Abstract
This chapter reviews a range of cases in England, Scotland, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand and Canada where expert evidence has figured prominently in relation to ASD. It identifies situations in which the evidence has been effective in facilitating a better informed decision by courts and what has led in others to courts not adopting or appreciating the nuances of the evidence that has been given in forensic reports or in viva voce evidence. The aspiration is to provide assistance to mental health professionals in relation to where they should direct their investigations and their analyses, as well in relation to errors which they should avoid, and also to legal practitioners in relation to how they should focus their commissioning of expert reports from mental health practitioners and where they should focus their questioning of expert witnesses.
Some material in this chapter has previously been published in more extensive form in Freckelton (2011, 2020a, 2020c). It is reproduced with permission.
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Freckelton, I. (2021). Expert Evidence about Autism Spectrum Disorder. In: Volkmar, F.R., Loftin, R., Westphal, A., Woodbury-Smith, M. (eds) Handbook of Autism Spectrum Disorder and the Law. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-70913-6_3
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