Ji.hlava 2024: Scent Evidence (dir. Zuzana Piussi) | Review

Scent Evidence (Pachova Stopa), a very intense and exploratory documentary by Slovak director Zuzana Piussi, explores the injustices faced by many citizens in the Czech Republic due to law enforcement using scent evidence as part of police investigations. This film held its world premiere at the 28th Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival in the Czech Joy section.

Piussi is not new to this issue and has previously explored various problems faced by Slovak and Czech society, particularly archaic judicial laws, in her earlier works.

In this 78-minute documentary, Piussi meets with the families of three youngsters who were unjustly convicted using scent evidence. With the help of civil activist and ex-dissident John Bok, Solomon Association chair Václav Peričevič, lawyer Šimon Mach, and others, the documentary sheds light on the Czech judiciary’s continued reliance on dogs to help find evidence used to convict individuals.

Among the law enforcement and judicial methods with high relevance in the evidentiary proceedings of many ex-communist states, the so-called “scent evidence” is included. Its main protagonist is a dog, which identifies the perpetrator. This method originated in the former GDR and was initially secretly employed by the German police against political dissent. Over the years, it became domesticated as one of the accepted strong evidentiary methods, and its acceptance extended to the law enforcement and judicial practices of many Eastern Bloc countries. In Czech Republic, the result of “scent evidence” alone is sufficient for a conviction.

The film shows us the difficulties of overturning a verdict or even asking for a retrial for the wrongly convicted. It follows the efforts of John Bok and his associates from the Solomon Association as they work on cases involving young people and their families fighting for justice against the judiciary in the Czech Republic. The lucid camerawork takes the audience into the backstories of these wrongfully convicted individuals and the lawyers from the Solomon Association fighting for their cause. Alas, most of the time, the judiciary remains a stone wall, adamantly sticking to their decision that scent evidence is the best way of capturing the guilty.

The film also delves into the story of how dogs, incredible companions, can be trained to possess abilities such as illness detection, seizure alerts, and even scent identification for crime-solving. In Czech Republic, scent evidence, collected using absorbent materials, is pivotal in convictions. Unlike in some countries where it’s supplementary, here it’s often the sole proof. This lack of collaboration with scientists leads to significant consequences – scent evidence often becomes the crucial or even sole piece of evidence leading to the conviction of the accused, carrying catastrophic consequences.

Piussi, who has been tackling issues of human rights and political stories, deals sensitively with the difficulties faced by the families and the injustice served on these wrongfully convicted individuals. Previously, Piussi has crafted around 20 full-length documentaries dealing with socio-political topics. Her film The Ordeal (2021), released and awarded at Ji.hlava IDFF, builds upon her successful docu-thriller on the “hijacking” of the Slovak justice system, The Disease of the Third Power (2011), and reflects the theme of misusing justice and the possible ways to reform it. In 2022, she released her full-length fiction debut The Unbalanced.

We are delighted to be reporting live from the 2024 Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival, running from October 25th to November 3rd, 2024.