Minimizing the reliability of the prosecution’s witnesses

When you’re accused of criminal wrongdoing, you have to aggressively defend yourself if you want to protect your future. After all, any kind of conviction can upend life as you know it, making it hard to reclaim the life that you once knew.

One area of attack that you might want to focus on in your criminal case is the reliability of the prosecution’s witnesses. If you’re not careful, their testimony could lead to conviction and land you behind bars. So how can you minimize the impact of their testimony?

Attacking witness credibility

The jury in your case will be tasked with assigning what it deems to be the appropriate amount of weight to witness testimony. If you allow the prosecution’s witnesses to testify uncontested, then the jury will likely take them at their word. If you can bring their reliability into question, though, then you can reduce the amount of weight that the jury gives that testimony.

There are several ways to attack the credibility and reliability of a witness, too, including doing the following:

• Pointing out any inconsistent statements that the witness has made, including those that were made under oath during a deposition.
• Illustrating any motivation that the witness may have to testify against you.
• Showing any negative animosity or bias that the witness has towards you.
• Demonstrating the witness’s character for untruthfulness, which may include educating the jury on the witness’s criminal history as it relates to their honesty.
• Using other evidence to show that the witness’s testimony can’t be trusted.

Don’t let weak evidence destroy your future

The prosecution is going to come across confident in your criminal case. Don’t let that rattle you too much. There are prosecutorial weaknesses in many criminal cases. You just have to find them in your case and exploit them to your advantage as you build your criminal defense.