This section is from the book "Popular Law Library Vol11 Common Law Pleading, Code Pleading, Federal Procedure, Evidence", by Albert H. Putney. Also available from Amazon: Popular Law-Dictionary.
Photographs are generally admissible in evidence when they are shown to have been accurately taken, and to be correct representations of the subject in controversy, and are of such a nature as to throw light upon it.3
2 9 Ency. of Evidence, 771.
They are admissible to prove identity of persons;4 identity and comparison of handwriting; resemblance of animals; scenery and all natural objects; buildings; the condition of a street or sidewalk at the time of an accident; the character of an injury to a person; the situation of land with reference to the grade of a street; as accurate copies of public records which could not be withdrawn from the files; to represent the scene of a crime at the time of its commission, and the locality and conditions at a railroad crossing where a collision had occurred.
Skiagraphs, or X-Ray photographs, taken by the X-ray process by an expert, where proved to have been correctly taken and accurately developed, are admissible in evidence when the expert testifies that they are true representations of that portion of the person to which they relate at the time taken,5 etc. The expert here testified that he was an X-ray expert and was regularly engaged in taking such photographs for physicians; that he took the negative from which the photograph was developed and that he developed the photograph, and that it was an accurate and correct representation of that portion of plaintiff's chest and body, etc. It was intended to show by the skiagraph that plaintiff's heart was displaced; that the walls of that organ had become thick and that an abnormally heavy tissue had formed on the walls of the heart. The testimony of the X-ray expert who had taken the skiagraph tended to show that the picture correctly represented the condition of the heart of plaintiff. Photographs taken by the X-ray process are admissible in evidence after proper preliminary proof of their correctness and accuracy has been produced.
4 Udderzook vs. Commonwealth, 76 Pa. St., 340. 5 G. & J. Elec. Ry. Co. vs. Spence, 213 I11., 224, citing 22 Am. & Eng. Ency. of Law, 2nd Ed., 755.
Vol XI. - 12.
 
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