Wrongful Convictions - Innocent People in Jail Part 2. Barb Brink, President The Alaska Innocence Project

Transcription

1 Wrongful Convictions - Innocent People in Jail Part 2 Barb Brink, President The Alaska Innocence Project

2 P.O. BOX ANCHORAGE, ALASKA (907) Bill Oberly, Executive Director

3 WHAT ARE THE LEADING CAUSES OF WRONGFUL CONVICTIONS?

4 The Leading Causes of Innocent People in Jail

5 EYEWITNESS MISIDENTIFICATION TESTIMONY A factor in nearly 75 percent of post-conviction DNA exoneration cases in the U.S., making it the leading cause of these wrongful convictions.

6 EYEWITNESS IDENTIFICATION FACTS 75% of those wrongful convictions (179 individual cases as of this writing) involved eyewitness misidentification. In 38% of the misidentification cases, multiple eyewitnesses misidentified the same innocent person. Over 250 witnesses misidentified innocent suspects.

7 EYEWITNESS IDENTIFICATION FACTS (cont.) 53% of the misidentification cases, where race is known, involved cross-racial misidentifications. In 50% of the misidentification cases, eyewitness testimony was the central evidence used against the defendant (without other corroborating evidence like confessions, forensic science or informant testimony).

8 EYEWITNESS IDENTIFICATION FACTS (cont.) In 36% of the misidentification cases, the real perpetrator was identified through DNA evidence. In at least 48% of the misidentification cases where a real perpetrator was later identified through DNA testing, that perpetrator went on to commit (and was convicted of) additional violent crimes (rape, murder, attempted murder, etc.), after an innocent person was serving time in prison for his previous crime.

9 EYEWITNESS IDENTIFICATION FACTS (cont.) Eyewitness identification also plays a key role in shaping investigations. In the immediate aftermath of a crime, an erroneous identification can derail police investigations by putting focus on an innocent person while the actual perpetrator is still on the streets.

10 Variables impacting accuracy of identifications Estimator variables = cannot be controlled by Justice System Lighting Distance Race Weapon Stress

11 Variables impacting accuracy of identifications System variables = those the criminal justice system could and should control, like Retrieving Memory & Recording Memory a) Line-ups b) Show ups c) Photo-arrays d) Communication with witnesses

12 PERCEPTION AND RECALL ARE IMPACTED BY THE ABILITY TO SEE AND HEAR THE ABILITY TO REMEMBER AND RELATE

13 THIS IS NOT NEW INFORMATION! 1908 Hugo Munsterburg On the Witness Stand: Essays on Psychology and Crime

14 On the Witness Stand: Essays on Psychology and Crime Hugo Münsterberg (1908/1925) Foreword (by Charles S. Whitman) Introduction Illusions The Memory of the Witness The Detection of Crime The Traces of Emotion Untrue confessions Suggestions in Court Hypnotism and Crime The Prevention of Crime

15 Chapter 2: The Memory of the Witness From Berlin, in the University Seminary of Professor von Liszt, the famous criminologist: The Professor had spoken about a book. One of the older students suddenly shouts, "I wanted to throw light on the matter from the standpoint of Christian morality!" Another student throws in, "I cannot stand that!" The first starts up, exclaiming, "You have insulted me!" The second clenches his fist and cries, "If you say another word --" The first draws a revolver. The second rushes madly upon him. The Professor steps between them and, as he grasps the man's arm, the revolver goes off. General uproar.

16 ALL STUDENTS ARE ASKED FOR A FULL ACCOUNTING OF WHAT THEY HAD SEEN

17 RESULTS The accounts with the smallest number of mistakes still had 26% erroneous statements; The accounts with the largest number of mistakes was 80%. The accounts with reference to the second half of the performance, which was more strongly emotional, gave an average of 15% more errors than those of the first half.

