The Sixth Amendment of the U.S.Constitution states that:
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.
With its 2004 decision in Crawford v. Washington, the the U.S. Supreme Court redefined how the Confrontation Clause portion of the Sixth Amendment applies. Since then, the U.S. Supreme Court and lower state and federal courts have been working through the application of this landmark decision. Of particular difficulty are lab tests. Thursday it was the N.C. Supreme Court’s turn to weigh in on the matter. As the Raleigh News & Observer reports:
Under the U.S. Constitution, defendants have a right to confront their accusers. But what happens when the accuser isn’t a person, but a lab test?
Can a test speak for itself and can its results be cited as facts by expert witnesses? Or must the technicians who conduct the tests be called each time to explain the process and interpret the results?
These questions are at the core of a debate over a basic right made knotty by technology.
The state Supreme Court ruled this week in a split opinion that the test results can stand alone if cited by expert witnesses offering independent opinions.
But others contend a test should be subject to the same questioning that a person making an accusation would face, and the only way to do that is to require the analyst who conducted it to testify at trial.
It remains to be seen if that’s the last word on the matter.