UK Forensic Regulator talks about “car crash” in Forensic Science

Posted on May 3, 2017 by csidds

Image result for car crash cartoon

Dr Tully is the Forensic Regulator in the UK. She has somewhat of an oversight role but seems to have little enforcement power. Her unit has published extensively on reporting and ethical considerations in the world of UK police forensics. The now privatised UK forensic system is being asked to make some advances.

Here she talks about why forensics needs a fix and the time is now. The US, however has AG Sessions to deal with regarding his recalcitrant belief that the police can police themselves.

Here she talks about certain forensic disciplines not meeting their deadlines for constructing published protocols and definitions using “car crash” as a descriptor. (innocuous subscription required).

Posted in forensic science reform protecting the innocent | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

FBI: DNA lab problems, scandals now presents new training on DNA STR stats

Posted on May 1, 2017 by csidds

Image result for middle age science oppression

“Forensic DNA Analysis, and in particular interpreting complex DNA mixtures and calculating statistics, can be challenging.”

That is the understated headline of the FBI’s newest training titled “ACSLD Webinair: DNA Standards and Guidelines” that was presented last week.

Here are some the reasons we should gain a bit of knowledge for a broader perspective on all things FBI and Forensics and their “challenges.”

 

Posted in forensic science reform protecting the innocent | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

A Few Forensics Related Links – Pelves and Murder Weapons and the “FBI Way”

Posted on April 28, 2017 by csidds

Murder weapons from the famed museum of the Royal College of Physicians in Edinburgh – some famous forensic cases and practitioners – Sydney Smith etc. Although he used hair microscopic hair comparison to convict. Oops.

Pelvic structures influenced by child birth used for death investigation may be seen in males as well. Oops.

Police DNA testing in India in 90 minutes: The FBI Way. (has annoying pop-ups).

New York exoneree Marty Tankleff passes the NY bar exam and intends to join wrongful conviction litigation as a lawyer. 

Aussie government DNA lab problems not reported by police for 12 months. Oooops. Similar hush to Massachusetts DA and FBI hair debacles in the US.

Posted in forensic science reform protecting the innocent | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Thanks to Drs Janice Klimm and Rick Cardoza – Taking Care of Bill Richards’ Smile After 23 yrs in prison

Posted on April 28, 2017 by csidds

Bill Richards was arrested for the murder of his wife Pamela in 1993 and eventually convicted in 1997 after three trials in California’s San Bernardino County. A linchpin for his last trial was testimony by two forensic dentists who talked about an injury on his murdered wife’s hand being a human bitemark. One said a single tooth in Bill’s mouth matched a feature present in a bruising pattern. With that, the conviction was finally achieved due to the power of forensic ‘expertise’ combined with baseless opinion.

Going forward to 2008, both dentists recanted their opinions, police and crime scene evidence was proven to be misleading or overstated and, at the worst, hair evidence seemed to suspiciously ‘appear’ months after it was not present at autopsy. Also, lets not forget the DNA recovered from Pam was from an unknown male. He was declared wrongly convicted and exonerated in 2008.

He stayed in prison ……..

……remember, this is San Bernardino we are talking about.  It’s DA had this to say about his admiration of bitemarks last fall  as President of the National District Attorney Association (@NDAAJustice).  In 2008. he and then (now governor)  California Attorney General Jerry Brown fought back with an onslaught of appeals.  With that as a background, you will see why Bill remained in prison for 8 more years.

Bill’s fight to overturn his conviction kept going and bounced up to the CA Supreme Court – twice. In July 2016, his conviction was quashed, over obstinate objections of DA Ramos and was released from prison. His lengthy story is extensively featured here  and here.

It is significant to know that Bill’s case generated a new law in California regarding admitting recanting testimony of forensic experts and scientific advances as relevant evidence of innocence. The Bill Richards anti-junk science law. 

This week, two other dentists, Drs. Janice Klim and Rick Cardoza, successfully completed extensive dental care to make Bill’s smile healthy and complete. Inmate health care treatment in prisons is notoriously poor and incomplete. Bill left prison with serious medical and dental problems not associated with his being personally neglectful. He was experiencing tooth pain the day he was released from jail in July 2016.

Thanks to Janice and Rick, along with expert dental technician and laboratory owner Vicki Jones of Advanced Dental Arts in San Diego, Bill is pain free and smiling again.

BTW, ironically both Janice (1) and Rick (2) are highly experienced and credentialed forensic dentists and are colleagues of mine. Vicki (3) is also very generous and has been a cosmetic dental lab professional for 25 years. Bravo to them all.

1                               2                                            3

 Image result for rick cardoza dds

 

 

Posted in costs of wrongful convictions, forensic science reform protecting the innocent | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

NY Times takes ‘sullen like children’ DAs to task over avoidance of crime lab scandal

Posted on April 28, 2017 by csidds

Image result for sullen children

21,587 Reasons to Fix Forensic Science

The pushback to overbearing police ‘science’ advocates comes in many forms. This article from the Editorial Board of the New York Times names some names.

Plus more recent from the NYT about science being pushed out of the courtrooms in the US.

Here are a few of my favorite posts about the prosecutorial culture of ‘winning at all costs’ that permeates many of the factors that lead to convicting the innocent.

FBI

Jeff Sessions

Wrongful Convictions from flawed police forensics. 

