The Lawyer Monthly Expert Witness Awards 2021

LAWYER MONTHLY EXPERT WITNESS AWARDS 2021 UNITED KINGDOM - 21 - www.lawyer-monthly.com and capability to carry out detailed and exhaustive forensic scientific peer-reviewed literature searches. Otherwise, findings of even the most august bodies and also top experts may very well be capable of being overturned by a few hours of simple literature searching. This process has not been assisted by the current situation of the internet search algorithms having not been written with the user in mind, inadvertently resulting in the maximisation of the expenditure required. The provision of legal aid, once again to all defendants, should possibly be considered by appropriate authorities as a fundamental human right in a civilised and world-leading economy, due to the situation that the principle of equality of arms can never be achieved in practice, as a result of being outside the reach of even the most wealthy defendants due to sheer expense. In this regard the situation of the defendant in a significant number of cases, where either the defendant is innocent, or the accuser may, for example, have been suffering from psychological challenges, shows that the stresses experienced are some of the most challenging that can be imposed upon a human being, with the possible unacceptable risk of suicide. The observation that such a situation could occur completely unexpectedly to anyone of any social status, for example a mother simply visiting a petrol station in order to obtain some treats for her children, should focus sharply the existential and ever- present risk to members of society. By this means, the situation of forensic experts having to subsidise scene visits or laboratory defence inspections while on holiday (currently in progress by the writer of this article, due to limitations in both private and government funding), or as extensions to other case visits, should be noted to be somewhat limited in potential. Thus, it can be seen that the provision of legal aid to people – often innocent, and with their lives suddenly thrown into sometimes life- threatening extremis due to a situation beyond their control – should perhaps be considered on par with that of the NHS, with its own specific ring-fenced tax contributions. This would serve as a form of insurance to all against random misfortune arising from inadvertent false accusations. The situation that the defence must go to Court without the most critical evidence, due to inability of the defendant to be able to afford an expert’s fees, should again be relegated to the dark ages. It should be noted that the current dilemma facing the Courts regarding competence of experts can be resolved by, (in addition to the usual lay considerations), their scientific peers opinion of their scientific reports, the sheer number of incidences where their expertise has prevailed, their length and type of casework experience, their use of the very latest peer-reviewed scientific literature references in their reports to support all conclusions reached, (thus eliminating the need for any possible requirement for the use of subjective evidence), the degree to which they have exhaustively investigated and considered the circumstantial as well as the scientific evidence, and also the situation as to whether they have been able to contribute significant observations and findings which none of the other experts have been able to. In this regard it can be seen that the concept of the single joint expert has the potential to prevent another expert confirming the findings of the opposing expert, and hence removes a vital safeguard against potential miscarriage of justice. The attempted interference by laypersons in scientific deliberations in the most complex and sensitive cases is still occasionally experienced, with the inevitable and entirely avoidable result that they suffer unnecessary inevitable professional humiliation when the scientific findings are verified by other scientific experts, and resulting in vast and unnecessary expenditure of public resources being incurred. Superimposed upon these considerations has been the fallout from the pandemic, with lockdown exhaustion, at its worst, having reduced the amount of quality preparation time per day to three hours. However, resumptionof themeans to refresh the psyche has been found to permit the usual ability to achieve quality work periods of 12 hours or more in a 24-hour period when required; and the extreme lockdown hardship, almost verging on the brink of human survival, appears to have improved, sharpened and honed organisational and creative ability. As a result, the year 2020 has paradoxically turned out to be the most forensically productive ever experienced. Thus, assistance has been successfully provided to a salvage incident that had the potential to cause an explosion almost as large as the incident in Beirut, a case involving arsenic toxicity, issues involving an expensive nightclub, a case involving accusation of intent of a UK citizen to internationally assassinate using hydrogen cyanide and nerve agents, a mid-air collision between a light aircraft and a helicopter, usage and deployment of ricin, possible influence of class A drugs in the death of an infant by accidental suffocation, and a likely murder involving thallium. The unusual experience of an increased level of defendants succumbing to fatal infections before reports could be completed is noted to be a relatively novel and unfortunate phenomenon. The green emission spectrum colour of the highly toxic element Thallium, used to rapidly and presumptively screen traces of the element, (e.g. in urine), and from which property, when heated to high temperature, the element was named, (“Thallos”, in Greek translating as a “Green Twig”) Source: Osram GmbH The explosion and developing shock fronts as a result of the detonation of the spherical mass of 500 tonnes of TNT (Thought possibly to be of a similar but lesser magnitude than the Beirut Ammonium Nitrate Disaster of 2020).