Forensic Science Today Distorted By TV Forensic science September 24, 2013 Abstract What is forensic science? The TV show CSI portrayal of forensic science is decent, but some people believe it’s farfetched. The TV show CSI being farfetched is causing a major issue in the criminal justice and court systems. In the following paragraphs it will be explained what the differences between what’s shown on TV, what really happens in real life, and how the TV shows affect their viewers. Joshua A. Downs Forensic Science Mrs. Schmidt September 24, 2013 Forensic Science Today Distorted By TV What is forensic science?
Something that I found very interesting with this video is that it seems to me that it is yet another example of a “crime scene investigation” style show and that is something that can cause a proble later. As we talked about the worry with these types of shows is that they can case the CSI effect on potential jourors. This style show in particular is one that I would worry about since it is showing the investigation of a real case unlike those that are seen on “CSI” or “NCIS” those are based on fake stories and people are less likely to see that as the way that things are done. Forensic science and its developments help the detectives find the crime scene, test and gather testimonial and physical evidence, and reenact the crime scene to help interrogation. Long after the crime scene is gone, investigators can virtually return to the scene of the crime to test out theories and compare evidence results to an investigation that leads to a confession.
The CSI Effect on the Criminal Justice System “Popular media and anecdotal evidence have purported the existence of the “CSI Effect” on juror decision-making” (Mancini, 2011). Those people who are viewers of programs such as: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Criminal Minds, and Bones reported significantly greater dissatisfaction with pro-prosecution scientific evidence and required a greater percentage certainty in finding guilt. These highly popular programs affect the public’s perception of forensic science which affects the decision making in the criminal justice system. In these illusory programs, stimulating and captivating crime scene investigators recover concealed evidence from the crime scene and analyze the evidence with exceptionally sophisticated scientific testing procedures. After hearing these investigators use this entire vocabulary of perfect scientific lingo, they manage to make complete conclusions about the offenders’ identity and involvement in the crime, and often extract a confession from the perpetrator, all within an hour.
b. In addition, fingerprinting and some parts of the shows are realities, such as the interviewing processes of suspects. c. Some or most CSI shows depicted some pretty messed up stuff however, real life crime scenes may be extremely worse than anything we’ve seen on TV. IV. What’s good about the CSI Effect?
Representation of Police in Television Crime Dramas The representation of police in crime dramas is important because it gives the audience an insight in what happens in reality. The focus texts I will be using to investigate are ‘Line of Duty’, because it touches on the controversy that the police are taking advantage of their positions, for example the main character DCI Tony Gates has a girlfriend that runs a drug business. I also chose ‘Luther’ and ‘Whitechapel’, as they show contrasting representations of the police, and they all give realistic representations as well. 70 % of the general audience who watch crime dramas response from the questionnaire feel the police are male dominated organisation. However 55% of the audience thought individual characters are represented to be “corrupt”, instead of “honest”, 85% thought “clever” and 75% “unprofessional”.
Forensic Science has become a popular profession due to show such as Crime Scene Investigation also known as CSI. Television shows like these give the general audience a glimpse of how science is used to solve crimes. And though some scenes are exaggerated and create what is known as “The CSI Effect”. The ability to solve a crime in hours or days has been exaggerated by the writers. The creators of show like these hire professionals to act as technical advisors and ensure the show is as realistic as possible.
He showed students videos of violent crimes and interviewed them 48 hours later either using a standard police interview or the cognitive interview. The found that people were significantly more likely to remember details correctly when interviewed using the cognitive interview, showing that cognitive interview is effective in improving recall. However this study was a laboratory experiment which means it lacks ecological validity as people may have not taken it as seriously as they would in reality so the results can’t be generalised. Also, there are ethical issues in this study as it showed people violence so they weren’t protected from possible psychological harm. More research into the effectiveness of cognitive interview has supported this study showing that cognitive interview is superior to standard interview.
Serial Killers May Be Living Next Door A serial killer could be dining, sitting, or even living next to you at this very moment. Most killers offer little to no obvious clues that will lead anyone to detect their often secretive, undercover actions. I ask myself, “How can we be so naive to these types of people?” Serial killers amongst us are often well educated, portray an All-American image, yet have a psychotic side to them. First, most serial killers are often well educated. Hannibal Lecter in the movie “Silence of the Lambs” is a psychologist.
Controlling Police Brutality The police have served an integral part in society as out protectors. Throughout the years, however, scholars as well as we citizens have begun to question the use of force, racism and internal corruption as well as other forms of misconduct by our officers of the law. The excessive use of force by police officers persists because of overwhelming barriers to their accountability. For instance, when police do get in trouble, it is normally a slap on the wrist, a lecture or loss of a vacation day as it stated in the article “Good Cop Bad Cop.” This fact makes it possible for officers who commit these violations to escape punishment and then often repeat their offenses. Every report of abuse is often met with denial or explanation of why the abuse was necessary instead of taking any real action like a suspension or removal of their badge in most cases.
The author, Elizabeth Loftus, studied using her own scientific research and other researcher’s findings memory distortion as well as the effects that leading questions and external factors have on a person’s memory. She studied this because while conducting her own research on memory distortion she became aware that many people have become wrongly convicted of crimes. She decided to further investigate why these wrongful convictions were taking place. Loftus found that it is relatively easy to plant false memories using suggestive or leading questions during witness interviews. To further back up this claim she found it was easy to place false memories and convince people it is true even if the memory is seemingly impossible; such as meeting Bugs Bunny in Walt Disney World.