18 RESULTS (cont.) Actual words were put into the mouths of men who had been silent spectators during the whole short episode; Actions were attributed to the chief participants of which not the slightest trace existed; And essential parts of the tragi-comedy were completely eliminated from the memory of a number of witnesses.

19 A SECOND EXPERIMENT IN 1906 A meeting of a Scientific Association, made up of jurists, psychologists, and physicians, all, therefore, men well trained in careful observation. Somewhere in the same street there was that evening a public festivity of the carnival.

20 A SECOND EXPERIMENT IN 1906 (CONT.) Suddenly, in the midst of the scholarly meeting, the doors open, a clown in highly colored costume rushes in in mad excitement, and a negro (sic) with a revolver in hand follows him. In the middle of the hall first the one, then the other, shouts wild phrases; then the one falls to the ground, the other jumps on him; then a shot, and suddenly both are out of the room. The whole affair took less than twenty seconds.

21 Forty (40) Eyewitness Accounts Were Handed In One whose omissions were calculated as amounting to less than twenty per cent of the characteristic acts; Fourteen had 20-40% of the facts omitted; Twelve omitted 40-50% of the facts; and Thirteen omitted more than 50% of the facts.

22 EVEN MORE TROUBLING: CREATED FACTS But besides the omissions there were only six among the forty which did not contain positively wrong statements; In twenty-four papers (up to ten per cent) of the statements were free inventions; and in ten answers -- That is, in one-fourth of the papers, -- more than ten per cent of the statements were absolutely false, in spite of the fact that they all came from scientifically trained observers

23 CONCLUSION One cannot rely on the accuracy of a normal person s memory. So how can one be sure of the testimony of any given witness?

24 Chapter 3: "The Detection of Crime" Munsterberg identified many factors that can: gain confessions influence testimony force a confession from those who are innocent

25 OTHER SCIENTISTS CONFIRMED THESE FINDINGS Yale law professor Edwin Borchard studied 65 wrongful convictions for his pioneering 1932 book, Convicting the Innocent. He also found that eyewitness misidentification was the leading cause of wrongful convictions.

26 WHY WERE MUNSTERBERG S CONCLUSIONS NOT FOLLOWED? He wrote many articles attempting to correct wrongs as he identified them. In The Americans (1904) and American Problems (1910) where he was highly critical of Americans saying that they had the "general inability to concentrate their attention on any one thing for very long." Also, bad timing.

27 MISIDENTIFICATION IN ACTION Factual Background The Cotton Case In two separate incidents in July 1984, an assailant broke into an apartment, severed phone wires, sexually assaulted a woman, and searched through her belongings, taking money and other items. On August 1, 1984, Ronald Cotton was arrested for the rapes. In January 1985, Cotton was convicted by a jury of one count of rape and one count of burglary. In a second trial, in November 1987, Cotton was convicted of both rapes and two counts of burglary. An Alamance County Superior Court sentenced Cotton to life plus 54 years.

28 The Evidence at Trial #1: A flashlight in Cotton's home resembled the one used by the assailant. Rubber from Cotton's tennis shoe was consistent with rubber found at one of the crime scenes. A photo identification was made by one of the victims. A police lineup identification was made by one of the victims.

29 The jury was not allowed to hear evidence that the second victim failed to pick Cotton out of either a photo array or a police lineup, and in fact picked out someone else. All of Cotton s alibi witnesses were family members. This conviction was reversed.

30 In November 1987, Cotton was re-tried, this time for both rapes, in Trial #2. Before the second trial, a man in prison, who had been convicted for crimes similar to these assaults, stated to another inmate that he had committed Cotton's crimes. The superior court judge refused to allow this information into evidence. The second victim had decided that Cotton was the assailant.

31 Cotton was convicted of both rapes and sentenced to life in prison.

32 COTTON S APPELLATE DEFENDER FILES A MOTION FOR DNA TESTING The samples from one victim were too deteriorated to be conclusive, but the samples from the other victim's vaginal swab and underwear were submitted to PCR testing and showed no match to Cotton At the defense attorney's request, the results were sent to the State Bureau of Investigation's DNA data base containing the DNA patterns of convicted, violent felons in North Carolina prisons.

