 Mystery: October 23, 2019 Issue [#9824] |
This week: Tampering with evidence Edited by: Arakun the twisted raccoon  
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Quote for the week: "The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd."
~Bertrand Russell |
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A case against a criminal is only as strong as the evidence. If the evidence is found to be unreliable, the case will fall apart.
Evidence can be unreliable for many reasons. For example, the fact that a suspect's DNA is found at a murder scene does not mean anything if the suspect had an innocent reason to be there.
Evidence might not be allowed in court if defense attorneys can prove it was interfered with in some way or not obtained legally. Even evidence that was obtained legally might actually be unreliable if it was deliberately planted to throw the police off the track.
Planted evidence in your story might be include weapons, DNA, money, stolen goods, drugs, photos, or anything else designed to throw the investigators off the track. The real guilty party might plant evidence that will lead to another person being blamed for the crime. Maybe a character might believe a certain person is guilty of a crime, and will plant evidence leading to that person to make sure they are caught. The police might even actually plant evidence themselves if they are sure their suspect is guilty but have a weak case. Planted evidence might lead to an innocent person being wrongfully convicted or might ruin a case against a guilty person if it is discovered to be false.
The strongest evidence in the world will be useless if a character prevents investigators from finding it. The perpetrator might clean up fingerprints, hair, blood, or any other evidence that places them at the scene. A killer might even hide or destroy a body, burn their bloody clothes, and throw the weapon in to the sea. They might also attempt to destroy electronic evidence such as text messages, emails, computer hard drives, and security video. If your characters try to alter or destroy electronic evidence, remember that IT experts often have ways of recovering what was removed.
A killer might try to make a murder look like suicide by placing a gun in the victim's hand or writing a fake suicide note. Another character might try to make a suicide look like murder by destroying the suicide note or removing and destroying the weapon. A character might even set up their own suicide to look like murder by planting evidence that points to someone they want blamed.
One form of unreliable evidence shows up often in mystery stories but hopefully never occurs in real life. An amateur detective or other lay person pokes around a crime scene and discovers a key piece of evidence which they bring to the police. Evidence discovered this way would not be admissible because the person would not be able to prove the circumstances under which they found it. Even actual police officers need to be careful about how they collect evidence and preserving the chain of custody that proves it was not tampered with
When you write stories that deal with unreliable evidence, you will need to think like both a criminal and a detective. How might a criminal try to hide a crime? How will the detective see through the network of lies the criminal has woven? In the best stories, it is not too easy for either of them.
Something to try: Write a mystery story that involves unreliable evidence.
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