Here is a fictional scenario which will illustrate some of the concepts that we are considering.
An unpopular congressman, visiting a university, was greeted by a large student demonstration. As he was stepping out of his car a raw egg thrown from the midst of the crowd struck him on the side of the head and broke, followed by a second and third. Soon the politician was cowering under a hail of missiles. As the crowd surged forward, he was helped back into the car by security officers and driven away.
A 20-year-old sociology student, Amelia Jackson, was arrested soon afterwards. She had been seen in the crowd, and was caught on surveillance cameras shouting angrily and holding a large placard on a pole.
Jackson was wearing a backpack containing some provisions she said she had bought in the market that morning. Among them was a cardboard egg box with spaces for ten eggs, but with only six eggs in it. She was taken into custody for questioning and later charged with assault, on the grounds that she had thrown one or more objects at the congressman with intent to injure or intimidate.
guilty as charged. Because of that, C would be a strange inference to make. She is no more likely to be innocent than she is to be guilty.
Additional evidence Amelia’s statement
When she was questioned, Amelia stated that she lived in lodgings with two other students and it was her turn to buy food and cook the evening meal. She had bought six eggs so they could have two each. She always bought eggs at a market stall, where they were sold singly. It was cheaper than buying ten. And she took her own cardboard container so that they would not break.
Stallholder’s statement
The owner of the stall where Amelia claimed to have bought the eggs stated that he did not recognise her when shown a photograph of her. But he did make the following statement:
‘A lot of the students buy their eggs loose. If they want a box they have to buy ten. I sell loads of eggs that way every day.’
Flatmates’ statements
The two students with whom Amelia Jackson shared an apartment were questioned separately, and asked the same three questions. Both gave the same answers:
Q: ‘Whose turn was it to cook that day?’
A: ‘Amelia’s.’
Q: ‘Do you know where Amelia was going when she left the apartment that day?’
A: ‘Shopping. Then to the university.’
Q: ‘Was she planning to attend the demonstration?’
A: ‘She didn’t mention it.’
Eyewitness account
58-year-old Rajinder Choudhury, a retired headteacher, picked Amelia Jackson out of a police line-up.* He said:
‘She’s the one. She was up ahead of me in the crowd, right where the stuff all came from.
She jumped up and down, and did a high five with the kid next to her. They were loving it.
Then she ducked down and picked something up. The crowd rushed forward then and I lost sight of her, but later I saw her get arrested, and saw her face close up. It was her all right.
Later I heard the police were asking for witnesses, so I came forward.’
* This is also known as an ‘identification parade’: a number of people form a line and the witness points out the one he or she claims to have seen. If the suspect is identified in this way, that is a form of direct evidence.
Discuss whether Amelia’s story is plausible (or is it far-fetched?). Is it corroborated by any of the other evidence and, if so, how
strongly? Is it seriously challenged by any of the other evidence?
Activity
Commentary
It is a reasonably plausible story. Anyone who has been a student, or knows students, would agree that most of them tend to shop as economically as they can, and if eggs can be got more cheaply by taking a container and buying them loose that makes sense. What is more, if there are only three residents in the flat (or apartment) then it also makes perfect sense to buy multiples of three, and not ten.
This does not prove Amelia was innocent, but it goes some way towards tipping the balance back in her favour.
What is more, there is considerable corroboration from both the stallholder and the other students with whom she shares the flat. Of course the flatmates might be
protecting her by answering as they do. They were questioned separately, so the fact that they gave exactly the same answers could mean they were telling the truth. But it could also mean they had prepared what they would say. As far as the stallholder is concerned, he has no
going on does not mean she actively took part in it. Besides, his identification of Amelia is practically worthless, for reasons which will be discussed in the next chapter. You may also have detected a possible tone of disapproval in his statement, for Amelia or for student demonstrators generally, which could be interpreted as prejudice. He might want her to be guilty, for one reason or another.
• Evidence takes many forms.
• The terms ‘evidence’ and ‘reason’ have some overlap in meaning when used in the context of arguments, and care must be taken to use them appropriately.
• Evidence can be divided into two main categories: direct and indirect (or circumstantial). Circumstantial evidence requires an inference to be made from the facts to the conclusion.
