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What s 25 of the 1997 Act does is to enable, not require, the prosecution to dispense with the necessity to call a doctor, someone on the General Register of Medical Practitioners under s 26 of the Medical Practitioners Act 1978, and instead to rely on an evidential certificate which the legislation admits as an exception to the rule against hearsay. Thus:
In any proceedings for an offence alleging the causing of harm or serious harm to a person, the production of a certificate purporting to be signed by a registered medical practitioner and relating to an examination of that person, shall unless the contrary is proved, be evidence of any fact thereby certified without proof of any signature thereon or that any such signature is that of such practitioner.
More radical, since the reform does not depend on the consent of the accused, is s 16 of the Criminal Justice Act 2006 enabling the admission in evidence of a formal statement made prior to trial where a witness is available for cross-examination by the accused but has given evidence materially inconsistent with the prior narrative, has refused to give evidence or denies ever making that statement; see The People (DPP) v Rattigan [2013] IECCA 3, [2013] 2 IR 221 and for the relevant formalities The People (DPP) v O�Reilly [2018] IECA 262.
Called as to the state of a person examined, or an object scrutinised for that purpose, regard may be had by an expert to existing tests and relevant notes for the purpose of giving a view on a relevant state of affairs. Reference to existing scientific or other expert literature is not a breach of the hearsay rule but the expression of an existing body of thought that informs an expert analysis.
apart from identity of person, things and handwriting are age; speed; temperature; weather; light; the passing of time; sanity; the condition of objects - new, shabby, worn; emotional and bodily states; and intoxication. The law�s hostility to opinion evidence is partly supported by the fact these are all cases where it is very easy for witnesses to make mistakes.
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