Making Forensic Evaluations: Forensic Objectivity in the Swedish Criminal Justice System

Abstract

This chapter discusses contemporary forensic evaluation practices in contemporary Sweden, in the laboratory and at the crime scene. At both sites, forensic practitioners must manage—and communicate—uncertainty. In the forensic laboratory, forensic scientists use a Bayesian approach to evaluate laboratory results, quantifying inescapable uncertainty and thus making it manageable. This approach has recently also been developed and adapted for crime scene technicians to evaluate their findings at crime scenes. This chapter discusses this extension to the crime scene, arguing that qualities such as impartiality and reliability are not inherent to forensic evidence but are the product of particular forensic practices. In other words, this chapter contends that forensic objectivity must be continuously negotiated and maintained—forensic objectivity is not a past concern but very much an ever-present one in criminal justice.

I am deeply grateful to my interlocutors for opening their world and generously giving of their limited time to me, to the Swedish Research Council and the Swedish Foundation for Humanities and Social Sciences for funding this research, and to my Body, Knowledge, Subjectivity colleagues for their invaluable comments.