CSI factor 'hurting crime cases'

Barry George always denied killing TV presenter Jill Dando

Fictional crime series like CSI are making real trials more difficult, a leading judge has warned.

Lord Justice Leveson said witnesses were reluctant to come forward because of the mistaken belief that forensic and expert evidence was paramount.

The judge called it the "CSI problem", a reference to the television drama in which cutting edge forensic skills are used to solve crimes.

He said expert scientific evidence was not the "single silver bullet".

Lord Justice Leveson, who is the Senior Presiding Judge for England and Wales, said: "It simply doesn't work like that".

He said there had been a huge increase in the use of expert witnesses, to the extent that they now "abound" in every field of law.

'Universal solution'

He went on: "One problem with this increased use of expert evidence is that it could be tempting to think that experts are a panacea - a fixer, a universal solution to the evidence or lack of evidence in a particular case.

"Am I far fetched in wondering whether this view is more attributable in programmes like CSI?", he asked.

"There can be a temptation, certainly in the eyes of the public, to think there can be expert evidence to prove the essential point in a case to the extent that you don't need regular, old fashioned, normal witnesses anymore.

"And I fear that this has an impact on willingness to help the police to pursue their inquiries, 'DNA will do it', or whatever."

Exaggerating their evidence

Speaking at a conference of expert witnesses in London, the judge also hinted that some experts were exaggerating their evidence or straying into subjects in which they did not have specialist knowledge.

BBC social affairs correspondent Danny Shaw said a number of miscarriages of justice have been blamed on mistaken expert evidence.

Last year Barry George was cleared of murdering the BBC TV presenter, Jill Dando, when the Old Bailey ruled that the original trial had put too much weight on ballistic analysis.

Solicitor Sally Clark was eventually cleared of murdering two of her children after it emerged that an expert witness had wrongly interpreted statistics on unexplained childhood deaths.