the traditional adversarial trial model for receiving evidence from vulnerable and child witnesses by advocating a panoply of special measures to be utilised during criminal court proceedings. The purpose of such measures is to enhance the quality of children’s testimony through the use of screens to block the view of the perpetrator (s.23), the removal of wigs and gowns (s.26), help of intermediaries (s.29) and the use of video links to give evidence (s.21). Most significantly, following the recommendations in the 1989 report of the Home Office Advisory Group on video evidence - the 'Pigot Report ', s. 27 and 28 YJCEA made provisions for pre-recorded cross-examination-in-chief and pre-recorded cross-examination respectively. After all, the cross-examination of a child who is a victim of a crime, particularly a sexual crime, is arguably one of the most challenging courtroom ordeals. However, s. 28 of the YJCEA has never been brought into force and still remains to be “the most controversial of all” measures within the 1999 Act (Hoyano & Keenan, 2010). As a result, although children may be given the opportunity to pre-record the first part of their evidence, they must still

When a crime is committed, one of the most important evidences for convincing jurors to make the decision is witness evidence. Witnesses in crimes have also been a crucial part on determining the final verdict. However, child witness testimony should not be allowed due to the harm that it inflicts on children. The article between a rock and a hard place: Why hearsay testimony may be a necessary evil in child sexual abuse cases by Watters, T., Brineman, J., & Wright, S. compares the positive and negative of using hearsay testimony instead of child testimony. The authors argues that the benefits outweighs the cost.

Within the last several years, the topic of children’s testimonial accuracy has become a largely studied area. It has been suggested that an interviewers bias and suggestibility has a powerful impact on a child’s performance during an interview (Cleveland, Quas & Lyon, 2016). Suggestibility affects the extent to which a child is able to retrieve and report on events due to psychological or social influences (Milne & Bull, 2003). Suggestibility is brought forth through psychological or social influences, such as suggestive questioning, repeating already answered questions or using praise or negative feedback when children give answers to questions (Cleveland et al., 2016). Researchers have found that age plays a critical role in the child’s ability to refrain from interviewer suggestibility, with results suggesting that the younger the child, the more susceptible they are (Cleveland et al., 2016). With relation to age, cognitive factors have also been found to play a role in children’s susceptibility. Findings from previous studies propose that lower cognitive functioning is associated with higher memory errors, suggesting that fewer memory errors would occur in children with higher cognitive functioning (Hritz et al., 2015). Similarly individual differences such as a child’s temperament or attachment style can also affect their susceptibility to suggestion (Hritz et al., 2015). As research has shown, children can be susceptible to interviewer suggestibility for a variety of