Forensic transcription – videos and readings
Ten minute video (longer video below)
About the author (with contact information)
Very quick introductions to issues in forensic transcription
- McMahon, M., & Fraser, H. 2023. Transcription of indistinct forensic audio: Time for reform. Law Institute of Victoria Journal, (August)
- Burridge, K. 2017. The dark side of mondegreens: How a simple mishearing can lead to wrongful conviction. The Conversation.
- Fraser, H. 2013. Covert recordings as evidence in court: The return of police ‘verballing’? The Conversation.
- Fraser, H. 2019. Don’t believe your ears: “enhancing” forensic audio can mislead juries in criminal trials. The Conversation.
- Fraser, H. 2020. Introducing the Research Hub for Language in Forensic Evidence. Judicial Officers’ Bulletin, 32(11), 117-118.
Cases mentioned in videos
The ‘shot the prick’ case
- Fraser, H., & Kinoshita, Y. 2021. Injustice arising from the unnoticed power of priming: How lawyers and even judges can be misled by unreliable transcripts of indistinct forensic audio. Criminal Law Journal, 45(3), 142-152.
Legal history of forensic transcription (Menzies, Butera, Eastman) from a linguistic science perspective
- Fraser, H. 2021. The development of legal procedures for using a transcript to assist the jury in understanding indistinct covert recordings used as evidence in Australian criminal trials: A history in three key cases. Language and Law / Linguagem e Direito, 8(1), 59-75.
‘Adelaide bank account’
- Fraser, H. 2018. ‘Assisting’ listeners to hear words that aren’t there: Dangers in using police transcripts of indistinct covert recordings, Australian Journal of Forensic Sciences, 50:2, 129-139.
The ‘pact’ case
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Fraser, H., & Stevenson, B. 2014. The power and persistence of contextual priming: more risks in using police transcripts to aid jurors’ perception of poor quality covert recordings. The International Journal of Evidence and Proof, 18(3), 205–229.
More detailed treatments of transcription and enhancing
- French, P., & Fraser, H. 2018. Why “ad hoc experts” should not provide transcripts of indistinct forensic audio, and a proposal for a better approach. Criminal Law Journal, 42, 298-302.
- Fraser, H. 2020. Enhancing forensic audio: What works, what doesn’t, and why. Griffith Journal of Law and Human Dignity, 8(1), 85-102.
- Fraser, H., & Loakes, D. 2020. Acoustic injustice: The experience of listening to indistinct covert recordings presented as evidence in court . Law Text Culture, 24, 405-429.