When prosecutors present evidence to a court, they must be ready to show that the thing they offer is the same thing the police officers, crime scene investigators, and agents seized. When that evidence is not distinctive but fungible (whether little bags of cocaine, bullet shell casings, or electronic data), the "process or system" which authenticates the item is a hand-to-hand chain of accountability.
Although courts generally have allowed any witness with knowledge to authenticate a photograph without requiring the photographer to testify, that may not suffice for digital photos. Indeed, judges may now demand that the proponent of a digital picture be ready to establish a complete chain of custody--from the photographer to the person who produced the printout for trial. Even so, the printout itself may be a distinctive item when it bears the authenticator's initials, or some other recognizable mark. If the photographer takes a picture, and then immediately prints and......

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Title: Csi Essay
Approximate Word Count: 4074
Approximate Pages: 17 (250 words per double-spaced page)

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