Driving Offences, reporting people anonymously question

Backside

So, you have footage of someone doing dangerous things in thier car on a main road (hypothetically), you report them to the Gardai but they tell you that you will have to testify in court.

Why the need to testify in court if the hard evidence is damning enough already?

GerardKeating

Backside wrote: »

So, you have footage of someone doing dangerous things in thier car on a main road (hypothetically), you report them to the Gardai but they tell you that you will have to testify in court.

Why the need to testify in court if the hard evidence is damning enough already?

Well for a start, to testify

• that the footage is real
• when and where it was taken

Pro Hoc Vice

Backside wrote: »

So, you have footage of someone doing dangerous things in thier car on a main road (hypothetically), you report them to the Gardai but they tell you that you will have to testify in court.

Why the need to testify in court if the hard evidence is damning enough already?

Think it through. There is no evidence given to the court of the time and date the footage was take, there is no evidence that the footage was recorded by x person. There is no chain of custody evidence, that is I took the film, I then transferred the raw footage to a computer, I then transferred that to a CD or DVD or VHS tape or to a memory card. I then labeled that copy with the lable DD1 and signed my name. I then transferred that copy and the other copies to x Garda on x date and time. Then that Garda gives evidence of giving it to the next person etc.

There is no evidence given in court that it was a public place, there is no evidence given as to the circumstances on the day in question.

To put it simply physical evidence can not just be handed into court with out all the necessary proofs in place.