Immigration Expert Witnesses

Immigration expert witnesses may consult on issues involving employment based immigration, green cards, immigration policy, and asylum.The Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA) presented Anthropologists as Expert Witnesses: Theory, Practice and Ethics at their annual meeting March 24-28. University of Cincinnati assistant professor of anthropology Leila Rodriguez has testified in immigration cases and writes:

I think the legal system’s understanding of culture is very different from how anthropologists define culture,” explains Rodriguez. The legal system often is looking for something with clear limits around it – the black-and-white answer – when most of our answers as anthropologists are gray.

Recorded sessions will be published at a rate of a couple a week, starting about two weeks after the annual meeting. Sign up to be notified via RSS or email.

Guilt, Innocence and Ethnography: Informants and Expert Witness Presenter: Jeffrey H. Cohen, The Ohio State University
Judicial Ignorance and Expert Witnesses in Asylum Cases Presenter: Murray Leaf, University of Texas at Dallas
The Epistemology of Expertise: Scientific Anthropology and Expert Witness Testimony in a Criminal Case Presenter: Leila Rodriguez, University of Cincinnati
The Role of Culture in Expert Witness Testimony: Presenter: Kendall Thu, Northern Illinois University
Expert Witness: Asylum vs. Criminal Proceedings with Central American Immigrants in U.S. Courts Presenter: Allan Burns, University of Florida
Can I Get a Witness? A Lawyer’s Perspective on the Critical Role of Experts in Saving Lives Presenter: Virginia Raymond, immigration attorney

The SfAA promotes interdisciplinary research in addressing issues affecting human beings around the world. With over 2,000 members, the society is the pre-eminent international organization in the field. The theme for the 75th annual meeting is “Continuity and Change.”