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Category Archives: AAFS
#Forensics: Errors in fingerprinting matches get some air time. Training and low standards a major focus.
One major issue in the fingerprinting world is how court testimony of these experts can mislead juries to expect mis-matches never occur. Fingerprint Analysis Is High-Stakes Work — but It Doesn’t Take Much to Qualify as an Expert
Posted in AAFS, costs of wrongful convictions, Crime, CSI, wrongful convictions
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#Forensics: How DNA transfer is affected by “shedder” status.
Any assumption that a DNA mixture can prove who was and wasn’t the perp gets clobbered in this study. Some people shed (i.e. leave) DNA more than others. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1872497319301164
Posted in AAFS, ABFO, CSI, DNA mixtures, DNA profiling
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#Forensics: Ageing the colors of a bruise. It doesn’t work.
Every dentist who has testified on the age of skin injuries from their color should contact the Innocence Project to initiate review of their unreliable opinion. Justice demands the advances of science should influence all these cases from the last … Continue reading
Dana Delger ’10 Fights to Keep Flawed Forensics From Convicting the Innocent | Columbia Law School
Dana Delger ’10 works as a strategic litigator for the Innocence Project and fights against using flawed forensic evidence, like bite marks, in criminal cases. — Read on http://www.law.columbia.edu/news/2019/11/dana-delger-fights-to-keep-flawed-forensics-from-convicting-the-innocent These lawyers know how to talk science. No wonder the crime … Continue reading
#Forensics Getting Better. Ultrasensitive protein method ( might) let scientists ID someone from a single strand of hair | Science | AAAS
Heavily shedding criminals, beware — Read on http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/11/scientists-can-now-identify-someone-single-strand-hair
Posted in AAFS, criminal justice, Forensic Science, police crime labs
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Forensics: Dundee and Glasgow take a look at the bitemarkers
Let’s see if prosecutors and the judiciary get the gumption and honesty to see this as the death knell for bitemark flim flam. Congrats to the Scots and Open Access publishing! https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00414-019-02163-5
#Forensics: Cop DUI machines busted.
…..and the police want to do their DNA rapid and inhouse. Yikes. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/03/business/drunk-driving-breathalyzer.html
#Forensics: read the difference between hanging vs strangulation. Special focus on the hyoid bone, cartilage, and vertebral fractures.
By Judy Melinek MD One might infer from this lit review, that the Epstein family’s medical expert has gone WAY OUT on a limb. https://www.medpagetoday.com/blogs/working-stiff/83087
#Forensics: Contextual bias influences and weak forensic testing results leads to jury overestimation of guilt
When police lab results are weak or ambiguous, juries commonly use non science circumstances to increase its value. https://phys.org/news/2019-10-csi-current-impact-bias-crime.html
Posted in AAFS, Crime, criminal justice, CSI, Forensic Science, Forensic Science Bias
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#Forensics: 16 minutes on DNA profiling, the good and the bad. From Dan Krane in Ohio
The opponents (i.e. prosecutors) to Dan’s methodology say that standards for minimum sample size and commercial profiling companies testing for inconsistencies and unreliabilities are not necessary. Of course they do. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpPkmDeS3Dg
FORENSICS and LAW in FOCUS @ CSIDDS | News and Trends 