• Evidence is strongest when it is corroborated by other evidence.
Summary
reason to say anything which would assist Amelia. Evidently he doesn’t even know her.
You may have answered these questions slightly differently, but you should have registered that the circumstantial evidence against Amelia now looks less threatening. It fits just as well with her statement as it does with the charge made against her. What has always to be remembered with circumstantial evidence is that if it can be explained away, and the explanation is not far-fetched, no safe conclusion can be drawn from it. An
evaluation of the evidence in this case would not be nearly strong enough to justify a conviction because any number of students, or others, could have bought eggs, and could have thrown them. Amelia is no longer in a special position, but is one of many potential suspects.
What about the ‘eyewitness’ statement?
Prima facie (meaning ‘on the face of it’) this may seem to count against Amelia. However, there are a number of weaknesses in Rajinder Choudhury’s evidence that you should have noted. Firstly, he did not see Amelia actually throw anything; all he saw was her reaction.
The claim that she was enjoying what was
previous day. He couldn’t be sure of the time. The Sunday papers had printed the story of White’s arrest, with a recent photograph of him getting out of the same white car at a friend’s wedding.
a How strong is the evidence provided by Mrs Short? Does it count as corroboration for Mr Green’s accusation?
b How reliable is the restaurant owner as a witness?
c What problems are there with Mr Long’s evidence?
d Where would you look for further evidence if you were investigating this case?
3 (Harder task)
‘Because of the compensation-claim culture which has grown up in many countries, advertising by lawyers and conditional-fee agreements for personal injury cases should not be permitted.’
Write a short evidence-based argument supporting or challenging this
recommendation. Base your argument on the evidence found in Docs 3 and 4 in Chapter 4.1 (pages 131–2, 134), and give an assessment of how strongly you think this supports your conclusion.
Answers and comments are on page 324.
1 Explain the difference between direct and indirect evidence, giving illustrative examples.
2 Imagine an investigation that turns on whether a certain person, whom we’ll call Mr White, visited another person, Mr Green, one Saturday afternoon.
Mr Green is accusing Mr White of coming to his house and assaulting him.
• A witness, Mrs Short, who lives in the flat below Mr Green, says that she saw a man answering White’s description arriving by car at the house on that Saturday. Later, when she went out to the shop, she noticed the car again, and thought she saw a parking ticket on the windscreen.
• White says he was nowhere near Green’s house, and produces a second witness – a restaurant owner – who testifies that White was in his restaurant on the Saturday in question, and that he stayed there all afternoon; and that his car – a white Peugeot – was in the restaurant car park the whole time.
White and the restaurant owner are old friends and business partners.
• On the Sunday evening a third witness, Mr Long, who lives opposite Green but doesn’t know him or White or the restaurant owner, comes forward and states that he had seen a white Peugeot parked outside his (Long’s) house the
End-of-chapter assignments
4.4 Credibility
Whilst we are often unable to say with confidence whether or not a claim is true, we can make a judgement as to its credibility – how justified we are in believing it. Credibility is determined by two main factors. The first is the plausibility of the claim itself. A wildly improbable claim is less credible than an unsurprising claim that fits in well with our other beliefs. But, as we all discover from time to time, something wildly improbable can on occasions be true, and something highly plausible can be false.
You may recall your role as the imaginary time-traveller in Chapter 2.3, attempting to convince a pre-Copernican population that the Earth is not a flat dish but a large ball whirling like a bucket on an invisible rope around a distant nuclear furnace . . . You can imagine their incredulity, given their other beliefs at that time. The account of the solar system that we now regard as fact was once so far beyond people’s understanding as to be fantastical. If the Earth were a ball, surely the people on the sides and underneath would fall off! Isaac Newton’s theory of universal gravity was not yet formulated; and that too was treated with derision when it was first announced.
Likewise some of today’s new scientific theories seem improbable. Some of the implications of quantum physics are more like science fiction than science fact, especially to a non-scientist. They don’t make ordinary sense, any more than the solar system made ordinary sense in the middle ages. The point of this is that plausibility and justification do not always correspond. Just because a claim seems implausible we should not reject it out of hand; nor should we accept a claim just because it seems plausible. We need methods
of evaluating claims that are more critical than merely relying on common sense.