Expert Testimony
In 1993 Meadow gave expert testimony at the trial of Beverley Allitt, a paediatric nurse accused (and later found guilty) of murdering several of her patients.
Meadow went on to testify in many other trials, many of which concerned cases previously diagnosed as cot death or sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Meadow was convinced that many apparent cot deaths were in fact the result of physical abuse.
Families that had suffered more than one cot death were to attract particular attention: "There is no evidence that cot deaths runs in families", said Meadow, "but there is plenty of evidence that child abuse does". His rule of thumb was that "unless proven otherwise, one cot death is tragic, two is suspicious and three is murder". Although this dictum is believed not to have originated from Meadow's own lips, it has become almost universally known as Meadow's law.
Read more about this topic: Roy Meadow
Famous quotes containing the words expert and/or testimony:
“If you want an expert on war, you get a retired general. I’m not exactly a general, but I am retired.”
—Sydney Biddle Barrows (b. 1952)
“I have been too long acquainted with human nature to have great regard for human testimony; and a very great degree of probability, supported by various concurrent circumstances, conspiring in one point, will have much greater weight with me, than human testimony upon oath, or even upon honour; both of which I have frequently seen considerably warped by private views.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)