How do prosecutors prepare to cross-examine defendants? Prosecutor Peter is preparing for a trial. Defendant Dexter may or may not take the witness stand. Peter has no idea what he would say if he does (no disclosure obligation on the defendant) but still needs to be ready. So, Peter thinks up a few lines of defence that Dexter could possibly adopt on his evidence-in-chief and prepares separate sets of cross-examination questions for each. To each question Peter expects one or more possible answers. Every subsequent question will often depend on what the answer to the previous one was. Peter aims to plan the questioning such that inconsistencies in Dexter's answers surface as soon as possible so that it becomes apparent that he is lying and Peter could just say &quot;no further questions, Your Honour&quot;. Is that roughly how prosecutors prepare? Do they draw flowcharts? Do they use some special methodologies? Or do they just fly by the seat of their pants?
I'd imagine that testimony from the defendant is rare enough that in the majority of cases, prosecutors do not meaningfully prepare for a cross examination. To the extent they do, I'd expect the preparation is similar to that for basically any other witness. So I wouldn't expect complicated flowcharts, because the general rule at trial is that you only ask questions whose answers are both known and helpful. So if I need to place the defendant at the OK Corral at 3 p.m., I'm only going to ask him where he was at 3 p.m. if I have evidence showing that fact is true -- maybe he gave a written statement to the sheriff, maybe he posed for a daguerrotype, whatever. I expect him to deny it, so I don't ask the question unless I have evidence more convincing than his denial. In this way, a defendant -- like any hostile witness -- is used less to provide any facts of their own, but rather as an involuntary narrator of my own story, authenticating evidence and validating the facts consistent with my theory of the case.
Lawyers may break confidentiality with client permission. You can also break your own confidentiality and talk to the prosecutor yourself. The prosecutor's response is up to the prosecutor; however, they tend to not be super excited about giving immunity to a witness for the defense if they might want to prosecute the witness later (and courts often are fine with that), so the more they suspect about your true role the less likely they are to grant it. No. If the feds later find truly independent evidence (they have the burden of showing it's truly independent), they can prosecute. Some states give transactional immunity to witnesses (you can't be prosecuted for crimes you testified about for any reason), but the Fifth Amendment doesn't require it and at least the feds aren't bound by state transactional immunity. It's hard to prosecute, but is possible if prosecutors play their cards right. Yes, it does allow civil liability. There is no right against self-incrimination in civil matters, only criminal liability. If the forced testimony leads to a lawsuit that bankrupts you, too bad.
Criminal charges are filed and prosecuted by the government, on behalf of the public, and there is no requirement for approval or cooperation by the victim. As a policy matter, a DA may decide to not charge a person in case the victim is unwilling (though less so in cases of domestic violence), perhaps because of the widespread impression that the victim has to "press charges" (which indeed they would have to do in the case of private prosecution, which is no longer allowed in the US). The alleged victim's reddit exchanges on the topic are here. An uncooperative victim does not make a good witness, even if they are compelled to testify. The police statement that they cannot pursue an investigation should not be interpreted as a statement of law, it's probably a statement of policy and practicality.
The parties can be required under oath to explain what they understand the plain meaning of the words to be. Where they disagree about the plain meaning of the words, they can use expert witnesses to give weight to their interpretation. Once the judge determines the plain meaning of the words (either by agreement between the parties or by reference to expert witnesses or other evidence), it is a matter of standard contract interpretation. Even in the case of an idioticon, where no expert witnesses are available, if the disagreement between the parties surrounds only a few words, the judge could find that there is no actual ambiguity because the context. Also, the judge could refer to parole evidence if needed. The purpose of the written contract is to provide evidence of your agreement. It is a bad idea to create evidence that you both may want to rely upon at some point if nobody else can understand it.
The situation you describe is extremely unlikely First, you will have been required to give a statement to the police who would have asked you most or all of the questions that you suggest before anyone gets anywhere near a courtroom and likely before any arrest has been made. That statement will be part of your evidence in chief. As in &quot;Is this your statement?&quot; &quot;Yes&quot;. &quot;Is this your video recording?&quot; &quot;Yes&quot;. After that, your evidence in chief is pretty much done. A witness of fact (rules for expert witnesses are different) can only testify as to what they personally sensed and what their state of mind was. So questions about what you saw, heard, tasted etc. are all perfectly legitimate as are questions about what you thought or felt. You are required to answer these questions honestly - if that means &quot;I don't know&quot; then say &quot;I don't know&quot;. All of the hypothetical questions look fine but as I said, they will all have answers in your police statement. The only one that's off-limits is &quot;&quot;Do you feel that a crime has been committed?&quot; - nobody knows if a crime has been committed; that's why we're having a trial.
united-states I am answering this in the case of a criminal jury trial (given the context of the previous question). It is my understanding that the judge must accept (almost?) all evidence admitted into court. So, this leaves me with three questions: What happens if an official shows evidence that the judge hadn't agreed to feature in the trial? . . . What happens if the evidence happens to be inadmissible? A trial in a criminal case takes place in a courtroom at a predetermined date and time, with the prosecutor physically sitting at one table in front of a judge and the defendant and the defendant's lawyer physically sitting at another table in front of the judge, and a jury physically sitting in a seating area to the side of the judge, and a witness (usually) physically sitting in a chair on the other side of the judge (in rare circumstances, for minor witnesses, testimony is provided by telephone with the phone put on speaker in the courtroom for all to hear), and a court reporter or tape recorder keeping track of what happens verbatim. In a trial, essentially all evidence comes in through witnesses sitting on a special the chair in front of the judge designated for witnesses (called the witness stand) at the request of either the prosecuting attorney, or the defense attorney. This is the only way the evidence is introduced (other than by stipulations of both side's lawyers). Prosecutors and defense attorneys don't testify or provide evidence themselves. The judge is usually not told what evidence will be offered at trial in advance, although sometimes a pre-trial hearing is held to consider a particularly important piece of evidence's admissibility prior to trial, in a hearing on what is called a &quot;motion in limine&quot; or a &quot;motion to suppress&quot;. If that happens, the judge's decision made in advance will be honored by the judge when anyone tries to introduce the evidence at trial. But those are the exception and not the rule. Usually, any witnesses can be asked any questions at trial and the judge does not consider the admissibility of the answer to the question until it is asked and objected to by the other side's lawyer at trial. A defendant can choose to be, but is not required to be, a witness in his or her own case. In a trial, when it is their turn, the prosecution and defense, respectively, ask witnesses to sit at the witness stand one by one and ask them questions, which the witness answers under oath, absent an evidence objection from the other side's attorney. While a witness is on the stand, exhibits such as documents or physical objects can also be introduced into evidence in connection with the authenticating testimony of the witness (except in cases where both sides stipulate to the admission of the documents or other non-testimonial evidence). As the lawyers try to introduce evidence by asking a question to a witness on the stand, or by asking the judge for permission to introduce non-testimonial evidence, the other side's attorney can say, &quot;I object&quot;. If that happens, the witness on the stand is not allowed to answer the question and the non-testimonial evidence (e.g. documents, or a knife allegedly used in a crime) is not made available to the jury until the judge rules on whether it is admissible or not in accordance with the rules of evidence. Usually, the judge rules on the evidence objection immediately in the moment, although in rare cases, the judge will let the jury have a break for a few minutes while hearing arguments from the lawyers for both sides on about the relevant evidence rules and/or researching the legal issue, before ruling on the evidence issue. Once the judge rules on the evidence issue, the trial continues immediately. If the judge &quot;sustains&quot; the objection to the evidence, then the question doesn't get asked and/or the jury doesn't get to see the non-testimonial evidence. The lawyer whose question or offer to introduce evidence was successfully objected to moves on to their next question (if any) for the witness instead. If the judge &quot;overrules&quot; the objection to the evidence, then the witness answer the question and/or the jury gets to see the non-testimonial evidence which is &quot;received&quot; into evidence by the judge. This process continues continuously, for as many business days as it takes, until all witness testimony and all non-testimonial evidence has been presented to the court and both sides have told the court that they have presented all of their evidence. Then each side makes closing arguments to the jury, the judge reads the jury instructions of law on how to resolve the case, and the jury is sent to closed room to discuss the case and decide whether to say &quot;guilty&quot; or &quot;not guilty&quot; with respect to each charge brought by the prosecution in the trial. This decision is called a &quot;verdict&quot; and when the jury has made up its mind on all charges present to it, the jury lets the judge know that it has made up its mind, and the judge calls everyone back to the courtroom, and the jury tells the judge what they decided in open court. If the verdict is &quot;not guilty&quot; on all criminal charges in the case, then the case is over, with no post-trial motions and no appeals. If the verdict is &quot;guilty&quot; the defendant is convicted, subject to post-trial motions to declare a mistrial and appeals by the convicted defendant. If the convicted defendant appeals the case, and the judge abused his discretion in overruling an objection to the evidence that is made by the lawyer for the defendant (or the defendant personally if the defendant is not represented by a lawyer), because no reasonable judge could have found that the evidence was admissible under the circumstances, then the appellate court rules that the judge has made an &quot;error&quot;. The appellate court will not find that the judge's ruling is an &quot;error&quot; if the judge made the correct decision for the wrong reason. If it is reasonably possible that &quot;error&quot; possibly in combination with other errors made by the trial court judge could have caused a convicted criminal defendant to have been acquitted by the jury if the errors weren't made by the judge, then the defendant gets a new trial. The new trial usually before the same judge with a new jury. But the new trial is before a different judge and a new jury if the judge is no longer a judge on the court for any reason, or if the judge has been so defiant of the appellate court (typically ignoring its instructions in a retrial after a first appeal) that the appellate court decides it must remove the judge from the case. A criminal defendant is only acquitted by an appellate court if the appellate court finds that it would be impossible under any circumstances for the defendant to be convicted in a new trial, possibly with different evidence presented by the prosecution. What happens if a private citizen does the above? This doesn't make sense. Private citizens don't rule on the admissibility of evidence in a criminal trial, and can't introduce evidence in a criminal trial except at the request of a prosecuting attorney or defendant's attorney by being called as a witness and asking the questions that the lawyers (and sometimes the judge as well) asks the witness. Witnesses are not allowed to volunteer testimony or provide documents to a jury unless asked to do so by a lawyer in the case. What happens if someone provides evidence in court without the knowledge of the judge? As the process described above should make clear, this is basically impossible absent some extremely irregular event on the same level of irregularity as someone bribing a jury or threatening a jury with harm if he votes the wrong way.
I'm curious as to how the US legal system determines who should present evidence and how much evidence is required by them to prove one side of an argument against a counterargument. In General In both criminal and civil cases in common law legal systems (legal systems derived from the English legal system, basically, the U.S., U.K., Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh), the burden of proof is on the party seeking to have a court do something. So, if the absence of evidence, the party seeking relief loses. Proof Of The Elements Of The Charge Or Cause Of Action Presentation of Evidence and the Prima Facie Case The party seeking court action presents their evidence first. If at the close of their opening case that party has not presented enough evidence to meet their burden of proof with respect to every "element" of the list of legal elements that they must prove to prevail in court, that party has not established a "prima facie case" and the case is dismissed without granting relief. If the prosecution or party bringing a civil case establishes a prima facie case, or if the defense does ask to have the case dismissed for failing to establish a prima facie case at the close of the evidence of the party asking the court to do something, then the defense presents their evidence if the defense wishes to do so (this is optional). (If the defense does present evidence, the prosecution or civil party seeking relief can then present a rebuttal case to disprove the new points of evidence in the defense case, and so on, back and forth until all evidence is taken.) Evaluating The Evidence In Light Of The Burden Of Proof Once both the party asking the court to do something and the defense have presented all of their evidence, the trier of fact (i.e. the jury in a jury trial, or a judge in a bench trial) decides if every element of the case of the party asking the court to do something has been established by the relevant burden of proof. In a civil case, the burden of proof is usually a "preponderance of the evidence" (i.e. that the evidence more strongly favors that the element was established than that it was not established); some elements on some claims in civil cases must be established by the higher standard of "clear and convincing evidence." In a criminal case, the burden of