A federal court in Tennessee heard arguments yesterday and today whether lie detection technology based on fMRI brain activity should be allowed in a criminal case involving a psychologist accused of defrauding Medicare. Magistrate Judge Tu Pham chaired the interim hearing and could issue his report anytime between now and June 1, when the trial begins.
The hearing provided the most formal legal test yet of whether fMRI lie detection meets the so-called Daubert standard to admit evidence in federal court, and as such, it could set an important precedent.
Last year, lawyers have applied to introduce fMRI evidence of the company lie-detection California-based No Lie MRI in cases of sexual violence in southern California (to demonstrate that the defendant told the truth). But they withdrew after prosecutors lined up expert witnesses to testify on the shortcomings of the method. And at a pre-trial hearing last week for a case of employer reprisals, a judge in New York has rejected an attempt to introduce fMRI lie detection evidence Cephos, the same company based in Massachusetts involved in Tennessee. New York The applicant's lawyers had hoped to use fMRI scans and expert testimony of Cephos to demonstrate that a witness told the truth, but the judge decided that the establishment of the credibility of a witness is the work the jury, not expert witnesses.
fMRI brain scans were introduced earlier in the sentencing phase of a murder trial (to indicate that the defendant had a brain disorder and should be spared the death penalty). But lawyers say that the requirements for the admission of evidence hardly are generally less stringent than those of a trial to determine the innocence or guilt.
Unlike previous cases involving fMRI lie detection, the court in Tennessee have heard evidence directly related to the scientific validity of the technology. The report Pham judge will take the form of a recommendation to the trial judge Jon Phipps McCalla. (Although the judge of the ordinary process would be the one to preside over a preliminary hearing, McCalla had a scheduling conflict and Pham took his place).
Stay tuned Science Insider for details as they emerge.
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