This course covers important aspects of fact-finding and the adducing and admissibility of evidence in legal proceedings. The course is structured to meet the admission requirements for practice as a legal practitioner in the Australian States and Territories. Particular topics include:

• investigation and organisation of factual material
• adducing evidence in court
• testimonial, real and documentary evidence
• examination, cross-examination and reexamination of witnesses
• burden and standard of proof
• relevance of evidence to facts in issue
• admissibility rules (e.g. credibility, hearsay, opinion, tendency and coincidence, identification and character evidence), and exceptions
• privileges
• judicial discretions and conduct of proceedings.

The course will be based on the Evidence Law; comprising the Evidence Act 1995 (Cth), which applies in proceedings in Federal and ACT courts, along with counterpart legislation in New South Wales, Tasmania and Norfolk Island. The course also makes reference to law reform perspectives such as the recent Australian Law Reform Commission report on Uniform Evidence Law (ALRC 102).  

The course is designed to be taken towards the end of the degree. The study of evidence is required for admission to legal practice.

 At the conclusion of this course students should be able to:

• demonstrate an understanding of the core principles and purposes of the law of evidence
• demonstrate detailed knowledge of the Uniform Evidence Law legislation
• identify the relevant evidentiary issues that arise on a given set of facts
• make arguments about the way in which those evidentiary issues are likely to be resolved, noting contrary arguments and their strengths
• provide legislative support / case authorities for propositions of law that they use in those arguments
• structure an answer to a problem question in a logical and effective way
• comment critically on the legislation and cases studied during the course and identify the considerations of policy that may underpin them.

The assessment for this course will involve two compulsory examinations: one at mid-semester and one at the end of semester.

More information about the means of assessment, including the relationship between the assessment and the learning outcomes of the course, will be available on the course home page by the first week of semester.

The standard course in Semester 2 involves 3 hours of lectures per week plus 1 tutorial per week for 10 weeks.

The Summer Semester version delivers the same number of lectures over a period of 3-4 weeks with 1 tutorial per week during this period.

Torts LAWS1203 and Criminal Law and Procedure LAWS1206.
Completed or completing five LAWS courses at 1000 level.

The most recent edition of the following text will be used in the course:

• S Odgers, Uniform Evidence Law, Thomson Reuters.

None, but students will benefit from rereading cases with which they are already familiar from earlier law courses, such as Torts and Criminal Law and Procedure - though now focusing on the factual bases of these cases and considering how ‘the facts' are actually established in legal proceedings, rather than concentrating on the principles of substantive law which are applied to the facts to reach a decision. Some aspects of criminal investigation and trial procedures are also portrayed (though not always realistically in terms of accuracy and analysis) in various ‘real crime' literature and courtroom drama.

A reading guide will be available in the course outline.