Forensic science

No More 'Reasonable Degree of Scientific Certainty'

Forensic science, already under review and scrutiny from an alphabet-soup of federal agencies, is getting another reining-in from the Department of Justice.

Terms such as “reasonable scientific certainty” can no longer be used, DOJ labs have to post internal validation studies online, and forensic scientists will be expected to uphold a 16-part “Code of Professional Responsibility for the Practice of Forensic Science,” announced Loretta Lynch, the U.S. Attorney General, in a memorandum last week.

Read more on forensic magazine.com here

Broward County Crime Lab DNA Mixture Problems

In March 2015, prosecutors temporarily stopped sending evidence to what was then a state-of-the-art city forensics lab in Washington, DC, over concerns technicians had bungled cases and misstated the likelihood DNA had been left at a crime scene. Earlier this month, the crime lab for the entire city of Austin, Texas, was shut down amid concern its technicians weren't following proper procedure. Both events amounted to earthquakes in the criminal-justice world: Crime labs are responsible for handling nearly every piece of physical evidence. They need to be accurate.

Now, according to an independent forensics analyst, the very same DNA issues have struck the scandal-plagued Broward Sheriff's Office Crime Lab. The place is just now recovering from allegations a former drug analyst potentially tainted thousands of separate cases.

read more here

DNA Evidence Is Not Infallible

Earlier this month, the Texas Forensic Science Commission raised concerns about the accuracy of the statistical interpretation of DNA evidence, and it is now checking whether convictions going back more than a decade are safe.

Despite how it is often portrayed, in the media and in courts, the forensic science of DNA is far from infallible. Particularly concerning is that police and prosecutors now frequently talk of 'touch DNA' — genetic profiles of suspects and offenders that have been generated in a laboratory from just a handful of skin cells left behind in a fingerprint.

Research done by me and others at the University of Indianapolis in Indiana has highlighted how unreliable this kind of evidence can be. We have found that it is relatively straightforward for an innocent person's DNA to be inadvertently transferred to surfaces that he or she has never come into contact with. This could place people at crime scenes that they had never visited or link them to weapons they had never handled.

Such transfer could also dilute the statistics generated from DNA evidence, and thereby render strong genetic evidence almost insignificant. (The statistics issue is reportedly the focus of the Texas investigation.)

read more at: http://www.nature.com/news/forensic-dna-evidence-is-not-infallible-1.18654?

 

ABA Rule of Law Initiative Training- Cairo, Egypt

ForensicAid, LLC will be taking part in a training for Attorneys provided by the American Bar Association Rule of Law Initiative in Cairo, Egypt in mid-February and mid-March. 

The ABA Rule of Law Initiative is an international development program that promotes the rule of law by working with in-country partners to build sustainable institutions and societies…

For more about the program, visit:

http://www.americanbar.org/advocacy/rule_of_law.html