Chapter 1: Basic Principles of Courtroom Testifying
The Value of Truth
The Bedrock for All Effective Testimony - Credibility
Likeability
Competency
Honesty
The Most Important of All Witness Skills - Visualization
Chapter 2: Witness Preparation
Bad Investigations Make Bad Police Witnesses
The Basic Elements of a Police Report
Working With the Prosecutor
Pre-Trial Police-Prosecutor Meeting
Review Police Report Before Meeting
The Witness Preparation Conference
Visiting Crime Scene
Exhibits
The Structure of a Direct Examination
Practicing Direct Examination
Preparing for Cross-Examination
Redirect Examination
Officer at Counsel Table During Trial
Witness Checklist
Chapter 3: Direct Examination
Direct Examination Testimony Must First Be Credible
Direct Examination - Goals
Direct Examination Question Strings for Traffic Officers
Elevating Quality of Police Officer's Testimony
Special Training and Experience
Measurement Accuracy and Completeness
Basis for Reconstruction, SFST, and DRE Methodologies
Certainty of Opinion Testimony
Photographic and Videotape Evidence
Lens
Full Frame
Including All Perspectives
Photograph Details
Using a Filter
Photograph Investigators
Photograph Log
Digital Photographs
Videotape Evidence
Picking Fruits of "Credibility Tree"
Calibration and Accuracy of Equipment
Walking Scene to Look for Potentially Exculpatory Evidence
Documenting Witness Locations on Drawings of Scene
Prior Investigations Where No Charges Brought
Consultations With Other Departments
Description of Reference Point Used for Measurements
Additional Measurements Not Used in Analysis of Crash
Multiple Measurements of Evidence, With Values Most Favorable to Defendant, Used in All Calculations
Drawing(s) of Scene Verified by Actual Measurements
Going Back to Scene of Nighttime Crash During Daylight Hours
Use of Models to Show Jury How Crash Occurred
Inspection of Deflated Tires and Coinciding Road Evidence
Inoculation Against Defense Attacks
Omissions in Evidence Gathering or Documentation
Expert's Opinion Differs From Testimony of Civilian Witness
Calculations Could Not Be Corroborated
Reconstructionist Not Present at Scene
Witness a Crash Reconstructionist Not Expert in Other Areas
No Statement From Defendant
Unprepared Witness
No Tests Preformed on Vehicles Involved in Crash
Chapter 4: Cross Examination
Cross-Examination - What the Police Witness Needs to Know
Cross-Examinations Dictate Case Outcomes
Two Types of Cross-Examination
General Areas of Attack on Police Witnesses
Attacking the Police Witness' Perception and/or Memory of an Event
Prior Inconsistent Statements
Bias, Prejudice and Motivation
Incompetence
Specific Attack Strategies for Traffic Officers
Common Attacks on Police Accident Reconstructionists
Control
The Use of Leading Questions
The Use of Headlines
Interrupting the Witness
Intimidation
Using the Judge
Use of a Document
Witness Strategies to Counter the Cross-Examination
Witness Control of Time
Defense Attorney Incompetence
Applying Visualization in Cross-Examination
In-Depth Analysis of Strategies Used in Reconstruction
Witness Knowledge/Competency
Incomplete or Faulty Investigation
Errors in Investigation or Reconstruction
Attacks on the Certainty of Opinion(s)
Partridge, Gerald N.
Gerald N. Partridge is a retired career prosecutor who served four terms as County Attorney for Washington County, Iowa and is widely recognized as one of the finest trial advocacy instructors in the nation. He is the Executive Director of Legal Sciences, Inc., a company that creates monthly computer-based police training lessons. He teaches witness preparation and cross examination for police and prosecutor agencies across the country, including the National College of District Attorneys.
Kwasnoski, John B.
John B. Kwasnoski is a Professor Emeritus of Forensic Physics at Western New England College. He has completed more than 500 accident reconstructions and testified throughout the country in criminal and civil cases, including the Susan Smith case in Union, South Carolina. He has written extensively on accident investigation and trial techniques and has lectured nationwide before police officers on DUI issues.
Stephen, John A.
John A. Stephen attended the University of New Hampshire, where he earned a bachelor¿s degree in Business Administration in 1984 from the Whittemore School of Business and Economics. Mr. Stephen then matriculated to Detroit College of Law, part of Michigan State University, and graduated Cum Laude with a Juris Doctorate degree in 1987.
Upon his graduation from law school in 1987, Mr. Stephen began his legal career as a Law Clerk for United States Federal District Court Judge Martin F. Loughlin.
After serving one year as a Law Clerk, Mr. Stephen became an Assistant Hillsborough County Attorney where he prosecuted numerous misdemeanor and felony crimes. In March of 1992, he became an Assistant Attorney General with the New Hampshire Department of Justice. In that capacity, he was the Director of the DWI Unit and was responsible for the statewide supervision of DWI-related cases. In addition to his duties as Director of the DWI Unit, Mr. Stephen prosecuted homicide crimes and regularly appeared before the New Hampshire Supreme Court on appellate issues involving criminal law.
In 1998, Governor Jeanne Shaheen appointed Mr. Stephen as Assistant Commissioner of the Department of Safety. Governor Craig Benson re-appointed him to the position in March of 2003. He assisted the Commissioner in overseeing the Divisions of State Police, Motor Vehicles, Safety Services and Fire Standards and Training. He also was directly responsible for the Division of Fire Safety and Emergency Management, including the E-911 Bureau, and served as the Commissioner¿s designee on numerous Commissions and Committees.
In April of 2003, Mr. Stephen was appointed by Commissioner Richard Flynn as the State of New Hampshire¿s Coordinator of Homeland Security. In that capacity, he acted as a liaison between the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the state, county, and local governments in New Hampshire. Mr. Stephen was also the architect behind the Memorandum of Understanding between the Department of Safety and the Department of Health and Human Services, consolidating emergency preparedness responsibilities and centralizing hospital bioterrorism funding.
In October of 2003 Governor Benson appointed Mr. Stephen as Commissioner of the Department of Health and Human Services for a four-year term. As Commissioner of the Department of Health and Human Services, he is charged with ensuring the health and well being of New Hampshire¿s residents, with particular emphasis on the most vulnerable citizens. Administrative responsibility includes Medicaid, elder services, financial assistance, mental health, disabilities, drug and alcohol, public health, child support, juvenile justice services and child protective services.
Mr. Stephen has for many years lectured local and state police, as well as prosecutors, on various legal and homeland security-related issues, including search and seizure and constitutional law. Mr. Stephen is an Adjunct Instructor at the New Hampshire Police Standards and Training Police Academy, where he has taught in the areas of criminal procedure, search and seizure, DWI apprehension and detection, accident reconstruction and drug recognition. He is also on the faculty at the New Hampshire Community Technical College, where he teaches criminal procedure.
Mr. Stephen has also published articles, manuals and books in different legal areas of police investigation and prosecution. He is the co-author of the Officer¿s DUI Handbook and Courtroom Survival: Making the Traffic Officer a Powerful Witness, and is the author of the Officer¿s Search & Seizure Handbook and the Officer¿s Arrest Handbook, all criminal and traffic law series publications by LexisNexis¿. Mr. Stephen is also co-author of LexisNexis¿s Investigation and Prosecution of DWI and Vehicular Homicide, and is the author of the highly regarded New Hampshire DWI Manual.
Mr. Stephen is married and has two children.
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