History Main / MakeTheDogTestify

* In 1994, when OJ Simpson's ex-wife Nicole and her friend Ronald Goldman were murdered, there was speculation that her Akita may have witnessed the crime. With that, there was further speculation that the dog would be brought into court to see if it would react violently to OJ, thus proving him to be the killer. Unfortunately, this tactic was never employed. One wonders whether or not this would have helped prove OJ guilty.

-->-- ''Series/{{Monk}}'', "Mr. Monk and the Dog"

* In Film/TheThreeStooges short subject, ''Film/DisorderInTheCourt'', a parrot's courtroom "find the letter!" solves the crime. Especially since the letter's tied around the parrot's foot.
* Played for laughs in the 1967 ''Film/DoctorDolittle.'' The authorities are questioning whether the Doctor is sane and can ''really'' talk to animals. One of Dr. Dolittle's moves is to put the judge's ''dog'' on the stand! (Did the judge have five or six pieces of pie?)

* In ''Series/ArrestedDevelopment'' Michael calls his brother GOB's puppet Franklin on the stand, then reveals that inside the puppet is a tape recording he made of the prosecuting attorney offering him a deal, which results in a mistrial. In a token gesture towards realism the puppet was actually on the witness list because of GOB's efforts. It also helped that it was a mock trial with Judge Reinhold as the judge.
* Used by the [[WitchHunt Witchsmeller Pursuivant]] in ''Series/{{Blackadder}}'', who called Blackadder's ''horse'' to the stand as part of the KangarooCourt, referring to him as "Satin [[SesquipedalianLoquaciousness the Loquacious]]". After the horse whinnies when asked a question...

* [[VigilanteJustice Vigilante justice variation]]: This is how Series/{{Dexter}} finds out that [[spoiler:Leon, and not the gang's no. 2,]] was responsible for [[spoiler:Brother Sam's death]] in season 6. [[spoiler:The dog didn't bark at the assailant, as seen on the security footage. The dog normally barks at everybody.]] Of course, since he kills [[spoiler:Leon]] by [[spoiler:drowning him in the ocean]], it may count as CharacterDevelopment.

* ''Series/ItsAlwaysSunnyInPhiladelphia'': In "[=McPoyle=] vs. Ponderosa: The Trial of the Century", Charlie, in an effort to prove Bill Ponderosa is not responsible for Liam [=McPoyle=]'s missing eyeball, forces the [=McPoyle=] family bird to take the witness stand. In a twist, it's with [[ThePerryMasonMethod the intention of proving the animal to be the]] ''[[ThePerryMasonMethod real]]'' [[ThePerryMasonMethod culprit]], as it apparently has a history of mutilating its owners. [[CloudCuckoolander Charlie's attempts to force it to confess (despite it not even being a talking variety of bird)]] obviously fail, but it does wind up generating enough reasonable doubt to get the case thrown out when it [[spoiler:attacks the plaintiff's attorney and gouges out ''his'' eye, too.]]
* ''{{Series/JAG}}'': In Season 5 "Front and Center" Colonel Sarah [=MacKenzie=] is defending a crewman on drug charges found on him by an old drug-sniffing dog, the client claims it was just a potent breed of oregano not marijuana. As the dog is the only reason for the charges, as the handler's testing equipment wasn't working and they destroyed the product already, Mac requests the dog verify his abilities to the court. She has ten identical bags filled by an outside independent lab, nine with the oregano the client claims to have had and one with the marijuana. The judge was skeptical, but Mac notes that these odds are in the dog's favor as normally the dog must sniff something out in a crowded airport with hundreds of bags in movement. It is permitted and the old dog fails the test by selecting an oregano-filled bag. The case is dismissed and client freed.

* ''Series/MurderSheWrote'' episode [[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0653533/plotsummary "It's a Dog's Life."]] A dog was trained by a murderer to press a button on command, causing someone to be crushed to death by a security gate. After it was brought into court to show how it committed the act, it went over to the murderer, proving he was the one who trained it.
* Played with in the ''Franchise/PerryMason'' television episode "The Case of the Perjured Parrot." The title bird (voiced by Creator/MelBlanc) was found alongside its owner's body, saying one phrase over and over -- and while not technically called to the stand, it was introduced in evidence. Perry does "cross examine" the parrot and proves this bird was a look-alike substitute for the murder victim's pet. Somewhat justified in that it was only an inquest rather than an actual criminal trial.
** Also counts as an InvokedTrope, [[spoiler:as the parrot was trained to say that phrase in order to frame a family member]]. The substitution was proven because the bird didn't know some phrases the murder victim's pet did, and wouldn't do the finger mounting trick the murder victim's pet knew how to do.
* In one episode of ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'', Tuvok used a dog as a rebuttal witness in defense of Tom Paris (successfully, it should be noted).
** And in ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'', Kirk used some tribbles to identify the Klingon infiltrator. Not an example ''in'' a court, but it did lead to an (offscreen) trial after the end of the episode. The Tribbles were really acting as an EvilDetectingDog, so they probably weren't needed.
* Averted in ''To Catch A Killer'' (1992). The police notice that the tracker dog has taken the 'mourning position' over [[PunkInTheTrunk the trunk]] of SerialKiller John Wayne Gacy's car, which the dog did in a previous murder case. However they're told that in the previous case, it was not allowed as evidence.
%%* Played with in the ''Series/{{Warehouse 13}}'' episode ''Past Imperfect''.
* In ''Series/TwinPeaks'', Waldo the [[NotInFrontOfTheParrot mynah bird]], the pet of a key suspect in the central murder investigation, was taken into police custody for this exact reason. [[spoiler: He was assassinated by another suspect to prevent this from happening, although ultimately, nothing the bird saw could have lead to the real killer.]]

* In one of Angus' short stories published in ''ComicBook/PaperinikNewAdventures'' a FunnyBackgroundEvent involves a lawyer telling a crook that a goldfish is going to testify, with the crook admitting he'd tried to kill it... by drowning.
* In ''ComicBook/YoungbloodJudgmentDay'' Toby "Skipper" King eventually calls to the stand Giganthro, a member of the time-travelling League of Infinity. Giganthro is a mutated caveman incapable of speaking any modern human language, though he understands well enough. Thankfully, team leader Zayla Zarn provides translation for his testimony.

* The justice system in VideoGame/LiberalCrimeSquad doesn't bother with trial competency. Even when animal rights are at their lowest, dogs and genetic monsters can still be accused, arrested, and put through the courts.

* The justice system in VideoGame/LiberalCrimeSquad doesn't bother with trial competency. Even when animal rights are at their worst, dogs and genetic monsters can still be accused, arrested, and put through the courts.

* The justice system in "VideoGame/LiberalCrimeSquad" doesn't bother with trial competency. Even when animal rights are at their worst, dogs and genetic monsters can still be accused, arrested, and put through the courts.

* The cats from "WesternAnimation/PlutosJudgementDay". Curiously enough, the defendant is [[Disney/PlutoThePup Pluto]], a dog.

** The trope image comes from Case 1-4, where Phoenix calls a witness's pet parrot to the stand after it is suggested as a joke, in hopes of using things the parrot was trained to say in order to make the case that the parrot's owner was involved in the [[ThatOneCase DL-6]] incident. Despite the entire court being utterly bewildered by the move ([[spoiler:[[CrazyPrepared and the prosecutor having actually planned for Phoenix to be that desperate]], and so ''retrained the parrot'' the previous night to not say the most damning phrase, "don't forget DL-6"]]), the parrot's testimony does manage to turn the case right around.

** The trope image comes from Case 1-4, where Phoenix, much to the court's bewilderment, calls a witness's pet parrot to the stand, and manages to use things the parrot was trained to say in order to make the case that the parrot's owner was involved in the [[ThatOneCase DL-6]] incident. Despite the case's prosecutor ridiculing the idea ([[spoiler: and actually ''retraining the parrot'' the previous night to not say the most damning phrase, "don't forget DL-6"]]), the parrot's testimony managed to turn the case right around.

->'''Lt. Randall Disher:''' Now he's afraid that she'll identify him.
->'''Adrian Monk:''' How?
->'''Lt. Randall Disher:''' She could bark at him.

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* ''WesternAnimation/AceVentura'':
** It had a similar case, where somebody abducted a dog hoping to make it reveal the secrets of its master, a high ranked officer. All the machine that read the dog's mind caught was the dog playing with the officer. Ace pointed out to the villain that dogs don't care about military secrets.
** Another episode had Ace's monkey, Spike, signaling that he saw a beast steal a hunting dog, but Ace thought Spike was letting superstition go to his head and pretended that Spike only said that in hopes of getting a cookie. When asked about what made Spike change his statement, Ace said he gave Spike ''two'' cookies.

* ''Series/LawAndOrder'': Jack [=McCoy=] has also brought a dog into a courtroom. The dog's owners are accused of manslaughter by recklessness because the dog mauled a woman to death, and their defense is that the dog is usually gentle and well-behaved, so they couldn't have anticipated his actions. In response, [=McCoy=] has the dog brought in (on a muzzle, completely under the control of animal experts) to prove the dog is clearly aggressive by nature and that keeping it made them responsible for the people it killed. The Judge does [[WhatTheHellHero call [=McCoy=] on it]] and forces [=McCoy=] to make a plea deal or he will declare a mistrial ([=McCoy=] agrees on the condition that the defendants accept a two-year minimum sentence; they try to protest, but the judge then pushes ''them'' to take it.)

'''Witchsmeller:''' [[IncrediblyLamePun It was a neigh]], My Lord, but I don't believe a word of it. I call for a recess. He may think he can fool us, [[ColdBloodedTorture but we have ways of making him talk]]!

* ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'': Vetinari's dog Wuffles in ''Literature/TheTruth'' is viewed as a potential witness. It helps that they have a werewolf to translate. There is also a reference to a parrot being in witness protection, living life as a large budgerigar.

* Vetinari's dog Wuffles in ''Literature/TheTruth'' is viewed as a potential witness. It helps that they have a werewolf to translate. There is also a reference to a parrot being in witness protection, living life as a large budgerigar.
** According to Mr. Slant, a zombie lawyer who's over 300 years old and therefore knows most of the city's legal history, other animals have been put on trial as actual defendants. Including ''a swarm of bees''! That's Ankh-Morpork for you.[[note]]This can actually happen in real life, at least in the US, though it's a bit different than what you're probably imagining ... it's mainly a shorthand form of "v. John Doe, an unidentified owner of (thing)".[[/note]]

* One of ''Radio/ThisAmericanLife'''s annual poultry-themed episodes featured the story of a lawyer who wanted to force a psychiatrist to play tic-tac-toe against a chicken in court. She was representing a mentally ill and retarded man on death row, and the prosecution was using this psychiatrist's testimony of having been beaten by him at tic-tac-toe as evidence that he was mentally competent enough to be executed. She remembered that as a kid she'd seen tic-tac-toe-playing chickens at fairs and decided to try to get permission to bring in such a chicken to prove a point about the level of intelligence required to best the psychiatrist. In her words, "Who can doubt a chicken? You can't. A chicken isn't going to lie. Chickens have integrity."

** Actually, the man doesn't go though with the surgical procedure on his dog, but instead researches (to a near ridiculous extent) another man who surgically altered his dog. Not wanting to go quite to this extreme, he looks into other methods to teach his dog to talk.

A specific CourtroomAntic. An animal is called to the stand to testify. It seems that in fictional courts, [[LoopholeAbuse there is no rule against that]].

** In the final case of the first game, Phoenix, to the bewilderment of the court, called a parrot to the stand; in fact, said parrot actually allowed him to turn the entire case around so fast everyone got dizzy, despite the parrot being [[spoiler:[[CrazyPrepared specifically trained by the]] BigBad not to talk about the most damning piece of evidence (in one night, no less)]].

** To date, the canon games have allowed Phoenix to cross-examine a parrot, a puppet, a two-way-radio, two ghosts, a dolphin, and a robot. Only 4 of the above were aware they were being cross-examined.

[[quoteright:256:[[VisualNovel/PhoenixWrightAceAttorney https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/polly_testimony.png]]]]
[[caption-width-right:256:"Witness! You can't just say "hello" and expect us to get anywhere! I want you to ''testify''!"]]

** According to Mr. Slant, a zombie lawyer who's over 300 years old and therefore knows most of the city's legal history, other animals have been put on trial as actual defendants. Including ''[[UpToEleven a swarm of bees]]''! That's Ankh-Morpork for you.[[note]]This can actually happen in real life, at least in the US, though it's a bit different than what you're probably imagining ... it's mainly a shorthand form of "v. John Doe, an unidentified owner of (thing)".[[/note]]

* In one of Angus' short stories published in ''ComicBook/PaperinikNewAdventures'' a FunnyBackgroundEvent involves a lawyer telling a crook that a goldfish is going to testify, with the crook admitting he'd tried to kill it... [[WhatAnIdiot by drowning]].

** In "Stop or My Dog Will Shoot", Snake winds up being freed on a technicality due to improperly filed paperwork. This was because said paperwork was [[WhatAnIdiot filed by the police dog]] responsible for his capture, Santa's Little Helper, and consists of paw print markings on an official form.