Alabama is seeking to become the first state to execute a prisoner by making him breathe pure nitrogen.
— Read on apnews.com/article/alabama-death-penalty-nitrogen-hypoxia-a6f414ff6147cbd38de6a8cd01f96653
The facts are grim.
The devastating fires in Maui have caused at least 115 deaths, yet only 46 of those have been identified two weeks on from the blaze, police said Thursday. Hundreds of people remain unaccounted for, too.
— Read on www.cnn.com/2023/08/26/us/maui-fires-rapid-dna-identify/index.html
The weeks of fragmentary information from Hawaii and news media has raised some concerns I want to mention. The hurdles to identification involved in this type of mass disaster are huge principally because of the high temperature effects on human remains. The number 1000 still missing continues to be mentioned. My experience with search for cremated remains began in 1993 during the Los Angeles riots initiated by the Ridney King police beating. Buildings burned to their foundations leaving tangles of structural beams and debris spread throughout the fire scenes. Our Coroner team was tasked to recover fire victims. What we found runs parallel to what has occurred in Lahaina. Exponentially worse in Hawaii. The recovery teams there are having to sift through the ashes and debris in hundreds of totally destroyed homes and businesses. This requires heavy equipment to remove burned structural components before visually inspecting all the residual ashed material. Then it all has to be sieved to recover fire splintered bone and teeth. This material is fragile and crumbly. The challenge is retrieving DNA. This is problematic due to extreme heat. The scope of this effort is huge. It is exhausting and often frustrating. I wish the community, first responders and recovery teams receive personal assistance counseling to add support in this tragic process. Aloha
There’s something about autism that invites scapegoating. The latest attack was on makers of Lexapro, the anti-depressant medication, when used during pregnancy. Six plaintiffs recruited three experts to testify to a supposed causal connection between the drug and their children’s affliction. The court rejected the expert testimony outright and dismissed the case. Three weeks
— Read on www.acsh.org/news/2023/08/24/junk-science-courtroom-keeps-coming-back-–-and-getting-swatted-17278
Identifying fire victims through DNA analysis: A geneticist explains what forensics is learning from archaeology
— Read on phys.org/news/2023-08-victims-dna-analysis-geneticist-forensics.html
Awful story. Hospital defense is absurd.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-news/maria-de-jesus-arroyo-gran-3383123
Thanks to @maxhouck@substack.com. Forensic genetic genealogists skirted GEDmatch privacy rules by searching users who explicitly opted out of sharing DNA with law enforcement.
— Read on theintercept.com/2023/08/18/gedmatch-dna-police-forensic-genetic-genealogy/
These maps — of geographical differences in skull shapes — have vanished from acceptable science (and cartography).
— Read on bigthink.com/strange-maps/cephalic-index-maps/
The Smithsonian’s human brains collection was led by Ales Hrdlicka, a museum curator in the 1900s who believed that White people were superior.
— Read on www.washingtonpost.com/history/interactive/2023/smithsonian-brains-collection-racial-history-repatriation/
FORENSICS and LAW in FOCUS @ CSIDDS | News and Trends 