the crime report

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Questionable forensic testimony has kept Joseph Ramirez behind bars in Florida for 25 years. Will a fifth trial finally set him free?

 When the National Academy of Sciences issued a report earlier this year saying that courtroom identifications made by forensic scientists based on evidence such as bite marks, ballistics and other tool marks are frequently overstated and without scientific basis, the academy could well have pointed to the 25-year-long prosecution of Joseph Ramirez in Florida to illustrate its point.

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The field of forensics is undergoing a self-examination after a report by a committee of the National Academy of Sciences found “serious problems” with much of the work performed by crime laboratories in the United States, reports the New York Times. Recent incidents of faulty evidence analysis were just high-profile examples of wider deficiencies, the committee said. Crime labs were overworked, there were few certification programs for investigators and technicians, and the entire field suffered from a lack of oversight.

But perhaps the most damning conclusion was that many forensic disciplines — including analysis of fingerprints and bite marks — were not grounded in the kind of rigorous, peer-reviewed research that is the hallmark of classic science. DNA analysis was an exception, the report noted. But many other investigative tests, the report said, “have never been exposed to stringent scientific scrutiny.” While some forensic experts took issue with that conclusion, many welcomed it. The report was “basically saying what many of us have been saying for a long time,” said Lawrence Kobilinsky of John Jay College of Criminal Justice. “There are a lot of areas in forensics that need improvement.”

When the National Academy of Sciences released a comprehensive report on February 18 laying out serious shortcomings in forensic science, the nation’s preeminent scientific organization also presented a road map for reform.

The NAS report shows that many forensic techniques which are relied on in courtrooms every day lack adequate scientific support. While DNA testing was developed through extensive scientific research at top academic centers, many other forensic techniques – such as hair microscopy, bite mark comparisons, fingerprint analysis, firearms, tool marks and shoe print analysis – have never been subjected to rigorous scientific evaluation.

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Several of the 200 people who have been freed because DNA tests performed after their convictions showed they could not have committed the crimes have joined civil rights groups, some current and former prosecutors, and a convicted Alaskan rapist in urging the Supreme Court to apply constitutional protections for the first time to what the prisoners’ lawyers call “arguably the most important development in the history of forensic science: the advent of DNA testing,” reports the Washington Post. They are opposed by victims rights groups; the vast majority of states, which have a patchwork of laws granting DNA access; and the federal government. The governments say that creating a constitutional right to the testing would infringe on states’ rights, overwhelm them with frivolous demands, and create an endless right of appeal.

On Mar. 2, the Supreme Court will hear its first case that confronts the dilemma of how to deal with DNA evidence, which former attorney general John Ashcroft called the “truth machine of law enforcement.” The Innocence Project, representing convicted Alaskan rapist William Osborne in the Supreme Court case, says that DNA evidence has helped exonerate 232 prisoners, 17 of whom had been sentenced to death. Osborne was convicted of the brutal rape and assault of a prostitute in a secluded area near the Anchorage International Airport in 1993.

After the release of NAS’s report on the future of forensics, we continue forensics week by listening to some of the top experts in the field discuss their thoughts.

The National Academy of Sciences forensic science study says viewers of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, even judges and lawyers, are under the false impression that the techniques on the show are science at work.  National Public Radio says the committee found that while some forensic evidence, like DNA, is top-notch, other evidence, such as fingerprints, is not nearly so reliable. The NAS panel says the U.S. should standardize tests and certify forensics experts. It wants to train technicians and supervise crime labs, and to separate the science in a crime scene investigation from the police work. The committee wants a new federal agency that would oversee this, but Congress might not want to spend the money to create a new agency, and legislators might have trouble legislating local police practices from Washington. (more…)

Forensic week continues with journalist Dena Levitz reporting live from the National Academy of Sciences in Washington D.C.  on the long awaited release of the The Committee on Identifying the Needs of the Forensic Science Community’s report “Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward.”

2:oo p.m. In the final exhange of the briefing, Don Murray, of the National Association of Counties, relayed his concern that there’s a serious lack of training for the shortage of forensic pathologists across the country. “They’re sometimes not trained enough to even be suspicious that a crime has been committeed,” he said.

In Minnesota, for example, some counties are absent a medical examiner and have to fly evidence to outlying areas. He then suggested a paraprofessional program to at least begin to add to the number of coroners. Edward’s response was that the focus must be on beefing up the medical side of the forensic community, not the coroner segment and that a paraprofessional addition wouldn’t solve the problem.

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