FRS 001 — Sec. 001 —
(1 unit) — CRN 92592 — M 9:00-9:50am — 3 Wellman
Evidence: Truth and Its Rivals
Instructor: Edward Imwinkelried, School of Law
Description: Laypersons have a simplistic conception of the operation
of the judicial system. They assume that the sole purpose of the system is to
determine the truth and accurately apply substantive constitutional, statutory,
and common-law rules. If that were the case, the courts would freely admit all
logically relevant evidence. However, in truth, there are many social policies
which constrain the introduction of relevant evidence at trials. The most obvious
example is the constitutional exclusionary rules of evidence. For instance, if
the police acquire physical evidence as a result of an illegal search, albeit
relevant, the evidence is inadmissible at a criminal trial. More broadly, there
are many evidentiary rules which block the introduction of relevant evidence.
In this course, the students will review several such rules and hopefully come
to an appreciation of the social policies which inspire the rules.
Format: The course’s pedagogic objectives are two-fold.
One purpose is to disabuse the students of the myth that the litigation in system
in general and evidentiary norms in particular are designed solely to advance
a search for truth. The other purpose is to introduce the students to the balancing
type of policy analysis which the legal system employs. In the course of reviewing
nine different types of evidentiary rules, the students will confront the question
of whether the law has done a good, bad, or indifferent job of balancing the competing
social interests. All the sessions will be normal class discussions. There will
be no field trips. Grading: The students will be graded
on the following basis. Twenty percent of the grade will depend on participation
during class discussions. In addition, during the semester, each student will
be required to write four papers (two to three pages in length) critiquing one
of the nine types of evidentiary rules discussed in class. Each paper will account
for 20% of the student’s grade.
About the Instructor: Professor Imwinkelried is a member of the
faculty of the Law School. His research interests include scientific evidence
and evidentiary privileges. He is a past chair of the Evidence Section of the
American Association of Law Schools and a former member of the Legal Issues Working
Group of the National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence.