Any evidence certainly will have to be scrutinized in court--not least of all the "cadaver dog" evidence. Who says there is any scientific accuracy in that at all? I know it's a popular notion and nice to believe, but who says how accurate it is at all? I mean, the dogs alerted on areas of the back yard. There wasn't anything there. So then, the rationalization that's applied is that the corpse must have been there but was moved, or someone touched a corpse and touched that area, etc, etc. There's some explanation regardless how the dogs alert. Well if it goes to court, hopefully we will hear what, if any, research has been done to determine the rate of accuracy of cadaver dogs noses. It's funny how quick some people are to just accept whatever new technique is used, though, no questions asked.
OK, I'll play.
As others have said, Cadaver dogs are well documented in court. As are all types of trained, certified search dogs.
However the dogs cannot give testimony in court. Instead what they do is open up an area of investigation, or a probable cause for LE to investigate something deeper. In court Cadaver Dog findings are always backed up by other corraborating evidence. This is the same for all types of search animals. A drug sniffing dog will give probable cause to search an area, but yu cannot get a drug conviction just on teh dogs nose. It needs to be backed up by other clear evidence at trial.
In this case we have two solid hits by the dogs on the car trunk. That may not be much in and of itself. And certainly would not convict someone. But when added to and corraborated by;
- Cindy's excited utterance in the initial 911 call, "It smells like a dead body". Excited Utterances are given a huge amount of credibility in court.
- The initial Investigator clearly described the smell of human decomposition in the vehicles trunk. The investigator testified to this in court while under oath. He also confirmed to the court that he had encountered this particular smell in the past, in the course of his duties as a homicide investigator. His experiences in this area are well and clearly documented, making him an extremely credible witness.
- The tow yard manager noted the smell when he was interviewed by LE. While by no means an expert, he was able to directly relate the smell to one that he had encountered previously in a situation that involved a dead and decomposing human corpse (the 5 day old suicide in a diferent car).
- a reluctant witness does admit to investigators that yes, he did notice the smell at the same time as the tow yard manager, and they did have some discussion of it.
- The air tests done at the body farm showed strong traces of the specific patern of chemical byproducts found in human decomposition. While a new test, which has not yet been fully used in court, it does use well proven technology, procedures and principles, that have been used many time in courts. While it is probably not enough and sufficiently unproven to be used as the soul source of evidence, it is more then sufficient to act as a secondary coraborating piece of evidence that supports other information, such as witness statements, search dog hits and lab test results.
- Stains showing bodily fluids discharged during decomposition of a human body are found in the trunk. This test is done by the FBI crime lab. Commonly recognized as one of, if not the, best in the world. Almost unimpeachable in court, absent a clear example of gross negligence. The witness statements, dog hits and independent air tests pretty much rule out any such negligence or error.
- human hair found in the trunk shows the bacterial ring commonly only observed post mortem.
So right there is 7 completely independent items that coraborate and back up the cadaver dogs hits. Question the dogs capabilities all you want, but the results will not change. the dogs detected death in that trunk, the humans detected death in that trunk, and the lab tests detected death in that trunk. 2 dogs, 4 humans, and at least 3 lab diferent lab tests. Undermining one of these elements will not make the others go away.
