[remotemass (OP)]

As you may know, in March 2019 Johnny Depp filed the $50 million lawsuit against Amber Heard and the trial will last until early June in a Virginia court.
Iff the Judge, in this case "Judge Penney Azcarate", did issue an order from that court for scientists to tell whether this gentleman was addicted or not to cocaine, to which degree and since when: how would scientists prove scientifically and be able to tell if someone is addicted to cocaine?
My guess is that the actor would only be needed to be filmed for 2-3 days in front of cocaine and his body language would make it clear and you would also be able to see it clearly that he laughs in a very mischievious way everytime the word cocaine is spelled out loud in his presence. Would this prove it scientifically?

Let's say that the judge, ordered for a coclusive legal opinion on that, from the "Faculty of Biology of the University of Cambridge".
1) What would be the required settings for a scientific lab experiment to bring about some conclusive legal opinion?
2) How many days would be required for him to be in that lab or physical setting being filmed?
3) How accurate would it be possible to estimate scientifically his degree of cocaine addiction, and also the estimation of a timeline of his cocaine use since first time being exposed to it and willingly consuming it?

and also:
4) How much would it cost to the Virginia court and also what legal bind would this legal opinion would than have? Could it be considered legally binding evidence from Science?

This is a very serious matter. Please do avoid any jokes. Please.

Hopefully, the judge, in this case "Judge Penney Azcarate", would also ask for the Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, Michel Moore, and possibly some other police departments from all over the world, to provide a legally binding statement on any knowledge they may have that could then make them liable as liars to a USA court if it was later apparent the Police was not being totally honest and was not telling the whole truth to their current knowledge on that matter and/or solely the truth about that specific matter.


- remotemass

[Bored chemist]

If you ask five people for a definition of "addicted" you will get 6 answers.
Getting agreement on such an experiment would be harder.

What problem are you seeking to solve?

[remotemass (OP)]

When people are addicted to smoking it is hard to be without nicotine/smoking/vaping for more than 3 days and very hard to be without smoking for more than 7 days. Since cocaine is considered more addictive than nicotine, I would consider someone addicted to cocaine if he cannot be more than 7 days without consuming it in any way provided he/she is able to do so at any time during the experiment. But I wonder what would scientists from Cambridge would consider scientific proof and legally binding scientific evidence to provide to a USA court in case they were asked to do so. Or what would be the bare minimum requirements and/or settings to be able to provide a convincing legal opinion, that could be used as evidence, on that matter.
Anyway, it seems okay if different scientists will come up with different definitions, setting requirements, etc. At the end of the day, I am just asking you to answer a question.

- remotemass

[Bored chemist]

But I wonder what would scientists from Cambridge would consider scientific proof and legally binding scientific evidence to provide to a USA court

It wouldn't matter what teh scientists thought. That is what the court is for.

[paul cotter]

As bored chemist has said, addiction is a wooly term. Cocaine does not produce the classical form of "addiction" as seen with opiates, benzodiazepines and alcohol where abstinence can cause real problems. One method to prove use would be to look for cocaine metabolites(benzoyl ecgonine, I think) in a hair sample. This would indicate use and not "addiction". In the case of opiates an injection of naloxone will trigger withdrawal symptoms in an addict but no such test exist for cocaine as no physical dependence occurs. A heavy cocaine user if deprived of a supply will be moody, depressed and generally demotivated but will be functional.

[evan_au]

If there is no physical addiction, then any addiction will be psychological.

Interviewing an actor will be a battle of wills between the interviewer and interviewee.

To bypass the acting skills, it may be possible to put the subject in a FMRI scanner (Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging), and show them a series of pictures of various items including typical cocaine scenes.
- A psychological addiction may be visible in the patterns of brain region activation.


All of this assumes that said person is willing to comply with the process at all - they may just not turn up!
- So the judge would need to determine that this finding would materially affect the outcome of the trial (which would be preceded by much argumentation from highly-paid lawyers)
- And the judge would need to order that the investigation be done
- In which case, failure to comply would be considered contempt of court
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_magnetic_resonance_imaging

[paul cotter]

Very smart idea there, evan_au(why didn't I think of that!). Areas around the ventral tegmental and nucleus accumbens regions where the reward function is located would surely light up. "Addiction" both psychological and physical(ie dependence) to any substance or activity leads to increased expression of the nuclear transcription factor delta phos b which changes neuronal behaviour.