proof is "proof beyond a reasonable doubt". Affirmative Defenses In addition to elements of a case that must be established to make a prima facie case, there are also "affirmative defenses" to a request that a court do something. Examples of affirmative defenses include self-defense, statute of limitations, immunity from suit, a pardon in a criminal case, etc. A defendant can win ether by showing that the party asking the court to do something has failed to meet their burden of proof with respect to one or more elements of the case, or by showing that an affirmative defense bars the request. In both criminal cases and civil cases, the burden is on the defense to show that there is at least some evidence that justifies consideration of an affirmative defense. This is called a "burden of production." In a civil case (and in some criminal cases in some jurisdictions), the burden of proof is on the defendant to prove an affirmative defense by preponderance of the evidence. In some criminal cases in some jurisdictions, once the defense has met a burden of production with regard to an affirmative defense, the prosecution must rule out the affirmative defense beyond a reasonable doubt to prevail. Deciding Who Wins Once both the party asking the court to do something and the defense have presented all of their evidence, the trier of fact (i.e. the jury in a jury trial, or a judge in a bench trial) decides if an affirmative defenses prohibit the party asking the court to do something from prevailing. The party asking the court to do something wins unless the defense can show that this party did not meet the burden of proof as to any one element of a particular criminal charge or civil cause of action (for each charge or cause of action), or that an affirmative defense bars that particular charge or cause of action. Often cases have conflicting testimony regarding what happened. The jury (or judge in a bench trial) can choose to belief that one person is telling the truth and that the other statement is either a lie or is unintentionally inaccurate for some reason. If the jury (or judge in a bench trial) isn't at all sure whose statement is true and whose is not, this favors the defendant if one is not more credible than the other. Complex Cases In a simple case, there is just one charge or cause of action, and there is just one defendant. But, often, there are multiple charges or causes of action, and each one must be evaluated as to each defendant of the multiple defendants in a single trial. In a civil case, sometimes there are counterclaims that defendants are trying to prove against plaintiffs, or cross-claims that defendants or counterclaim defendants are trying to prove against each other that have to be evaluated. Also, in civil cases, sometimes one or more of the defendants is also prosecuting one or more separate causes of action against someone other than the original plaintiffs or co-defendants. In that case, that defendant is also a third-party plaintiff, and someone other than the original plaintiff and defendants is a third-party defendant (third-party defendants can also bring third-party counterclaims against the third-party plaintiff, third-party crossclaims against third-party codefendants, or their own claims against new parties or against the original plaintiffs). Other Rules Special Statutes Regarding Proof Of Facts Sometimes, there are particular kind of facts for which a statute says that a "prima facie case" is established automatically if a certain kind of evidence is presented. For example, it is common for the law to say that a prima facie case regarding ownership of real estate, or the status of a bus as a school bus, is established by presenting a copy of an official document that says so. Usually, when a statute says something like that, the prima facie case can still be overcome, for example, by presenting a subsequent document that shows that the real estate was then sold to someone else, or that the school bus status of the bus was later revoked. But, when a statute like that is present, the plaintiff or prosecutor doesn't have a duty to prove the negative that there was no subsequent sale of the real estate or that the school bus status certificate was still in force on the date of the incident. Rules of Evidence There are also "rules of evidence" that govern what kind of facts can be presented at a trial to prove a case. For example, in a U.S. criminal trial a fact cannot be established with evidence that is hearsay, such as an affidavit or a statement that a witness heard someone else say and is retelling to the court. A very important rule of evidence in U.S. criminal trials that flows from the United States Constitution, is the evidence obtained by law enforcement illegally may not be presented by the prosecution, even if it definitively shows that a defendant is guilty. This is called the "exclusionary rule." Application To Facts Is it up to the prosecution to present full and complete evidence that the system only takes pictures when the bus is stopped (presumably reviewing source code or conducting tests) or is there some kind of legal concept of "good enough at a glance" evidence where they've met some minimum burden of proof that the picture is taken when the system is turned on and it's only on when the bus is stopped, therefore it must be functioning as expected? The prosecution has to convince the jury (or the judge in a bench trial) that every element of the crime as define in the statute has been proved beyond a reasonable doubt and that any affirmative defense upon which the defense meets a burden of production has been