📄 Sidebar: forced expert calculations — Friday, June 23, 1995
Address:
C:\DEPT103\CRIMINAL\1995\JUN\23\SIDEBAR-FORCED-EXPERT-CALCULAT.DOC
TRIAL
▲ Day 102 of 167

Sidebar: forced expert calculations

Date: Friday, June 23, 1995 • Utterances: 18
A sidebar dispute over whether defense attorney Peter Neufeld can compel a prosecution DNA expert to perform statistical frequency calculations the witness disagrees with methodologically. Judge Ito ruled the cross-examination was permissible but limited its scope, while warning Neufeld twice about speaking too loudly and threatening a $250 fine.
1 (The following proceedings were held at the bench:)
2 THE COURT:

All right. We're over at the sidebar. What's your authority for being able to force an expert witness to make calculations that he doesn't agree with?

3 MR. NEUFELD:

It's not a question of making calculations. I am allowed to ask him a question, and the question--

4 THE COURT:

Keep your voice down.

5 MR. NEUFELD:

The question I asked him is, can one calculate the frequencies of all possible contributors to this mixture. He said, "One can, but I disagree with it." That's his answer on that. He also made it clear--

6 THE COURT:

Keep your voice down.

7 MR. NEUFELD:

He also made it clear it's his position you can do the calculations but he disagrees with it. All I can ask him to do--since he's already testified to the frequencies for Cellmark databases, I am going to simply ask him at this point to provide those kinds of frequencies for the people who cannot be excluded. That's all. He can say, "I disagree with it," as much as he wants. I can ask him using items which are in evidence, what he has looked at has already--you know, it's the Cellmark database he's familiar with, the frequencies on there and at--

8 THE COURT:

Mr. Clarke.

9 MR. CLARKE:

Well, first of all, NRC--Mr. Neufeld has characterized what the NRC report has said. The witness already testified that the only way this database is part of that report is if you assume that that's what they meant. But more importantly, at this point, we've been given six different charts involving a technique that the evidence shows at this point is extremely confusing, well, extremely misleading, and I think going through these charts with this state of the evidence serves no purpose. It's irrelevant and confusing to the jury based upon this evidence thus far.

10 THE COURT:

How much more are you going to do besides just this chart?

11 MR. NEUFELD:

I'm not doing the other--

12 THE COURT:

Counsel, if I have to warn you to keep your voice down one more time, it's going to cost you 250 bucks.

KEY QUOTE
13 MR. NEUFELD:

It's not just this one. Just all contributors to the mixture other than the one shown, all people that contributed 4 alleles. I'm not going to do the other items of evidence. I was going to, but I'll dispense with all of them.

14 MR. CLARKE:

We also--we also have a witness who has said this is scientifically wrong. We're having him make a series of manipulations that the evidence shows is wrong.

KEY QUOTE
15 THE COURT:

It is cross-examination and this is a computing theory. All right. I am going to overrule it, but I'm limiting you to those two areas. And--excuse me, counsel--you have to give him the opportunity to say that he vehemently disagrees with this, but he can do it.

KEY QUOTE
16 MR. NEUFELD:

Fine.

17 MS. CLARK:

Your Honor, Mr. Neufeld is--

18 THE COURT:

No. No. You don't get to talk.

KEY QUOTE

Temperature

tense

Key Quotes (4)

Lance A. Ito
Counsel, if I have to warn you to keep your voice down one more time, it's going to cost you 250 bucks.
Ito's characteristic bluntness — managing courtroom decorum with financial threat during an already contentious DNA sidebar.
Lance A. Ito
It is cross-examination and this is a computing theory. All right. I am going to overrule it, but I'm limiting you to those two areas.
The ruling — defense wins the right to force the expert through the calculations, but scope is curtailed.
Lance A. Ito
No. No. You don't get to talk.
Ito cuts off Marcia Clark attempting to join the sidebar argument after the ruling was already made.
George Clarke
We also have a witness who has said this is scientifically wrong. We're having him make a series of manipulations that the evidence shows is wrong.
Core prosecution objection — the expert's own disagreement with the methodology undermines the value of forcing him through it.

Evidence (2)

Informal
Cellmark DNA database frequency charts — six different charts presented by defense involving mixture contributor calculations
discussed, challenged
Informal
NRC report on DNA statistics — Neufeld claimed it supported his calculation approach; Clarke disputed the characterization
discussed, disputed

Notable Exchanges (3)

Peter NeufeldLance A. Ito
Ito repeatedly warns Neufeld to keep his voice down during sidebar, ultimately threatening a $250 fine on the third offense.
tense
Lance A. ItoMarcia Clark
Clark attempts to speak after Ito has already ruled; Ito cuts her off with 'No. No. You don't get to talk.'
sharp
Peter NeufeldGeorge Clarke
Neufeld argues the expert already admitted the calculations can be done (just that he disagrees with them), so forcing them on cross is legitimate. Clarke counters that compelling an expert to perform calculations he calls scientifically wrong is misleading to the jury.
strategic

Light Moments (1)

Lance A. Ito
Ito threatens Neufeld with a $250 fine for talking too loud at a sidebar — a procedural absurdity that cuts the tension.

Credibility Attacks (1)

⚔ DNA expert (prosecution witness, name not given in transcript)
forced concession
Neufeld sought to compel the expert to perform frequency calculations for all possible contributors to the DNA mixture, using the expert's own admission that the calculations are technically possible (even if he disagrees with the methodology) as the lever.

Objections

1 objections (0 sustained, 1 overruled)
Proceeding 6531 • 18 utterances
Criminal Trial
Department 103
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📂 JUN 23, 1995 📄 Sidebar: forced expert calcula
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