Witnesses must take an oath to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth before they can testify at trial. But witnesses sometimes mischaracterize the facts, and sometimes they straight-up lie on the stand.
Either situation can be disastrous for you in your criminal case if it goes unaddressed. After all, the judge and jury could take the witness at their word if you don’t do anything to challenge their testimony.
What can you do when a witness is being dishonest?
Leading up to trial, if you think a witness is being less than truthful, you need to prepare to call them out on it. Here are some ways you can do so:
- Depose the witness before the trial so that you can lock them into sworn statements that you can then use against them at trial.
- Find other inconsistent statements that the witness has made.
- Search their criminal history to see if they have any convictions for offenses related to dishonesty.
- Think about whether the witness is motivated to testify against you for some reason.
- Consider whether the witness is biased against you.
- Analyze the other evidence in your case to see if you can show that the witness couldn’t possibly have seen or heard what they claim to have seen or heard.
- Think about whether you can use the witness’s demeanor against them.
Attacking the credibility of the prosecution’s witnesses could be key to your criminal defense. So, be thorough here to see what you can do to minimize the impact of their testimony.
Build the aggressive criminal defense you need to protect your future
With so much on the line in your criminal case, you owe it to yourself to put forth the strongest criminal defense possible.
That’s going to take a lot of preparation and knowledge of the law, but don’t let that scare you away from the process. Instead, do everything you can to ensure you can craft compelling legal arguments aimed at attacking the prosecution’s case and protecting your future. Hopefully then you can avoid conviction and reclaim the life that’s temporarily been stripped away from you.