Survey of Law Enforcement Perceptions Regarding Digital Evidence

This paper analyzes state and local law enforcement agents’ perceptions about prosecutors’ knowledge of digital evidence and their willingness to prosecute cases involving digital evidence, and agents’ perceptions about judges’ knowledge of digital evidence and their willingness to admit digital evidence in legal proceedings, Statistical analysis indicates that a significant negative correlation exists between the size of the population served by law enforcement agents and their perceptions about judges’ knowledge of digital evidence and willingness to admit digital evidence. Also, positive relationships exist between the size of the population served and law enforcement perceptions of prosecutors’ knowledge of digital evidence and willingness to prosecute digital evidence cases, and perceptions about judges’ willingness to admit digital evidence. The implications of these findings are discussed along with suggestions for future research.