In criminal trials, defendants often offer alternative explanations of the facts when they plead for their innocence. In its ruling on the Venray murder case, the Dutch Supreme Court dealt with the question when and how courts can reject such alternative explanations. According to the Supreme court, while courts should typically refer to evidence that refutes the explanation, they can also argue that the explanation 'did not become plausible' or that it is 'not credible'. Finally, courts can state that an explanation is so 'highly improbable' that it requires no response. However, the Supreme Court did not explain these terms, leading to confusion about how they ought to be interpreted. This case comment offers a Bayesian interpretation according to which these three terms relate to (i) the posterior probability of the explanation, (ii) the credibility of the defendant, and (iii) how obvious it is that the explanation is improbable. This interpretation clarifies the Supreme Courts ruling and ties it to the criminal law system's goals of error minimization and of producing understandable decisions efficiently.

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案例评论：回应被告讲述的难以置信、难以置信和极不可能的故事：对文雷谋杀裁决的贝叶斯解释

在刑事审判中，被告在为自己的无罪辩护时通常会提供其他事实解释。在对 Venray 谋杀案的裁决中，荷兰最高法院处理了法院何时以及如何拒绝此类替代解释的问题。根据最高法院的说法，虽然法院通常应该参考驳斥解释的证据，但他们也可以争辩说解释“没有变得合理”或“不可信”。最后，法院可以声明一个解释“极不可能”，以至于不需要回应。然而，最高法院没有解释这些术语，导致人们对它们应该如何解释产生混淆。本案例评论提供了贝叶斯解释，根据该解释，这三个术语涉及 (i) 解释的后验概率，(ii) 被告的可信度，以及 (iii) 解释不可能的明显程度。这一解释澄清了最高法院的裁决，并将其与刑法系统的目标，即错误最小化和有效做出可理解的决定联系起来。