Savage at Crime Scene

The first thing I noticed is obviously the way he drove into the crime scene.  He barrelled right into the driveway, and nearly hit the two other detectives that were already there.  He could have also ran over some substancial evidence that may have been on the ground, hence the reason there were cones there.

He seemed to have a very laid back attitude about the whole investigation, dismissing the sargent from the scene and saying he was going to re-trace the whole incident. He did not do fingerprinting properly and was waving the finger printing materials in his assistant's face, which is unsanitary.
Upon entering the bathroom, he proceeds to wipe off blood smears that appear on the mirror instead of documenting them as evidence and having them tested.  When a bag of heroin was discovered in the kitchen, instead of taking it in for testing, he dips his finger in it to taste it, thus destroying evidence.    When it came time to treating the media, he was very impolite and did not handle the conference in a professional manner at all.

While this is an obvious exaderation of a real investigation, I do feel like this could actually happen because some police officers are careless, ignorant, or they just honestly don't know.  Falsyfing evidence is very popular, and commonly done accidentally.  However some police officers will on purposly falsify evidence to cover for another officer or someone they know.  What should be done to prevent these instances is more education about the importance of evidence and honestly collecting it.  Officers should be made accountable for their actions if they do something that falsifies the evidence or if they fail to document it.

Court Diagram

First, on the lowest of the diagram is Circuit court, which in new hampshire has 3 divisions- family, which takes care of adoption, domestic violence, divorce and custody battles, juvenile cases, and child services.  Next comes the Probate division which deals with last wills/testaments, adoptions, estates, guardianship of certain people after a death, and equity.  Finally, to finish out the Circuit division is the circuit court district division which deals with landlord/tenants, civil cases involving property that spans up to $25,000, small claims cases up to $5,000, misdemeanors, traffic violations and domestic violence petitions, depending on the county.

Next step up from Circuit is Superior court.  Superior court handles the jury trials in both criminal and civil cases, cases that involved damage to a person or property that values higher than $1,500, serious crimes, and also handles certain appeals from the district circuit court.

Lastly, we arrive at the Supreme  court, they decide appeals from all the court levels and also offer opinions to the executive and legislative branches of the government.

Source: http://www.courts.state.nh.us/selfhelp/find_your_court.htm

Polygraphs

Should lie detector tests be admissible in court?  How can polygraphs assist police in finding a suspect? When are they misused?

I feel that lie detector tests should be admissible in court because the suspect being polygraphed is made aware and given the conscious choice to submit to a polygraph or not, therefore waiving the fact of permission.  Therefore, the results of the polygraph are able to be used in a court setting as documented evidence.  Polygraphs can help police because, simply put, police re not psychics or mindreaders (except in movies like RIPD) and cannot reach into the suspect's mind and body to determine and pull out a detected lie.  The polygraph calmly acts as the psychic in this case and gently can tell if the suspect is lying, without torturing the suspect physically.  They can be misused however, because some police officers use it as a crutch instead of focusing on the importance of the evidence it can bring up.  Some police officers automatically make all suspects submit to a polygraph, even when there is no pre-evidence that the suspect is possibly lying.