Do unofficial testimonies and civil recordings hold value in the US courtroom? As far as I know admitting to something while not under oath has no value, as it should. But if there is a case against you with some other solid evidence can an unofficial/not under oath confession be used against you in the US courtroom? And for that matter is confessing to a police officer while not under the oath of the courtroom considered a valid confession? Also, does recorded audio or video by a civilian, for example, hold value in the US courtroom? The reason I am asking is because in my country: 1. Any confession or testimony NOT made to a police officer or other similar legal party (we don't have oaths) is completely meaningless. This is because when speaking to a police officer, as he is considered an official representation of the law, etc. you are required to recognise the gravity of the situation and speak only truthfully, therefore anything you say is taken to be truth and can be used as valid testimony. Similarly if you just randomly tell someone you killed someone you could be joking, not of sound mind, etc. and that is why such a confession is worthless. .2. Audio or video footage not recorded by a police device or other officially recognised device, such as a security or traffic camera, is also worthless as you can never say for certain said footage is unedited or not inscenuated, i.e. that someone did not hire actors to look like you and perform a crime. EDIT: After some more researching it turns out I was wrong. Confessions to a police officer hold a lot more value than ones, say, made on the internet, but the ones on the internet could still be used in court, albeit almost noone would take them seriously for the aforementioned reasons. Confessions to civilians, however, are different because in that manner the civilian appears in the form of a witness, which has value. As for audio and video recordings it turns out it doesn't matter if they are made by a civilian or a security camera, both can be used in court but rarely have too much value for the aforementioned reasons. In the end here, and as I believe elsewhere, you need more than circumstantial evidence to successfully convict a person (you need witnesses, direct evidence, etc.).
Your confessions, to anyone, can be used against you. If A admits to B that A stole the car, B can testify to what A said. In fact, if B accuses A of a crime and A says nothing (and C witnesses this), C can testify as to what B and A said (or didn't say) – this is known as an adoptive admission, and it is up to the jury to decide if they think the silence is significant. Recordings are likewise admissible. All evidence is in principle defeasible, so if there is a video of "you" committing a crime, you can make the case that it wasn't really you, and the jury will weigh the evidence to see if they are firmly convinced that you did commit the crime (at least in New Jersey... long story about 'burden of proof').
You can't prove a negative, so they can't be convicted of perjury for lying about whether they remember; Yes, they can. The government can convict the witness of perjury by proving that they did remember. This may be difficult, but it's not impossible. Now you may say that we can't ever prove with certainty what a person did or didn't remember. But the legal standard isn't certainty, it's beyond a reasonable doubt. So a jury is allowed to draw a reasonable inference about whether they remembered, based on evidence of their outward behavior and other circumstances. As an extreme example, suppose Alice was overheard chatting freely about topic X an hour before the trial, but when asked about topic X on the stand, said she didn't remember. When presented with evidence of her earlier conversation, a jury could reasonably infer that she was lying about not remembering. Is it possible that she truly had a memory lapse in the intervening hour? Sure, anything is possible. Is it reasonable to believe that she did? Probably not. The US Department of Justice's Criminal Resource Manual has this to say on the subject: Witnesses who claim not to remember, rather than deny a fact, may be prosecuted for perjury. However, the government must prove both that the witness at one time knew the fact and that the witness must have remembered it at the time he or she testified. United States v. Chen, 933 F.2d 793, 795 (9th Cir. 1991). If the dates of the transaction and testimony are sufficiently close, memory may be inferred. Instances in which the witness remembered other events that occurred at the same time or earlier than the event in question, or mentioned the event either immediately before or after his testimony, would be probative of the witness's memory at the time of the testimony. The two witness rule does not apply to prosecutions based on false memory lapses, and circumstantial evidence is sufficient, since there is no direct evidence possible concerning what the defendant actually believed. Gebhard v. United States, 422 F.2d 281, 287 (9th Cir. 1970). There's a similar issue in all laws that deal with a person's knowledge or intent. Suppose Alice hits Bob with a stick and he dies. To convict Alice of murder, it must be proved that by hitting Bob, she intended to kill him. Can we ever really know what was in her heart? Maybe not, but if there is evidence that shortly beforehand, she told someone that she was going to kill Bob, it would be a reasonable inference that this was her intention.
As an example, under the laws of Colorado, USA, deleting the footage would be a crime. See CRS 18-8-610: A person commits tampering with physical evidence if, believing that an official proceeding is pending or about to be instituted and acting without legal right or authority, he: (a) Destroys, mutilates, conceals, removes, or alters physical evidence with intent to impair its verity or availability in the pending or prospective official proceeding; If you cause a crash, you should certainly believe that you are going to be sued, and a lawsuit is definitely an official proceeding. And it sounds like your purpose in deleting the footage is to prevent it from being used in that lawsuit. So you'd be clearly guilty under this law. It is a class 6 felony, carrying a sentence of 12-18 months in prison and a fine of $1,000 to $100,000. It may be counterintuitive, but according to a law firm, a digital video would be considered physical evidence: Physical evidence may include electronic records, videos, or audio recordings. This includes emails, text messages, social media messages, image files, video files, and computer files. If you don't delete the video, it is likely to be demanded by the plaintiff during the discovery process so that it can be entered into evidence. Rule 37 of the Colorado Rules of Civil Procedure lists the sanctions that can be imposed if you refuse, such as: charging you for legal fees incurred by the plaintiffs in trying to obtain it assuming that the video proves whatever the plantiffs say it would show (e.g. that you were speeding, driving recklessly, etc) entering a default judgment against you (the plaintiffs automatically win the suit, as if you had refused to show up in court) holding you in contempt of court, which can lead to you being put in jail until you choose to comply, as well as fined.
