Editorial

Professionalism - duties and privileges

We all know that being a professional carries both duties and responsibilities. Traditionally, belonging to a profession has also carried certain privileges. Ultimately, the purpose of any professional privilege must be to facilitate the work of the professional in the interests of the public as a whole and, just possibly, to facilitate recruitment and retention to what are difficult and demanding, what's the word? - professions. Some privileges are inherent in the functions that the members of a particular profession carry out. Examples include the right of audience of barristers and the right to prescribe of physicians. Others are granted to make the work of professionals easier in the public interest. In the forensic arena there is currently the right, shared with public analysts, of some forensic scientists to give documentary evidence by certificate rather than by statement. There are few, if any, other privileges that forensic scientists have in their workplace at present.

The end point of the delivery of professional services by many, but not all, forensic professionals is the provision of factual and opinion evidence in court. Life for the court-going forensic professional is not always a bed of roses. One or two privileges would certainly make the work easier. A start would be acceptance by listing officers that a statement of unavailable dates by a professional or expert witness would normally mean just that, that one is unavailable for a good reason. Whilst, when assisting the court at the request of the prosecution, the expert is usually, but not always, asked for a list of unavailable dates, and other, often intimate, information these often appear to be ignored when the dates of trials are fixed. Worse, even when copies of summons from other courts, blocking out dates, are provided these may also be ignored. As for the supposedly over arching supremacy of the coroner's subpoena, I have had to point out to Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) case managers and lawyers that it is I, and not they, who would have to sit in the cells if I do not comply with the summons of the coroner. The coroner's subpoena, properly drafted, is such a potent tool that it should be used sparingly. To be asked to block out two weeks so that one can attend at an inquest for an hour or so on one unspecified day during that two weeks is not reasonable, except in the most exceptional case. This is particularly so if the 'summons' is signed by the coroner's officer rather than by the coroner herself, is thus invalid, and a bright CPS lawyer spots this, with the result that one becomes piggy in the middle in an undignified and unprofessional fight for one's body (and brains) between different courts.

When the forensic professional actually gets to court there can still be problems. One such problem is that the different courts apply different standards at their security checkpoints. There can be no certainty that the innocent contents of one's briefcase that are acceptable at the entrance to one court building will be acceptable elsewhere. The default mode for court security

Robert Forrest

officers is always courtesy. The exceptions can be particularly unpleasant by comparison. My worst court experience was to have all electronic gadgets in my briefcase and in my pockets confiscated on entry to the court building. When I remonstrated, pointing out that I needed them to assist the court, I was rewarded with a pat down in public by a security guard of, I think, the opposite sex. The court did not react with sympathy when I was asked to do some complex 'what if' calculations whilst in the witness box and I had to point out that I had had my calculator, programmed in anticipation of just such questions, confiscated at the court building entrance despite my reasonable explanation as to why I needed to retain it in my possession. The gall of that episode was spiced by having seen a police officer, also a witness for the prosecution, enter the court building festooned with radio, baton, mobile phone and CS spray. There are other examples of the courts not treating all who enter their doors, to assist the court as professionals, as equal security risks. Some security officers, on finding a mobile phone in my briefcase, ask, 'Are you a doctor or lawyer?' as if those two professions had any especial charisma of virtue. Two crown courts I regularly assist as an expert will rountinely impound my Dictaphone and camera, leaving my laptop, with the facility to make sound recordings for several hours, and my mobile phone, with built in camera, in my possession. Of course, I know, as does every forensic professional, that one should not take photographs within the court building or attempt to record court proceedings. I consider it to be treating me as less than a professional that I am not treated with the elementary degree of trust that assumes I know, and will follow, the proper rules for behaviour in court.

One of the advantages of professional registration ought to be that the court leaves the tools of one's profession in one's possession on entry to the court building, in the knowledge that any impropriety in their use can be dealt with not only by the court but by one's professional organisation. Even in the present climate of paranoia about security, it is difficult to see how such a privilege would constitute any sort of a security risk.

It is also not particularly 'professional' to find oneself sitting next to the accused andlor his family whilst waiting to give evidence or when eating one's lunch.

My case, in asking that recognition of the professional status of members of the Forensic Science Society should bring with it some of the privileges of other 'servants of the court' is simply that this would make our demanding work less stressful and enable us to carry it out with greater efficiency in the interests of justice.

science&.jt-istice Volume 45 ~ o . 1 (2005) I Page 1