33 RESULT? The state's data base showed a match with the convict who had earlier confessed to the crime.

34 CONCLUSION After Cotton's attorneys received the DNA test results in May 1995, they contacted the district attorney, who joined the defense attorneys in the motion to dismiss the charges. On June 30, 1995, Cotton was officially cleared of all charges and released from prison. In July 1995 the governor of North Carolina officially pardoned Cotton, making him eligible for $5,000 compensation from the state. Cotton had served 10 1/2 years in prison.

35 WHAT WENT WRONG? UNCONSCIOUS TANSFERENCE For Jennifer, this chain began when she attempted to translate her memories from that dark, traumatic summer night into concrete, usable information by working with police to assemble a composite sketch.

36 The image of the composite sketch then primed her to select Ronald s mug shot, which resembled the composite;

37 Her selection of the photograph, in turn, influenced her perceptions when Ronald Cotton appeared before her in person.

38 Although unsure for a fleeting moment, she chose Ronald from the line-up, thereby solidifying her identification of Ronald as her perpetrator.

39 This ID was reinforced by police and in pre-trial proceedings, and the certainty continued to build upon itself;

40 The image of Ronald Cotton s face was even haunting her in nightmares.

41 By the time of the 2d trial she was utterly certain that Cotton was the rapist.

42 Her visions of Ron as her attacker became so firmly set in her brain that, when presented with both Ronald Cotton and her real attacker, she reaffirmed that Ronald was, undoubtedly, her assailant.

43 ONE OF THE VICTIMS Jennifer Thompson-Cannino lives in North Carolina with her family. She speaks frequently about the need for judicial reform, and is a member of the North Carolina Actual Innocence Commission, the advisory committee for Active Voices, the Constitution Project, and Mothers for Justice. Her opeds have appeared in the New York Times, the Durham- Herald Sun, and the Tallahassee Democrat.

44 ANOTHER VICTIM Ronald Cotton lives with his wife and daughter in North Carolina and currently works at an insulation plant. He has spoken at various schools and conferences including Washington and Lee University, University of Nevada Las Vegas, Georgetown Law School, and the Community March for Justice for Troy Anthony Davis in Savannah, GA.

45 PICKING COTTON, THE BOOK Erin Torneo lives with her husband and twin sons in Dublin. She was a 2007 New York Foundation for the Arts Nonfiction Fellow. In 2010, she received the American Society of Journalists and Authors' Arlene Writing Award for her work on Picking Cotton. Ronald, Jennifer, and Erin received the 2008 Soros Justice Media Fellowship for this book

46 LINE UPS and their problems

47 NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH A SHOW-UP

48 The Unconscious Influence In a standard lineup, the lineup administrator typically knows who the suspect is. Research shows that administrators often provide unintentional cues to the eyewitness about which person to pick from the lineup.

49 The Simultaneous Influence In a standard lineup, an eyewitness is shown individuals or photographs simultaneously. Research shows that this tends to lead eyewitnesses to choose a lineup member based upon a relative judgment (i.e. who looks most like the perpetrator?), rather than basing the identification on his or her own mental image of the perpetrator.

50 The Solution: sequential presentation of lineups Research has shown that presenting lineup members one-by-one (sequential), rather than all at once (simultaneous), decreases the rate at which innocent people are identified. Research has also demonstrated that when viewing several subjects at once, witnesses tend to choose the person who looks the most like but may not actually be the perpetrator.

51 ASSUMPTION: He Must Be There In a standard lineup, without instructions from the administrator, the eyewitness often assumes that the perpetrator of the crime is one of those presented in the lineup. This often leads to the selection of a person despite doubts.

