"this young lady has definitely got a bit of a criminal past."

[passionflower]

I understand. But my point was primarily that the fraud charges show that her disregard for others was long-standing.

I don't expect stuff like that to be admissible, but it gives the people piecing things together a greater understanding of the type of person they are dealing with. For example, it might give medical experts a foothold so that they can attempt to unravel Casey Anthony.

In terms of being directly used to convict someone, no. They're not a big deal. But in terms of identifying the type of person we're dealing with, the prior bad acts say quite a lot.

I think you are right about former acts........