overcome by the relevant burden of proof. Usually, this is a broad legal standard, and the jury (or judge in a bench trial) has to decide if the burden of proof has been met by the facts presented which were legally admissible as evidence. It wouldn't be uncommon for a defendant to present no new evidence in a defense case (other than having cross-examined the prosecution's witnesses) and merely argue at the completion of the prosecution's case that the evidence presented didn't establish a particular element of the prosecution's case beyond a reasonable doubt. For example, the defense might argue that the picture presented by the prosecution was not taken when the bus was at a complete stop, and if the prosecution didn't present some convincing evidence that the bus was at a complete stop when the picture was taken (e.g. the testimony of the bus driver and other witnesses), the defense should win. But, it is almost always up to the jury (or the judge in a bench trial) to decide if the prosecution's evidence is good enough to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the prosecution proved the case. Often a defendant will not want to call any witnesses beyond the witnesses presented in the prosecution case, because a defendant's witness might cause the jury to overcome its doubt that a fact only weakly proved by the prosecution was actually true, for example, when only one not very credible prosecution witness had testified regarding the same fact. If the identical case were presented to two different juries, one jury could decide to believe the bus driver who said that the bus was at a stop when the picture was taken, and a different jury could decide not to belief the bus driver, and both decisions would be valid. Consequences Of A Verdict If the judge or jury acquits the defendant in a criminal case, the case is over and there is no appeal. If the jury is hung (there is no unanimous ruling to convict or acquit (but see endnote)), in a criminal case, there is a mistrial and the defendant can be tried again. If the jury convicts, one of the grounds for an appeal by the defendant is that the evidence was insufficient to prove some element of the charge beyond a reasonable doubt, and if the appellate court agrees than the conviction is overturned and there can be a retrial (or in some cases, the defendant is acquitted). Appellate Review Of The Sufficiency Of The Proof The law recognizes that different juries could interpret exactly the same facts in different ways and will reverse a conviction because the burden of proof was not met only if "no reasonable jury" could have interpreted the evidence in a manner consistent with a conviction. For example, on appeal, an appellate court will always assume that the jury thought that every pro-defendant witness, whose credibility was questioned in any way by the prosecution, was lying and that the jury believed that every pro-prosecution witness was telling the truth, even if the defense presented evidence that could have caused a reasonable juror to question the truthfulness of a prosecution witness. Appeals for failure to prove something beyond a reasonable doubt can be easier in a bench trial than in a jury trial because following a bench trial the judge will often publicly state the actual reasons in terms of findings of fact and law that the judge used to reach a conclusion. So, the defendant need only show that a key fact actually found by the judge was not supported by the requisite proof. END NOTE Oregon State, and prior to 2019, Louisiana, did not require juries in all criminal cases to be unanimous.
First, while Law and Order should not be taken as an accurate depiction of a New York trial, it especially should not be taken as an accurate depiction of an Australian trial. Australian law, while it has some major similarities with US law (both ultimately derive from the law of England), is not US law. With procedural matters (such as "may jurors ask questions of witnesses"), it can potentially differ from court to court. In general, jurors may not simply ask a witness a question. The jury's job is not to investigate and figure out if the defendant was guilty or not; it's to evaluate the cases presented by each side. US (and Australian, as far as I know) courts use what's known as the adversarial model, where the prosecution and the defense both present the best cases they can and a neutral third party decides which case was stronger. In a US criminal trial, the state is expected to justify why someone should be in jail; the jury shouldn't be helping them justify it. This isn't how all jurisdictions around the world work, but it's how the US does. One concern with juror questions is that it has the risk that the juror will not be impartial. Jurors are not supposed to get into arguments with witnesses, or to go after them to try to prove a point. In your case, the juror might be introducing an entirely different line of reasoning from the one either side is presenting, and that's simply not their job. People have raised the concern that a juror thinking up questions might be deciding the case before they hear all the evidence, and might give too much weight to the answers to their own questions (or read a lot into it if a question is denied). There are also rules on what questions may be legally asked; lawyers know these and jurors generally don't, which is why jurors may almost never directly ask a question to a witness. Where they can ask questions, it's virtually always written questions, which the judge reviews, gives to both sides to see if anyone objects, and then reads to the witness in a neutral tone.