What are the factors in weighting whether to disclose substantive evidence vs. using it for impeachment at trial? In an adversarial system (such as that in the jurisdictions in the U.S.) the surprise factor is disallowed on trial. I am not knowledgeable on the procedural exceptions, but generally speaking the documentary evidence (including deposition transcripts) has to be filed during the discovery stage of proceedings. A discovery deadline is set up during case scheduling, and extensions of that deadline have to be requested via motion. There is the slightly related concept of sequestration of witnesses whereby inconsistencies may serve to impeach a witness's testimony, but that is different than withholding from the jury any pre-existing evidence that a plaintiff would like to be considered on trial (whether for impeachment or otherwise). Also, it is in the injured party's best interest that the jury get to see the evidence rather than have it merely rely on a witness's reaction of surprise. The wrongdoer's lawyer will try to confuse the jury and thus outweigh the jury's perception of a "surprised witness", but that attempt is likelier to fail if the jury has the evidence with which to compare the witness's testimony at trial.
SCOTUS suggests in Townsend v. Sain, 372 U.S. 293, that a subject's confession was constitutionally inadmissible if it was adduced by police questioning during a period when petitioner's will was overborne by a drug having the properties of a &quot;truth serum.&quot; In Miranda v. Arizona, it is held that If the interrogation continues without the presence of an attorney and a statement is taken, a heavy burden rests on the government to demonstrate that the defendant knowingly and intelligently waived his privilege against self-incrimination and his right to retained or appointed counsel. Escobedo v. Illinois, 378 U. S. 478, 490, n. 14. This Court has always set high standards of proof for the waiver of constitutional rights, Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U. S. 458 (1938), and we reassert these standards as applied to in-custody interrogation. Subsequently in Colorado v. Connelly, defendant suffered from psychosis that &quot;interfered with his ability to make free and rational choices and, although not preventing him from understanding his rights, motivated his confession.&quot; The court found that Coercive police activity is a necessary predicate to finding that a confession is not &quot;voluntary&quot; within the meaning of the Due Process Clause. Here, the taking of respondent's statements and their admission into evidence constituted no violation of that Clause. While a defendant's mental condition may be a &quot;significant&quot; factor in the &quot;voluntariness&quot; calculus, this does not justify a conclusion that his mental condition, by itself and apart from its relation to official coercion, should ever dispose of the inquiry into constitutional &quot;voluntariness.&quot; In the Massachusetts case Commonwealth v. Hilton, 443 Mass. 597, the Mass. Supreme Court (in the first ruling) said that We see no error in the judge's finding that the defendant's mental infirmities were such that she did not understand the Miranda warnings, and we therefore conclude that statements made after the interrogation did become custodial were properly suppressed. On remand and after in a second appear, in Commonwealth v. Hilton, 823 N.E.2d 383, the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that a finding that the defendant was unable to make a knowing, voluntary, and intelligent waiver of her Miranda rights is not enough, standing alone, to support the finding that her statements were involuntary. The court found that the defendant was competent to stand trial contrary to the trial judge's determination, and said that because we are unable to determine if the judge would have allowed the supplemental motion to suppress without the erroneous findings, we vacate the order for suppression and remand for further consideration. The point here is that being mentally disabled is not per se proof that a confession is involuntary. Turning specifically to intoxication, in Colorado v. Jewell, the trial court suppressed a confession while intoxicated &quot;based on its finding that Jewell was too intoxicated to knowingly and intelligently waive his right to remain silent.&quot; The Colorado Supreme Court reversed the suppression [b]ecause the facts do not support the trial court's determination that Jewell's intoxication was so severe that he was demonstrably unable to knowingly and intelligently waive his Miranda rights which leaves open the possibility that there is some such degree of intoxication. The court determined that Intoxication only invalidates an otherwise valid Miranda waiver if the court finds through a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant was incapable of understanding the nature of his rights and the ramifications of waiving them. Subsequent discussion partially fleshes out how one might determine whether a waiver is unknowing or unintelligent. Citing Colorado v. Kaiser, the court suggested considering whether “the defendant seemed oriented to his or her surroundings and situation; whether the defendant's answers were responsive and appeared to be the product of a rational thought process; whether the defendant was able to appreciate the seriousness of his or her predicament, including the possibility of being incarcerated; whether the defendant had the foresight to attempt to deceive the police in hopes of avoiding prosecution; whether the defendant expressed remorse for his or her actions; and whether the defendant expressly stated that he or she understood their rights.” One issue was raised regarding &quot;cases where, as here, the intoxication is self-induced.&quot; A fundamental result of the mass of Miranda case law is that coercive actions by police invalidate a confession. Getting a suspect drunk(er) would be a clear case of a coercive police action, and presumably would be inadmissible under Townsend v. Sain.
