Category Archives: Crime lab scandal

Serial rapists and underachieving government crime lab; cops as “super-experts”

“Did Failures at APD’s Crime Lab Lead to Sexual Assaults in Houston?” (Austin Chronicle) A new Harvard Law Review article titled “The Judicial Presumption of Police Expertise” questions whether police should be treated as expert witnesses when giving testimony in criminal … Continue reading

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Forensic racism suggests “blinding” case details as a cure.

Here’s a new level of nastiness. The above is an example of scientific racism reported from the forensic anthro post Ancestry, Race and Anthropology. A new example from Iowa. From the Desmoines-Register A thistle to former state forensic scientist Amy Pollpeter, who expressed blatantly racist sentiments on social … Continue reading

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False forensic testing adds to growing mistrust of cops, their labs and prosecutors

A couple of telling articles call again for the public to understand how the relationship between cops , their crime labs and prosecutors lead to false convictions via intimidating suspects into pleading guilty via misused field testing kits. Barry Scheck … Continue reading

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Illinois crime lab bill created to seal faulty testing from public view

Cases of government-run crime labs  “hiding” forensic errors and gaffs from criminal defendants and the public got a boost in Illinois this week……We can use this to clearly understand who and how prosecutors and LE PACs control the legislators in … Continue reading

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The Mississippi Sting operation that uncovered Michael West’s bitemark bunk

One of the extraordinary defense presentations at the recent EL Howard hearing in Columbus MS was given by the Honorable Chris Plourd (pictured above), the presiding Judge of Imperial County, CA Superior Court. Judge Plourd rose to the bench in … Continue reading

Posted in AAFS, ABFO, Bitemarks, costs of wrongful convictions, Crime lab scandal, Dr. Michael West, exoneration, Ray Krone bitemark case, wrongful convictions | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Another crime lab scandal arises from Virginia : Old school blood-typing failures

On the heels of Keith Allen Harward’s 33 years of wrongful incarceration, Virginia is now tackling hundreds of cases over the decades containing more questionable forensic “science.” Harward’s erroneous identification from a bitemark is only the beginning. “The Innocence Project … Continue reading

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TX and CA: How Prosecutors ignore the effects of junk forensic science on their convictions.

CSI forensics seems to be infallible on TV. Not as much in the real world. Try reading”Bitten by Experts” from Jordan Smith at The Intercept. Its all about the junk. In the same vein, this article gives a closeup on where the … Continue reading

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Forensic lab autonomy in Mexico way ahead of US counterpart labs managed by police

Police have no jurisdiction in Mexican forensic science laboratories and investigations. DNA crime scene collection is done by civilian investigators. Fascinating. My county has made at least four attempts, in the last 30+ years, to put the Ventura County ME’s office … Continue reading

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Forensics: White House Science and Technology opinion on Bitemark Identification

Here is the keynote speaker ( Jo Handlesman Ph.D) at a 2015 NIJ conference on forensic science speaking about the unenviable position bitemarkers have attained by showing no reliability in their opinions and being individually inconsistent in their courtroom testimony. … Continue reading

Posted in AAFS, ABFO, Bite Marks, Bitemarks, costs of wrongful convictions, Crime lab scandal, criminal justice reform | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Why the NC Carolina CSI lab got slammed in the media. The Public is scared about wrongful convictions.

The above photo is from a recent exoneration case from North Carolina. The joy on Dwayne Dail’s  face is palpable. You probably won’t often see this discussion on TV , but people are really upset about wrongful convictions occurring on a … Continue reading

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