Comment on Nachson: Alternative “truths” of repressed memories: Views of judges of the Israeli supreme court

Abstract

Multiple “truths” in criminal trials represents the main idea proposed in this article. Typically, this rather arguable, albeit intriguing, concept refers to a relativistic approach on the concept of truth. But relativism is not what the author suggests; he claims that “truth” remains a correspondist construct, in which corroborating evidence is necessary.

The author refers to the debate on memory repression, presenting evidence for and against this concept, differences that stem from the difficulties to empirically measure repression. Experts can have very different and at times opposite opinions on the same legal case, and all are presented and received as “truths.” Multiple “truths.” More specifically, attention is focussed on the Israeli Supreme Court, and examples of allegations of child sexual abuse in children who have recovered memories of sexual abuse after years of no memory. In certain Israeli court cases, it is accepted that repressed traumatic memories are remembered after years, a stance mainly fuelled by professionals believing in repression.

Such issues are not unique to Israel. As the author documents well, they have been very common in other countries as well, for many years, not just countries often reported about (e.g., Battista et al., 2023), and it is easy to draw parallels between Israel and the situation in Italy (Convertino et al., 2022; Magnussen et al., 2013), where many controversial examples on the topic of memory repression in childhood sexual abuse exist (Mazzoni et al., 2025).

The law in Israel admits recovered memories as evidence of abuse. It is surprising to learn about such perspective of the Israeli Supreme Court, given that in Israel the knowledge of judges on these topics is rather well researched, and, as in other countries (Magnussen et al., 2008; Magnussen et al., 2010), judges are aware of this controversy and the problems deriving from memory recovery techniques. Israeli courts then can fall easily victim to “multiple truths”, i.e. differences between paradigms defined by clinical viewpoints.

Interestingly, the author also highlights another problem all legal systems have in common, the fact that “absence of evidence is not evidence of absence”, an intriguing topic on how evidence is dealt with in court. This is a highly debated issue by philosophers of the law, addressed usually by proposing standards of proof to weigh presence vs. absence of evidence (e.g. Ferrer Beltran, 2021). In criminal cases, the standard of proof represents the degree to which a party (prosecutor/defence) must prove its case to succeed. It is linked with the burden of proof, i.e. the requirements to satisfy that standard. In many legal systems, including nowadays the Italian system, the standard of proof, for the prosecutor's arguments, is to prove the case against the defendant “beyond any reasonable doubt.” However, lack of evidence that in principle could favour the defendant's position is not used in legal reasoning. This imbalance is discussed by scholars studying the role of evidence in jurisprudence.

The neutral stance taken by the author when addressing such controversial and polarising topics is admirable. Both sides of the traumatic memory debate are clearly stated, whilst taking an unbiased standpoint. This represents a genuinely important stance if we want to avoid never-ending memory wars. But this stance is not passively neutral. The consistent message is to always focus on corroborating scientific evidence in legal decisions, as the only way to bridge the gap between different fields is to communicate and inform about existing empirical evidence. We believe different professionals might actually have more commonalities in their ultimate goals than differences. However, because expert testimonies on the two sides are often in complete contrast with each other, judges are left in a precarious and difficult situation, especially when dealing with cases of childhood sexual abuse. This remains a major problem, shared by many countries. A more integrated and neutral stance is necessary to help overcome it.