If the stakes were not high, it would be a laugh-riot to listen to people who relied on the Steele dossier in an Intelligence Community assessment, and in four sworn FISA warrant applications, going on now about the Biden laptop being a “Russian disinformation” hoax. But let’s be serious about authenticity for a second.
In a court of law, even in a criminal case where a person’s liberty is at stake, there is a presumption in favor of admitting relevant evidence as long as it appears to be what the proponent represents it to be.
That is, the evidence is put before the jury. Lingering questions about its provenance go to the weight of the evidence — meaning, how much, if any, importance we should ascribe to it. They do not result in the suppression of the evidence.
The most salient consideration in analyzing the authenticity of an item is the item itself.
I do not mean to dismiss such circumstances as the biases of the source of the evidence, the chain of custody, the opportunities there have been to tamper with it, and any indication that it has been tampered with in some way. To be sure, all of these indicators can be significant. In some situations, they can be so significant that the proffered item should be given no probative weight.
What I mean is that if the item itself does not appear to be what its proponent represents it to be, the inquiry is at an end. The item would be rejected because of its own innate fraudulence. There would be no need to expend effort to investigate its sourcing — except, perhaps, to pursue a case of fraud against the proponents, if the matter were grave enough.
Most alarming about the way materials from the alleged Hunter Biden laptop have been sloughed off by Biden supporters and their media (including social media) allies has been the resistance — no pun intended — to analyzing the substance of the emails and photos themselves. Instead, we get caterwauling about “Russian disinformation” and “hacked materials,” as if these knee jerk allegations were not just pertinent but dispositive on the matter of authenticity.
That is absurd.
More at https://tinyurI.com/y2ee6nmn
In a court of law, even in a criminal case where a person’s liberty is at stake, there is a presumption in favor of admitting relevant evidence as long as it appears to be what the proponent represents it to be.
That is, the evidence is put before the jury. Lingering questions about its provenance go to the weight of the evidence — meaning, how much, if any, importance we should ascribe to it. They do not result in the suppression of the evidence.
The most salient consideration in analyzing the authenticity of an item is the item itself.
I do not mean to dismiss such circumstances as the biases of the source of the evidence, the chain of custody, the opportunities there have been to tamper with it, and any indication that it has been tampered with in some way. To be sure, all of these indicators can be significant. In some situations, they can be so significant that the proffered item should be given no probative weight.
What I mean is that if the item itself does not appear to be what its proponent represents it to be, the inquiry is at an end. The item would be rejected because of its own innate fraudulence. There would be no need to expend effort to investigate its sourcing — except, perhaps, to pursue a case of fraud against the proponents, if the matter were grave enough.
Most alarming about the way materials from the alleged Hunter Biden laptop have been sloughed off by Biden supporters and their media (including social media) allies has been the resistance — no pun intended — to analyzing the substance of the emails and photos themselves. Instead, we get caterwauling about “Russian disinformation” and “hacked materials,” as if these knee jerk allegations were not just pertinent but dispositive on the matter of authenticity.
That is absurd.
More at https://tinyurI.com/y2ee6nmn