52 Lineup composition: Fillers (the non-suspects included in a lineup) should resemble the eyewitness description of the perpetrator, NOT WHO THE POLICE THINK IT IS; The suspect should not stand out (for example, he should not be the only member of his race in the lineup, or the only one with facial hair). Eyewitnesses should not view multiple lineups with the same suspect in it.

53 TOO GOOD

54 Who did it?

55 THE SOLUTION: DOUBLE Blind administration Research and experience have shown that the risk of misidentification is sharply reduced if the police officer administering a photo or live lineup is not aware of who the suspect is. Reliability increases even more when the witness is TOLD the administrator does not know which image if any, is the suspect.

56 THE SOLUTION: Instructions The person viewing a lineup should be told: that the perpetrator may not be in the lineup; that the investigation will continue regardless of the lineup result; not to look to the administrator for guidance because they don t know who it is.

57 The Solution: Recording Confidence Statements Immediately following the lineup procedure, the eyewitness should provide a statement, in their own words, articulating their level of confidence in the identification. WHY? An uncertain identification can become more certain over time and exposure. Positive Feedback skyrockets confidence. *** Repeating an image increases confidence.

58 The Solution: RECORDING Identification procedures should be videotaped whenever possible this protects innocent suspects from any misconduct by the lineup administrator, and it helps the prosecution by showing a jury that the procedure was legitimate.

59 SUCH REFORMS HAVE BEEN ADOPTED BY WISCONSIN NEW JERSEY NORTH CAROLINA NORTHHAMPTON MA SUFFOLK COUNTY MA (BOSTON) SANTA CLARA COUNTY (CA)

60 IMPROPER FORENSIC SCIENCE 50 percent of wrongful convictions later overturned by DNA testing hair microscopy, bite mark comparisons, firearm tool mark analysis and shoe print comparisons ALL discredited

61 DNA CANNOT FIX EVERYTHING? only 5-10% of all criminal cases involve biological evidence that could be subjected to DNA testing. In the other 90-95% of crimes, DNA testing is not an option so the criminal justice system relies on other kinds of evidence, including forensic disciplines that may not be scientifically sound or properly conducted.

62 What is junk science? 1) LACK OF STANDARDS a) the use of forensic disciplines or techniques that have not been tested to establish their validity and reliability; b) THE METHOD WAS developed solely to solve crime; c) No quality control standards.

63 Examples Matching teeth marks Voice comparisons Hair analysis There is no way of knowing how rare similarities are, so no way of knowing how meaningful the evidence is.

64 2) Improper Testimony Testimony about forensic evidence that: presents inaccurate statistics gives statements of probability or frequency (whether numerical or non-numerical) in the absence of valid empirical data interprets non-probative evidence as inculpatory concludes/suggests that evidence is uniquely connected to the defendant without empirical data to support such testimony.

65 EXAMPLE This hair appears similar when looked at under a microscope. VERSUS This hair matches the DEFENDANT S.

66 3) Forensic Misconduct Fabricating inculpatory data or failing to disclose exculpatory data; Mistakes that could result from lack of training, poor support or insufficient resources to meet an ever-growing demand; Reported results when no tests were conducted at all.

67 4) Good Science Gone Wrong Forensics techniques that have been properly validated such as serology, commonly known as blood typing are sometimes improperly conducted or inaccurately conveyed in trial testimony.

68 LAWYERS AND JUDGES WENT TO LAW SCHOOL BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT SCIENTISTS

69 The admissibility of SCIENTIFIC evidence IN COURT FRYE TEST: Is the field in which the underlying theory falls generally accepted in the relevant scientific community? Are there procedures available that can produce reliable results and are they generally accepted in the relevant scientific community?

70 The DAUBERT Test 1. Can the procedure be tested and thereby validated? 2. Is the procedure peer reviewed? 3. Is the rate of error for that procedure available? 4. Is the procedure generally accepted in the scientific community?

71 The Evolution of Blood Analysis The A B O blood groups identified by Austrian scientist Karl Landsteiner, who found three different blood types in 1900; He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1930 for his work. Was developed for medical purposes, NOT to solve crimes.

72 Comparisons of Blood Types The distribution of the blood groups A, B, O and AB varies across the world according to the population. There are also variations in blood type distribution within human subpopulations.

73 Blood analysis gone wrong Alejandro Dominguez was 16 years old when he was convicted in Illinois of a rape he didn t commit. Semen was found on the victim s body, the scientist from the Northern Illinois Crime laboratory testified, and Dominguez s blood type matched the semen sample, meaning he could have been the perpetrator.

74 OMISSION The scientist did not tell the jury, however, that no potential semen donor could be excluded because the victim s blood group markers could be masking the perpetrator s. Dominguez was convicted and sentenced to nine years in prison. Dominguez was officially exonerated on April 26, 2002, after DNA testing proved that he could not have deposited the semen left by the perpetrator.

75 Alejandro Dominguez

76 Forensic Hair Analysis = LOOKING AT HAIR

77 SEE?

78 HAIR Analysts will testify that hairs from a crime scene match or are consistent with defendants hair. This is based solely on appearance. There is no scientific research on validity and reliability of hair analysis. They have no way of knowing how rare these similarities are, so there is no way to know how meaningful this comparison evidence is.

79 CURTIS MCCARTY CASE: Oklahoma City A government analyst (Joyce Gilchrist) originally concluded that the tested hairs were not consistent with McCarty. However, two years later when McCarty was arrested, the analyst changed her notes to say they could have been his. Result: 22 YEARS IN JAIL 19 on Death Row

80 GILCHRIST S TESTIMONY SPANNED 20 YEARS In 2000 GILKCHRIST was asked to re-examine the hair evidence on appeal and she said that it would be suitable for DNA testing. However, when defense attorneys asked her to produce the evidence, she said it had been lost or destroyed. These hairs have never been found. At the close of the investigation, Gilchrist was fired due to the forensic fraud she had committed in several cases. Her false testimony has contributed to two other wrongful convictions that were later overturned by DNA testing, those of Jeffrey Todd Pierce and Robert Miller. She testified in thousands of cases during her 20-year career.

81 Oklahoma City District Attorney Robert Macy sent 73 people to death row during his 21 year career more than any other prosecutor in the country. Twenty of those 73 have been executed.

82 STEVE BARNES The Crime On the evening of Sept. 18, 1985, 16- year-old Kimberly Simon left her Marcy, New York, home walking to meet a high school friend. The next day, police officers found her body near the side of a dirt road. She had been raped and strangled to death.

83 EYEWITNESSES Several people in Utica told police that they had seen Simon walking along a busy street between 5:30 and 6 p.m. Others said they saw Steven Barnes distinctive truck on that road around the same time. He became a suspect based on these vague statements from eyewitnesses.

84 SNITCHES AND ALIBIS One man, in police custody for an unrelated incident, testified that he was riding in a police vehicle when he saw the victim walking on the road and saw a truck similar to Barnes truck nearby. Steven s brother-in-law testified that he saw a young woman getting into a truck along the road that was clearly not Barnes truck. Others said they saw Barnes at a local bowling alley through the evening of the murder. OR

85 POLYGRAPH He was given a polygraph test which investigators said was inconclusive and police checked his truck for fingerprints and trace evidence. He was released without charges at that time. More than two years later, however, investigators were still working on the case and asked Barnes to submit blood, saliva and hair samples. He was arrested in March of 1988, more than two years after the crime, and charged with rape, sodomy and murder.

86 TIRE TRACKS Although tire print comparison has never been a validated forensic practice, the tracks from the crime scene were compared with Barnes truck tires and investigators determined that they did not match.

87 DIRT ANALYSIS Dr. Elaine Pagliaro, the supervising criminalist at the Connecticut State Police Forensic Laboratory, compared soil samples taken from Steven s truck with dirt samples taken from the crime scene a year after the murder and testified that they had similar characteristics. Soil comparison has not been validated scientifically. Because there is not adequate empirical data on the frequency of various class characteristics in soil samples the analyst s assertion that these items of evidence were consistent or similar is inherently prejudicial and lacks probative value.

