Source of article ComCon - Communication Consulting.

Ideally, jurors asked to render a verdict in a criminal trial make judgments of guilt or innocence based solely on the trial evidence, which is presumably diagnostic of guilt or innocence. Information diagnostic of guilt or innocence includes eyewitness accounts, physical evidence, and the existence of an alibi. How does information not diagnostic of guilt or innocence – a defendant’s physical attributes or character – affect verdicts? Can such non-diagnostic evidence dilute information diagnostic of guilt?…