Ethical issues across different fields of forensic science

Abstract

Many commentators have acknowledged the fact that the usual courtroom maxim to “tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth” is not so easy to apply in practicality. In any given situation, what does the whole truth include? In case, the whole truth includes all the possible alternatives for a given situation, what should a forensic expert witness do when an important question is not asked by the prosecutor? Does the obligation to tell the whole truth mean that all possible, all probable, all reasonably probable, all highly probable, or only the most probable alternatives must be given in response to a question? In this paper, an attempt has been made to review the various ethical issues in different fields of forensic science, forensic psychology, and forensic DNA databases. Some of the ethical issues are common to all fields whereas some are field specific. These ethical issues are mandatory for ensuring high levels of reliability and credibility of forensic scientists.

Dilemas éticos en la práctica psicológica forense: Revisión sistemática y análisis bibliométrico

“…El dilema de aceptar llevar a cabo una evaluación psicológica forense sin tener la formación especializada en psicología forense se ubica en la categoría de dilemas sobre competencia profesional y fue identificado en cuatro textos (Yadav, 2017;Molina, 2012;Ackerman y Pritzl, 2012;Urra, 2010). En estos casos, los autores afirman que es frecuente que los psicólogos acepten realizar una evaluación psicológica para responder a los cuestionamientos legales sin contar con un entrenamiento o capacitación previa en psicología forense, lo cual resulta delicado dadas las implicaciones que los resultados pueden tener en la vida de los participantes en el proceso jurídico/judicial.…”

“…De los 16 textos revisados sobre los dilemas éticos en psicología forense en la figura 2, puede apreciarse que 8 (50 %) de ellos fueron realizados en Estados Unidos de América (Ackerman y Pritzl, 2011;Bush et al, 2014;Candilis y Neal, 2014;Neal y Brodsky, 2014;Pirelli, et al, 2018;Richards et al, 2015;Richards y Tussey, 2013;Vaisman-Tzachor, 2014); dos (12.5 %) fueron elaborados en España (Molina, et al, 2012;Urra, 2010); dos (12.5 %) en Australia (Allan, 2013;Thomson, 2013); uno (6.25 %) en Alemania (Fromberger, et al, 2018); uno (6.25 %) en India (Yadav, 2017); uno (6.25 %) en Nueva Zelanda (Barnao et al, 2012) y uno (6.25 %) en Reino Unido (Davies et al, 2013).…”

Ethical criteria when a (potential) perpetrator asks a human rights organization to defend their case based on the forensic documentation of alleged torture. How shall we proceed?

“…Some (Adshead & Sarkar, 2020) analyse the ethics of particular treatment techniques without addressing the background issue of whether to accept a client in the first place. Some authors compile different professional forensic and medical criteria for decisions (Swanepoel, 2010;Yadav, 2017), but only propose a vague case-by-case decision-making process. A few authors propose integrated models of legal and medical duties called "robust professionalism" (Candilis, 2009) that advocate for a compassionate inquiry into clients' backgrounds and reason for becoming torturers.…”

Forensic organizational psychology: shedding light on the positive repercussions of ethical leadership in forensic medicine

“…Despite the existence of various organizational ethical codes emerging from diverse forensic international associations, various forensic scandals have recently occurred. Yadav (2017) suggested that organizational forensic ethical codes should be complemented with personal and ethical codes. His recommendation was, however, vague as his study did not clarify what personal and professional ethical codes actually refer to.…”