88 Hair Pagliaro also testified that two hairs collected from Barnes truck were microscopically similar to the victim s hairs and dissimilar from Barnes hair. She added that no hairs similar to Barnes samples were found on the victim s body.

89 BLUE JEAN IMPRINT Pagliaro also testified that she conducted a photographic overlay of fabric from the victim s jeans and an imprint on Barnes truck and determined that the two patterns were similar. The state then entered testimony from a selfemployed manufacturers representative who told the court that the stitching on the brand of jeans the victim wore was unique and that as many as 200 pairs may have been sold in Oneida County, New York, in 1985.

90 Because there is no adequate empirical data on the frequency of various class characteristics in blue jeans the analyst s assertion that these items of evidence were consistent or similar is inherently prejudicial and lacks probative value.

91 UNVALIDATED Because there is not adequate empirical data on the frequency of various class characteristics in human hair, soil samples or imprints, the analyst s assertion that these items of evidence were consistent or similar is inherently prejudicial and lacks probative value.

92 INNOCENCE PROJECT The Innocence Project began representing Barnes in 1993 and secured DNA testing on his behalf in The Oneida County District Attorney consented to conducting DNA tests on evidence from the crime scene, but those tests were inconclusive because the DNA technology at the time did not yield a profile. A decade later, in 2007, the Innocence Project reopened the case, and Oneida County District Attorney Scott McNamara agreed to conduct DNA testing. This round was conducted using Y-STR testing, an advanced technology that had not been previously available.

93 Y-STR TESTING The new tests yielded conclusive results on sperm cells from the victim s body and clothing none of which matched Barnes. After serving almost two decades in prison for a murder and rape he didn t commit, Barnes was freed on November 25, His exoneration became official on January 9, 2009, when prosecutors announced that they were dropping all charges. Shortly after his exoneration he celebrated his 43rd birthday the first one at home in two decades.

94 After spending 19.5 years in jail, Steve came to Alaska in 2011

95 FINGERPRINTS What does a fingerprint expert do?

96 S/HE LOOKS at Fingerprints A fingerprint in its narrow sense is an impression left by the friction ridges of a human finger. A friction ridge is a raised portion of the epidermis on the fingers and toes (digits), the palm of the hand or the sole of the foot, consisting of one or more connected ridge units of friction ridge skin.

97 How are fingerprints made? Impressions of fingerprints may be left behind on a surface by the natural secretions of sweat from the eccrine glands that are present in friction ridge skin, or they may be made by ink or other substances transferred from the peaks of friction ridges on the skin to a relatively smooth surface such as a fingerprint card.

98 Friction Ridges

99 Latent v. Exemplar Prints Exemplar prints, or known prints, is the name given to fingerprints deliberately collected from a subject, whether for purposes of enrollment in a system or when under arrest for a suspected criminal offense. During criminal arrests, a set of exemplar prints will normally include one print taken from each finger that has been rolled from one edge of the nail to the other, plain (or slap) impressions of each of the four fingers of each hand, and plain impressions of each thumb. Exemplar prints can be collected using Live Scan or by using ink on paper cards

100 Latent Prints are those found Latent prints means any chance or accidental impression left by friction ridge skin on a surface, regardless of whether it is visible or invisible at the time of deposition.

101 Finding Latents It is generally necessary to use a developer, usually a powder or chemical reagent, to produce a high degree of visual contrast between the ridge patterns and the surface on which a fingerprint has been deposited. Examples: ninhydrin, diazafluorenone and vacuum metal deposition.

