ABSTRACT
The two major areas in which DNA analysis is involved in court proceedings are criminal cases and paternity disputes. Other cases, although just as important, tend to be rare users of DNA analysis. Although the mechanics of DNA analysis do not alter between these, the way in which the resultant data is used does vary quite considerably. For criminal and paternity cases these differences start with the initial question that is being asked. It is important that the right question is asked for the right case. There is, for example, little point in asking the same question in a paternity case as in a criminal case. A question asked in a criminal case might be ‘what is the probability that the sample originated from this person rather than another, unrelated, individual?’, which in a paternity dispute would be meaningless, since we already know where the sample came from. It is unfortunate that very often results are presented in court without the exact question that needs to be asked being explicitly stated. This is the central element of this chapter: the right questions for the particular case with which you are faced.
