Rules of Evidence
GE v. Joiner, Kumho Tire, and this third case form a combination of cases that address the issue of admissibility of expert testimony when concerns about its scientific basis and reliability are raised.
What is Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals?
The case in which the USSC identified the Constitutionally-required minimum for finding a criminal defendant competent to stand trial.
What is Dusky v. US?
The custody decision-making standard that is most commonly employed in the 50 states.
What is the bests interests of the child standard?
After this Texas defendant's convictions for drowning her 5 children were overturned, she was subsequently adjudicated NGI when tried a second time.
Who is Andrea Yates?
In this 1976 decision, the Supreme Court of California ruled that confidentiality of psychotherapist-patient communications was not absolute, and mental health professionals had a duty to protect third parties from the potentially violent actions of their clients.
What is Tarasoff v. the Regents of the University of California?
An out-of-court statement offered to prove the truth of the matter asserted therein.
What is hearsay?
One of AAFP's/ABFP's co-founders, this Massachusetts-based psychologist-attorney was instrumental in developing the Competency Screening Test (CST) and Competence Assessment Instrument (CAI), which were among the first tools developed to facilitate assessment of a criminal defendant's competence to stand trial.
Who is Dr. Paul Lipsitt?
This debunked "syndrome” has been used by some to explain why a child whose parents are in the middle of a highly contested custody matter might express hatred and resistance toward one of his or her parents.
What is parental alienation syndrome?
In response to this man's NGI adjudication in 1983 for the attempted assassination of President Reagan, a number of US jurisdictions revised various aspects of their insanity laws and procedure.
Who is John Hinckley?
After his case was decided, the man who was the subject of this 1966 USSC case sold souvenirs in the form of his autograph on cards containing the information the Court ruled LEOs must provide persons in their custody before interrogating them.
Who is Ernesto Miranda?
The number of the Federal Rule of Evidence that defines an expert witness and describes expert testimony.
What is 702?
This frequently cited federal appellate case from 1968 stands for the proposition that amnesia, per se, in not an automatic bar to a defendant's competence to proceed/stand trial.
What is Wilson v. US?
This interdisciplinary professional organization has developed guidelines for custody evaluation practice and a secondary set of guidelines addressing brief custody evaluations.
What is the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts?
The insanity test or standard that is used in the greatest number of US jurisdictions.
What is the M'Naughten standard?
In this 2008 decision, the USSC ruled that a criminal defendant's right to represent him/herself at trial is not absolute.
What is Indiana v. Edwards?
This approach to impeachment involves challenging an expert’s testimony by citing and using various documents such as practice guidelines, scientific articles, or professional texts.
What is impeachment by learned treatise?
This SPJ tool, which is used to direct examiners’ assessments of criminal defendants’ trial competence, was developed by three Canadians. Spoiler alert: none of them were Alex Trebec.
What is the Fitness Interview Test-Revised?
This custody decision making standard, proposed by psychoanalysts Joseph Goldstein, Anna Freud, and Albert Solnit, although it has not gained much ground in terms of changing the law of child custody, has influenced the thinking of some judges, lawyers, and mental health professionals.
What is the Least Detrimental Alternative standard?
The less formal name or title which is sometimes used to describe the irresistible impulse test or standard.
What is the policeman at the elbow test?
The 2002 case in which the USSC ruled that the Constitutional prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment precludes execution of persons with intellectual disabilities.
What is Atkins v. Virginia?
In 2016, the National Commission on Forensic Science recommended to the U.S. Attorney General that all expert witnesses avoid employing this often used term when writing or testifying about the level of confidence they had in their opinions.
What is reasonable certainty?
In this landmark case the court ruled that the defendant’s decision to decline an insanity defense should be honored if the decision is a competent one.
What is Frendak v. US?
In this oft-cited Iowa Supreme Court case, custody of a seven-year-old boy was awarded to the parents of his deceased mother instead of his father, who was described as an agnostic and “political liberal” living in an unpainted house in northern California.
What is Painter v. Bannister?
The insanity test or standard that is in use in only the US Virgin Islands and the state of New Hampshire.
What is the Durham product test or standard?
In this 1975 case the USSC determined that the state "...cannot, without more, confine a person with mental illness who is capable of surviving safely in the community by themselves or with the help of willing family or friends."
What is O'Connor v. Donaldson