Forensic medicine

Forensic Medical Opinions are crucial to criminal cases for example when it comes to understanding a cause of death, the time of death or how and when an injury came about.

The Forensic Medicine (FM) Project evaluates what scientific assumptions, other than those pertaining to the triad in shaken baby cases, impact on methods used by pathologists (Level 1). Scenario-based experiments are used to examine what happens when pathologists integrate new evidence into their decision making, including both new scientific evidence pertaining to their own methods, and the opinions of other experts in the same case (e.g. forensic chemical analysis; narcotics in blood, or age; X-ray interpretations).50 The latter will focus on the importance of group dynamics e.g. diffusion of responsibility (Levels 1 & 2).51 Also legal practitioners’ interpretations of medical reports in relation to the beyond all reasonable doubt standard are examined, including e.g. individual differences (Level 3)