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Posted on Wednesday, July 02, 2014
Courts Embrace the Use of GPS Evidence
Because judicial notice allows a court to accept as a true a fact that is so well-known or authoritatively tested that it cannot reasonably be doubted, the fact that federal courts have begun to take judicial notice of the accuracy of GPS tracking data is an important step for plaintiffs and alarming for defendants. While some critics of this decision point to the fact that GPS signals can be lost in buildings or tunnels, and individual tracking devices may be unreliable, others assert that even where a tracking device is reliable, it may pose serious constitutional concerns, raising Fourth Amendment questions.
Parties litigating cases that involve GPS evidence shouldn’t simply rely on the fact that it will be admissible no matter what, however. Especially in bigger cases, where the parties have the resources to do a thorough job, parties should be prepared to address not only the accuracy of GPS in general, but the accuracy of the particular device used in the situation.
Frank Gulino is an associate attorney at Berenzweig Leonard. He can be reached at fgulino@berenzweiglaw.com.
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