Admission of a recovered memory in a court case Essay Example

courts started allowing recovered memory testimony as part of evidence despite the tough objection by defendants who argued that the use of recovery memory had no scientific basis. The defendants also argued that the memories were not true, implanted into the patient through a combination of suggestive questioning and drug therapy. In the 1990`s, there was some reluctance and acceptance of the ideas that recovery memories were not true and this led to a black lash in its use in the law. In a court room which is handling a case on a recovered memory, the repressed memory should have the following characteristics: the claimants of the case should be available, when the alleged claim took place, the individual being sued, the conditions which this memory of childhood were developed, the information provided about the therapy and the source of repressed memories of concern to the court.

According to research done by Williams, he found out that thirty eight percent of women who had once been sexually abused at their early ages could not even remember the in cadence after seventeen years and especially when it was done by someone close and familiar to them. In this work I shall analyze some of the known truths or the positive side of believing in recovery memories and also look further deep into the shortcomings which are brought by putting much trust in recovery memories. A recovered memory can either be wrong or right. After analyzing the positive and negative side of recovered memories, I shall come up with a final decision and the kind of reaction I would take as a judge if I was to rule

upon such a case of a recovered memory.

As a judge, I would rule in the favor of the woman. I will recommend that the woman present her recovered memory of abuse to the jury. I will base my ruling on scientific evidence of Schooler and his coworkers (Schooler, 2001;Schooler, Ambadar, &Bendiksen, 1997) who described case studies of persons who remembered long forgotten incidents of CSA that were corroborated. In addition, the study shows that these recovered memories experiences are not false but instead arise because of other ways. Some of the victims who lost their memory tend to talk about the incidences of abuse even before the memory recovery. The ‘’forgot it at all’’ phenomenon, makes the individual to fail to remember anything before the recollection of the abuse. With this phenomenon, it is likely that the father actually sexually abused the woman and therefore the jury should grant her fair judgment.

In addition, the woman should present her case to the jury basing on the following four points that explain reported forgetting of traumatic events. These points include; dissociation, ordinary forgetting, repression and false memory. Dissociation is associated with separation of normal related mental processes causing them to function differently from the rest. It is hard to reject this explanation of dissociation when it comes to memory recovery. Another supporting point is repressed memory, memories of traumatic events like sexual abuse do remain in the mind of the victim and it affects his or her conscious thought and action. High level of stress is one of the causes of repression, whereby the individual might not be able to recall the event though it still affects

him or her consciously.

Basing judgment on normal forgetting, the woman will have to be given a chance to present her case. It is normal that human beings are bound to forget some traumatic events. The woman might have forgotten sexual assault by the father while she was in tender age but remembered the event after she grew up. Remembering of the forgotten memory may be triggered by media presentation like television show and movies. As a judge, I will have to consider all the options that might have led the woman to remember the sexual assault by the father.
On the other hand child sexual abuse memories cannot be full reliable; this is because it depends on others to collaborate the events that took place during the time that the abuse took place. This may include witness who were present when the ordeal happen which may include the perpetrators themselves. It may also require the help of a therapy which helps in triggering the memories of the abuse.

According to Loftus (1993) Memories recovered by persons themselves seem to be truer as compared to memories recovered during therapy. In this case child abuse memories recovered during therapy are in many cases seen as false memory. This is simply because persons who undergo therapy are subjected to a series of triggers which in turn bring about false memory. Child sexual abuse memories may not be relied on because some of the therapist may be triggering false memory knowing so as to benefit from more from their clients. The memories may end up being real and vivid in the clients mind hence putting to question the reliability of the

memories. On the other hand most child abuse memory depend on the memories and the ability to remember of a person hence leaving little or no room of clinical views or tests to confirm what really happened. This undermines the credibility of the victims’ case in the court of law even if the child abuse really took place, it would be difficult to for a jury or judge to believe (Geraerts, 2009).

In some instances studies have shown that some people create false memories in order to help themselves to cope with the post traumatic stress of a similar incident that took place, mind playing tricks o n a person.
Most times the only option available is to depend on the memory of person which in many instances as shown by the many scholars it’s not enough.

In conclusion the woman should not be allowed to allow submitting her recovery memory evidence to the jury simply because there are very many contradicting circumstances. The evidence is mostly relying on the memory of the woman and this will force the jury to speculate around the issue, further more there are no witnesses to collaborate her story hence making the evidence not reliable since the only thing being depended on is the word and memory of the woman. Admitting this in to evidence will be unfair to the accused since the reliability of the evidence is in question. This might also be a false memory and if admitted to evidence will be unfair to the accused. Some of the jury may be sympathizers of the woman hence and by admitting this into evidence will be unfair to the accused person.

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