In many jurisdictions, there is a "witness fee" that one is required to pay, as a token recognition of the value of a person's time. Fact witnesses can often be obligated to appear and testify, for minimal compensation, but not against themselves. In federal cases, Rule 17(b) of the Rules of Criminal Procedure permit the defendant to apply to ask the government to pay the witness fee if they cannot afford it and the presence of the witness is necessary for an adequate defense. The other side of a case (in this example, the prosecutor) could try to impeach the witness's testimony (i.e. make him seem less credible in the eyes of the jury) by demonstrating that the witness is a "professional witness" (i.e. fees from saying things in court are a major part of the witness's regular income). That doesn't seem to apply to the facts you've listed, where the witness just happened to be in that place and time to observe what happened and (assuming for this question) accurately testified as to what he saw. Personally paying the police officer or judge for a favorable result is a different question with a different answer.
Confidential statements made in confession to a religious advisor are privileged in every U.S. state and in federal court. There is a body of law that surrounds each kind of privilege (attorney-client, psychotherapist-patient, doctor-patient, priest-parishioner, accountant-client, husband-wife) that covers exceptions to the general rule. At least a couple of privileges (attorney-client and husband-wife) actually involve more than one distinct privilege: attorney-client privilege has a confidential communications component and a work product component that have different rules; a husband-wife privilege has a confidential communications component and a 5th Amendment like component that allows one spouse to refuse to permit the other current spouse to testify against him or her. The privilege for confessions made to priests is generally speaking, broader than the attorney-client privilege. Both attorney-client privileges have crime-fraud and prevention of imminent harm exceptions that do not apply to priests. The work product component of the attorney-client privilege also has an exception when work product is the sole available source of critical information available by no other means (e.g. due to the fact that destructive testing was conducted on evidence). A judge cannot order a priest to disclose to a grand jury or any other tribunal or official, what was said in confession, and the priest could not be held in contempt for not testifying in this manner. Indeed, even if, for example, a secret microphone had been placed on a suspect and captured his confession to a priest, the recording of that conversation would not be admissible as evidence in any legal forum due to the privilege. Often, as in the case of a seal of confessional for a Roman Catholic priest, a privilege is also accompanied by a duty on the part of the person receiving the confidential information to keep the information disclosed confidential. But, the duty to keep privileged communications confidential does not always exactly match the scope of the privilege. For example, a Mormon minister's religious obligation to keep confessions confidential might not be precisely the same as those of a Roman Catholic priest, even though confessions to either one would be privileged from compulsory disclosure in a court or other tribunal. Similarly, confidential communications to an attorney can be disclosed by an attorney in furtherance of the representation in a way that a confidential communication to a priest usually could not be disclosed. In at least some jurisdictions, the priest could probably be compelled to testify regarding whether an individual came to a place at a given time to confess (which would establish alibi or lack thereof, and proximity to the time scene at a particular time) since that itself wouldn't be a confidential matter shared with the priest and could have been witnesses by anyone else in the church building who was not a part of the confession whether it not it actually was witnessed by anyone else. In such a jurisdiction, if the priest refused to testify regarding that matter, the priest could be held in contempt of court just like any other witness under a subpoena who refused to testify. The law is not entirely clear over the extent that the priest-parishioner privilege is mandated solely by a statute, common law rule, or court rule (as the case may be from state to state, this varies considerably), and to which extent the statute, common law rule, or court rule providing for the privilege is constitutionally mandated by the free exercise clause of the 1st Amendment to the United States Constitution (incorporated to apply to the states through the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution), and by parallel state constitutional provisions. The question of whether the priest-parishioner privilege is constitutionally mandated matters because some states, in the wake of scandals involving sexual abuse of children by clergy, have sought to extend the requirement that a designated person knowing of instances of child abuse must report their suspicions to authorities, that applies to many kinds of licensed professionals who deal with children in most states, to religious officials who deal with children and their supervisors and colleagues in their churches or denominations. If the question is constitutional, it might be the case that these laws would be unconstitutional. Middle ground might find that there might be a duty of someone taking a confession from a priest to report child abuse (because this is an abuse by the priest of the privilege of receiving privileged confessions), but not a duty to report child abuse disclosed in confession by anyone else. Of course, if there is no constitutional dimension to the privilege, the legislature is free to modify it with legislation as they see fit. There is also an issue in every particular privilege regarding whom the privilege belongs to, and hence, who has a right to legally waive a privilege and allow testimony concerning the confidential communications to be provided. It might belong to the person making the confession, it might belong to the priest, or it might belong to both (hence requiring mutual consent for a waiver of privilege and not just consent by one individual who holds the privilege). I am not familiar with the state of the law in every jurisdiction regarding who holds the privilege for confidential communications with clergy.
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.