102 Classification patterns ARCH LOOP

103 WHORL

104 TOUGH CHOICES Another problem for the early twenty-first century is that during crime scene investigations, a decision has to be made at an early stage whether to attempt to retrieve fingerprints through the use of developers or whether to swab surfaces in an attempt to salvage material for DNA profiling. The two processes are mutually incompatible, as fingerprint developers destroy material that could potentially be used for DNA analysis, and swabbing is likely to make fingerprint identification impossible.

105 CRITICISMS OF FINGERPRINT COMPARISONS The subjective nature of matching, despite a very low error rate, has made this forensic practice controversial The few tests that have been made of the validity of forensic fingerprinting have not been supportive of the method.

106 International Association for Identification (IAI) agrees to Proficiency Test in 1995 Four suspect cards with prints of all ten fingers were provided together with seven latents. Of 156 people taking the test, only 68 (44%) correctly classified all seven latents. Overall, the tests contained a total of 48 incorrect identifications.

107 SURPRISE! David Grieve, the editor of the Journal of Forensic Identification, describes the reaction of the forensic community to the results of the CTS test as ranging from shock to disbelief. What is striking about these comments is that they do not come from a critic of the fingerprint community, but from the editor of one of its premier publications." Sandy L Zabell, 2005 Journal of Law and Policy.

108 FINGERPRINT ERROR Brandon Mayfield case: an Oregon lawyer who was identified as a participant in the 2004 Madrid train bombings based on a fingerprint match by the FBI.

109 The FBI weighs in The FBI Latent Print Unit processed a fingerprint collected in Madrid and reported a "100 percent positive" match against one of the 20 fingerprint candidates returned in a search response from their IAFIS Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System. The FBI initially called it an "absolutely incontrovertible match".

110 CNP Subsequently, however, Spanish National Police examiners suggested that the print did not match Mayfield and after two weeks, identified another man whom they claimed the fingerprint did belong to.

111 Mayfield, con t. The FBI acknowledged their error, and a judge released Mayfield, who had spent two weeks in police custody, in May 2004.

112 Mayfield, con t. On 29 November 2006, the FBI agreed to pay Brandon Mayfield US$2 million in compensation.

113 I feel better, do you? The formal apology stated that the FBI, which erroneously linked him to the 2004 Madrid bombing through a fingerprinting mistake, had taken steps to "ensure that what happened to Mr. Mayfield and the Mayfield family does not happen again.

114 FINGERPRINTS ARE DANGEROUS Craig D. Harvey In April 1993, in the New York State Police Troop C scandal, Craig D. Harvey, a New York State Police trooper was charged with fabricating evidence. Harvey admitted he and another trooper lifted fingerprints from items the suspect, John Spencer, touched while in Troop C headquarters during booking. He attached the fingerprints to evidence cards and later claimed that he had pulled the fingerprints from the scene of the murder.

115 IN THE WRONG HANDS The forged evidence was presented during John Spencer's trial and his subsequent conviction resulted in a term of 50 years to life in prison at his sentencing. Three state troopers were found guilty of fabricating fingerprint evidence and served prison sentences.

116 VOICES If the speaker claims to be of a certain identity and the voice is used to verify this claim, this is called verification or authentication. identification is the task of determining an unknown speaker's identity.

117 VOICE ANALYSIS The David Pope case: After a sexual assault, the woman reported strange messages on her answering machine. Larry Howe Williams, a Houston Police Officer, presented the jury with a comparison of the recorded calls and a tape recording of Pope s voice.

118

119 David Pope Case He claimed that they matched because the sound waves made similar patterns on a paper drum. Williams testified that he was certified to conduct voice print analysis following a two-week course and two years of on-the-job training

120 VOICE ANALYSIS When testifying about a voice on an answering machine and Pope's voice, an analyst was asked, "The bottom line analysis on the known voice and the unknown voice in this situation were only made by one single person in the whole wide world?" and the analyst replied, Exactly." The analyst was then asked, "Just like fingerprints, it is unique?" and the analyst said, "Exactly."

121 Juries and Defense Experts The defense called an expert on voice analysis who confirmed that voice spectrographic analysis was not scientific and couldn t determine an exact match between human voices. After a very short deliberation, the jury found Pope guilty of aggravated sexual assault, and he was sentenced to 45 years in prison.

122 JUSTICE, 15 years later In January 1999, the Dallas County District Attorney s Office received an anonymous call that supported Pope s claim of innocence. Upon receiving this tip, the prosecution reopened Pope s case and ran DNA tests on the rape kit. The results matched a convicted rapist, and excluded Pope as the perpetrator. Pope was pardoned by Governor Rick Perry on February 2, 2001 after spending 15 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. Pope became the first person exonerated through DNA testing in Dallas County.

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124 Bite Mark Evidence RAY KRONE CASE: An analyst testified that he was "certain" that Krone's teeth caused bites on the homicide victim, and that it was "a very good match." He went on to say that bite mark comparison "has all the veracity, all the strength that a fingerprint would have." The prosecution also failed to disclose that an FBI expert had examined the bite marks and said they weren't from Krone.

125 KRONE He was sentenced to death and a consecutive twenty-one year term of imprisonment, respectively. Krone was found not guilty of the sexual assault.

126 KRONE Krone won a new trial on appeal in 1996, but was convicted again, mainly on the state s supposed expert bite-mark testimony. This time, however, the judge sentenced him to life in prison, citing doubts about whether or not Krone was the true killer.

127 KRONE It was not until 2002, after Krone had served more than ten years in prison, that DNA testing would prove his innocence. DNA testing conducted on the saliva and blood found on the victim excluded Krone as the source and instead matched a man named Kenneth Phillips. Phillips was incarcerated on an unrelated sex crime and, although he had lived a short distance from the bar where the victim worked, he had never been considered a suspect in her murder.

128

129 IT CAN HAPPEN TO ANYBODY Ray Krone spent more than a decade in prison, some of it on death row, before DNA testing cleared his name. He was the twelfth death row inmate whose innocence has been proven through postconviction DNA testing. Prior to his arrest, Krone had no previous criminal record, had been honorably discharged from the military, and had worked in the postal service for seven years.

130 THE SOLUTION? BETTER SCIENCE National Academy of Sciences Urges Comprehensive Reform of U.S. Forensic Sciences 2 YEAR STUDY Experts who provided testimony included federal agency officials; academics and research scholars; private consultants; federal, state, and local law enforcement officials; scientists; medical examiners; a coroner; crime laboratory officials from the public and private sectors; independent investigators; defense attorneys; forensic science practitioners; and leadership of professional and standard setting organizations

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132 RECOMENDATIONS 1. Establish National Institute of Forensic Science 2. Set national standards for forensic sciences and enforce those standards. 3. Research accuracy, reliability, and validity of disciplines. 4. Remove all public forensic labs from administrative control of law enforcement and prosecutors.

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134 RECOMMENDATIONS (2) 5. Establish SOP to remove human bias and error. 6. develop tools for advancing measurement, validation, reliability, information sharing, and proficiency testing in forensic science and to establish protocols for forensic examinations, methods, and practices. 7. Laboratory accreditation and individual certification of forensic science professionals should be mandatory. 8. Forensic laboratories should establish routine quality assurance and quality control procedures to ensure the accuracy of forensic analyses.

135 RECOMMENDATIONS (3) 9. Establish a national code of ethics for all forensic science disciplines and develop enforcement processes.

136 Specific to Fingerprints develop: standards for representing and communicating image and minutiae data among Automated Fingerprint Identification Systems. Common data standards would facilitate the sharing of fingerprint data among law enforcement agencies at the local, state, federal, and even international levels, which could result in more solved crimes, fewer wrongful identifications, and greater efficiency with respect to fingerprint searches; and

137 baseline standards to be used with computer algorithms to map, record, and recognize features in fingerprint images, and a research agenda for the continued improvement, refinement, and characterization of the accuracy of these algorithms (including quantification of error rates).