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31 January 2008 / John Cooper KC
Issue: 7306 / Categories: Features
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Book Reviews

witness testimony:PSYCHOLOGICAL, INVESTIGATIVE AND EVIDENTIAL PERSPECTIVES
Edited by Anthony Heaton-Armstrong, Eric Shepherd, Gisli Gudjonsson and David Wolchover / Oxford University Press /
RRP £49.95 / 496 pages

The role of the criminal justice system must be to find the truth. Quite what that “truth” means has and continues to be the subject of much debate. Some confuse truth with proof.  An analysis of the law of evidence only takes us as far as establishing how much can be proven, but proof does not always equate to truth. A person will be acquitted if the prosecution has failed to prove the case but it does not follow that that acquittal contains within it the truth of what happened.

This book, edited by a team of eminent people in their fields, develops a unique analysis of the way our adversarial system works and guides the reader through a series of closely argued sections designed to produce clear, cogent, accurate and reliable evidence.

Beginning with psychological perspectives, a series of writers, principally the respected Gisli Gudjonsson, deal with

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Anthony Collins—William Hallett & Lorna Scully

Anthony Collins—William Hallett & Lorna Scully

Anthony Collins hires two talented legal directors

Switalskis—five appointments

Switalskis—five appointments

Firm expands national abuse compensation team

Mathys & Squire—nine promotions

Mathys & Squire—nine promotions

IP firm announces new partners and senior promotions across UK offices

NEWS
A High Court ruling has sent a jolt through the legal profession after a newly qualified solicitor used an internal AI tool to produce court correspondence containing a fabricated legal citation
A significant data privacy ruling has clarified what counts as valid consent under UK data protection law
Executors may be overlooking billions of pounds in estate assets hidden in forgotten investments and misplaced share certificates
Britain’s booming non-surgical cosmetics market is operating in what some critics describe as a regulatory ‘Wild West’
Family contact disputes are becoming an increasingly prominent feature of Court of Protection litigation
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