Manhattan DAs loves bitemarks

 

Posted in forensic science reform protecting the innocent | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Sessions suspends internal and external review of erroneous FBI forensic cases

Posted on April 27, 2017 by csidds

Image result for max houck

The Backstory on Bad Forensic Science – NY Times

Retrograde amnesia might be a diagnosis for Attorney General Sessions’ expanding ‘walk-back’ of years long efforts by media and some forensic practitioners to rid the Criminal Justice system of junk ‘science’ long used in US courts. Max Houck is one of those practitioners. (almost smiling in this pic).

Take a look at hair, for example. DNA took the elite of the FBI to the cleaners. Much like the bitemarkers. Its surprising that Max Houck (featured in the video interview) and I in the mid 90’s both hit on DNA profiling as a means to validate pattern opinions seen in hair and skin bruising. Neither of us were impressed with the results.

See Max at his best in this NY Times video. 

Posted in forensic science reform protecting the innocent | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Waiting on Sessions to steer Forensics on course for a ……..

Posted on April 26, 2017 by csidds

Image result for the unknown

Forensics and science progress are surely interlopers to the minds of ‘tough’ prosecutors like Mr. Sessions. Some States are following his trends by limiting post conviction appeals to a mere 5 years under the guise of  “Fair Justice Act(s).” Counter pose that with the fact that the average length of time for a successful DNA exoneration is 14 years. One-half of these cases involved forensic opinions and methods that were flawed or or even worse. All of this prosecutorial hop scotch is happening quick-step while reviews of  police controlled forensics is going backwards with alacrity.

The US Attorney General has interrupted federal efforts toward a “Uniform Language for Testimony and Reports” and substantive “Forensic Science Discipline Reviews.” Subjects included the forensic train wreck of bitemark analysis. While we are all waiting breathlessly for Sessions, the State of Massachusetts is setting up the beginnings of its own review and management of police crime labs in the face of its notorious crime lab scandal involving 21,000 cases.

Jeff Sessions ‘advancing’ forensic science…..

As a substitute, he promised on April 10, 2017 the following:

1. In the coming weeks, the Department will appoint a Senior Forensic Advisor to interface with forensic science stakeholders and advise Department leadership;

2. The Department will conduct a needs assessment of forensic science laboratories that examines workload, backlog, personnel and equipment needs of public crime laboratories and the needs of academic and non-traditional forensic science practitioners, and issue a report to Congress; and

3. The Department will publish a notice in the Federal Register seeking public comment on how the Department should move forward to strengthen the foundations of forensic science and improve the operations and capacity of forensic laboratories. The notice will remain open until June 9, 2017.

“These actions are being undertaken on the expiration of the National Commission on Forensic Science (NCFS) and will increase the capacity of forensic science providers, improve the reliability of forensic analysis, and permit reporting of forensic results with greater specificity. The Task Force’s Subcommittee on Forensics will spearhead the development of that strategic plan.”

Posted in forensic science reform protecting the innocent | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Medical Labs have more scientific safeguards than Forensic Labs

Posted on April 24, 2017 by csidds

Jeff Sessions Wants Courts to Rely Less on Science and more on ‘Science”

“Clinical laboratories must meet higher standards to be allowed to diagnose strep throat than forensic labs must meet to put a defendant on death row.” – Mother Jones

Forensics Left in Lurch by Sessions – The Scientist

“The loss of an even partially independent national commission is no trivial matter,” Erin Murphy of the New York University School of Law wrote in The New York Times. “In its brief two years of existence, it drafted 43 standards that actually changed forensic science, on the ground, for the better. . . .”

 

 

 

Posted in forensic science reform protecting the innocent | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Sample of Scientific Forensics in the News

Posted on April 24, 2017 by csidds

Image result for hair isotopes

This edition will focus on the presence of research-based forensics being talked about in our part of the world where “rigorous science is good” is coming out of the White House . Seem that the Science March got most of the news this weekend along with the Arkansas execution.

Isotopes from hair creating a path to micro-substances is recorded so far in a few cases.   This article from the ISHI blog is more detailed. One researcher presents the need for more than “one off” results before getting too excited. Another experimented on himself. Few labs have this specialized equipment.

A couple previous blog posts here and here lend some modulation to the current enthusiasm.

Mosquitos, Zika, viruses and our warming climate (not in Washington DC however).

Sadly, that’s about it for today on the science side.

Here is a bunch involving criminal justice.

Remember in 1980-90s when PANIC, not , put around 100 innocent people in prison? It’s happening again x10

Baton Rouge DA and Innocence Project tangle over missing evidence in old rape case –

Why more falsely accused people are being exonerated today than ever before. http://time.com/wrongly-convicted/?xid=fbshare

 

Posted in forensic science reform protecting the innocent | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Taking Police #Forensic Labs to task – “Incompetent or Worse” LCN DNA testing

Posted on April 22, 2017 by csidds

Los Angeles Crime Lab messes up a rape test. 10 trillionths of a gram of genetic material can put you in jail. 

It took LA Senior Public Defender Sam Leonard 17 months to get to the truth.

“If this is incompetence, it’s gross incompetence … and repeated gross incompetence,” Thompson said. “You have to wonder if [the techs] could really be that stupid.”

– William Thompson (Talking about Low Cell Number DNA testing.)

Read first: “The false promise of DNA testing – the forensic technique is becoming ever more common- and ever less reliable.” (2016)

Then read about Sam’s DNA West LA  case: 

“I’ve been doing DNA for 10 years – only DNA cases – and I’ve never seen anything like it,” Leonard said of the case. (2017)

Posted in forensic science reform protecting the innocent | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment