Forensic mental telehealth assessment (FMTA) in the context of COVID-19.

Due to the present COVID-19 pandemic, forensic mental telehealth assessment (FMTA) is an increasingly utilized means of conducting court-sanctioned psychiatric and psychological evaluations. FMTA is not a novel development, and studies have been published during the past two decades that opine on the positive and negative implications of conducting testing and interview procedures online, in forensic and traditionally clinical matters alike. The present article examines prospects for eventual legal challenges to FMTA, describes considerations for conducting FMTA in both institutional and residential settings, and concludes that FMTA is now-due to predicted accommodations on the part of courts, attorneys, institutions, and professional guilds-a permanent part of the forensic evaluation landscape, even once the present COVID-19 pandemic has subsided.

On the Trail of the "Virtual" Expert: Counsel's Guide for the Current Pandemic

Others gave up a couple of months ago and don't care how many dirty dishes and empty beer bottles are piling up in plain view while their children dive-bomb around the room. Frances J. Lexcen, Gary L. Hawk, Steve Herrick & Michael B. Blank, Use of Video Conferencing for Psychiatric and Forensic Evaluations, 57 Psychiatric Serv. 713 (2006);Gina Manguno-Mire et al., The Use of Telemedicine to Evaluate Competency to Stand Trial: A Preliminary Randomized Controlled Study, 35 J. Am. Lawyers and judges often have a difficult time grappling with the nature and implications of these two terms (see Jacqueline A. Chorn & Margaret B. Kovera, Variations in Reliability and Validity Do Not Influence Judge, Attorney, and Mock Juror Decisions About Psychological Expert Evidence, 43 Law & Hum. Because everyone knew that witches float, witches were tossed into the river: