''Davie v Magistrates of Edinburgh'' 1953 S.C. 34. encapsulates the Scots law position regarding the role of

expert witness An expert witness, particularly in common law countries such as the United Kingdom, Australia, and the United States, is a person whose opinion by virtue of education, training, certification, skills or experience, is accepted by the judge as ...

es in providing their opinion to the court in criminal and

civil proceedings Civil law is a major branch of the law.Glanville Williams. ''Learning the Law''. Eleventh Edition. Stevens. 1982. p. 2. In common law legal systems such as England and Wales and the United States, the term refers to non-criminal law. The law rel ...

Case

In ''Davie v Magistrates of Edinburgh'', an expert witness gave evidence concerning the effect of

shock wave In physics, a shock wave (also spelled shockwave), or shock, is a type of propagating disturbance that moves faster than the local speed of sound in the medium. Like an ordinary wave, a shock wave carries energy and can propagate through a me ...

s in blasting operations and referred to a specific section of a pamphlet that allegedly supported his opinion. The Court of Session disproved of the Lord Ordinary's action of adopting other parts of the pamphlet that the expert had not made reference to. :" The Court cannot...rely upon such works for the purpose of displacing or criticising the witness's testimony." - at 41.

Law

Lord President

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stated that "their duty is to furnish the judge or

jury A jury is a sworn body of people (jurors) convened to hear evidence and render an impartial verdict (a finding of fact on a question) officially submitted to them by a court, or to set a penalty or judgment. Juries developed in England du ...

with the necessary scientific criteria for testing the accuracy of their conclusions, so as to enable the Judge or jury to form their own independent judgment by the application of these criteria to the facts proved in evidence." Therefore, an expert witness should only offer their opinion as to the facts that have already been established in

court A court is any person or institution, often as a government institution, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and carry out the administration of justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in acco ...

, and "should not hinder the trier of fact's duty by telling them how to assess the evidence that they have heard". The weight to be given to the evidence provided by the expert witness is a matter for the judge (in civil, or summary criminal proceedings) or jury (in solemn criminal proceedings) alone. The court also stated that "expert witnesses are only required in order that certain facts can be assessed and understood in their specialist/scientific context". Moreover, in this case it was held that "in some situations, the scientific knowledge that an expert witness claims to have must be proved in court", such as in "Hewat v Edinburgh Corporation" 1974 S.C. 30. This is to prevent false claims of credentials that may affect the reliability of the opinion advanced by the expert witness. As a result of this case, only the extracts of any literature relied upon by an expert witness whilst giving their

testimony In law and in religion, testimony is a solemn attestation as to the truth of a matter. Etymology The words "testimony" and "testify" both derive from the Latin word ''testis'', referring to the notion of a disinterested third-party witness. ...

may be used against them to challenge their opinion. The remainder of any texts/journals is not admissible and thus cannot be relied upon by the expert or any other party to the proceedings.

Notes

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*Raitt, F, Evidence: Principles, Policy and Practice, Edinburgh: W. Green, 2008 1953 in case law 1953 in Scotland Scottish case law Evidence case law History of Edinburgh 1950s in Edinburgh 1953 in British law {{Edinburgh-stub