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Forensics Gone Wrong: When DNA Snares the Innocent (2016)

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Re: Forensics Gone Wrong: When DNA Snares the Innocent (2016)

#11

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

A lot of what the article is saying makes sense, but I really wish the reporter had pushed a bit harder on Hampikian. He conducted a study to show that mixed DNA analysis can falsely exclude people, but are there similar studies that confirm the complex strategies he's exploring in the Tapp case can't falsely exclude people?

"Civil rights advocates object to [familial DNA] because it means that simply being related to an offender can make you a person of interest." If Hampikian knows that DNA can snare the innocent, shouldn't he be opposing any use of familial DNA rather than helping people use it in their appeals?

Re: Forensics Gone Wrong: When DNA Snares the Innocent (2016)

#12

Post by sixothree »

theGnuMe wrote: post #8
opwieurposiu wrote: post #5

[flagged]

Yes but technically the jury are the ones who convicted.

I would argue the jury was lied to here. Having been a juror on a murder trial, I witnessed first hand how much people are willing to believe prosecutors. In my case there were very obvious timeline issues and jurors just looked past it without a second thought.

Re: Forensics Gone Wrong: When DNA Snares the Innocent (2016)

#13

Post by throw0101d »

See also:

> The Phantom of Heilbronn, often alternatively referred to as the "Woman Without a Face", was a hypothesized unknown female serial killer whose existence was inferred from DNA evidence found at numerous crime scenes in Austria, France and Germany from 1993 to 2009. The six murders among these included that of police officer Michèle Kiesewetter, in Heilbronn, Germany on 25 April 2007.

> The only connection between the crimes was the presence of DNA from a single female, which had been recovered from 40 crime scenes, ranging from murders to burglaries. In late March 2009, investigators concluded that there was no "phantom criminal", and the DNA had already been present on the cotton swabs used for collecting DNA samples; it belonged to a woman who worked at the factory where they were made.[1]

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_of_Heilbronn

Re: Forensics Gone Wrong: When DNA Snares the Innocent (2016)

#15

Post by jansan »

Do people know about the Phantom of Heilbronn? For 15 years, police in Germany found DNA of one and the same person on about 40 different crime scenes. The crimes seemed to be completely unrelated, including murder, burglary, theft and even disputes between neighbors. This person was labeled "The Phantom" and all that was known aws that she was a female (XX chromosme type female). Everyone agreed that she must have been a true monster.

To keep it short, it was all a contamination of the swabs used by forensics. The DNA belonged to a worker in a factory where the swabs were produced. It took the police 15 years to find out. 15 years!

I sometimes wonder what would have happened if that woman had by accident become a suspect in a crime and her DNA run through the police's DNA database.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heilbronner_Phantom

Re: Forensics Gone Wrong: When DNA Snares the Innocent (2016)

#16

Post by hiatus »

Lord-Jobo wrote: post #10
arcbyte wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's more work we can do to balance the power of individual defendants against the state, but the adversarial justice system is the most accurate and effective system for mediating public safety, punishment, and revenge ever developed in the history of the world.

The main concern here is that the system is being nearly entirely bypassed. Literally 98% of cases plea out^1, bypassing the entire system of court procedure that is supposed to resolve these issues. 1: https://www.npr.org/2023/02/22/1158356619/plea-bargains-crim...

Submitting a plea is part of court procedure, and I'd also point out that the data you shared is for US federal cases, which have a notoriously high rate of conviction which could explain why people are quick to plea out.

> In fiscal year 2022, only 290 of 71,954 defendants in federal criminal cases – about 0.4% – went to trial and were acquitted, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of the latest available statistics from the federal judiciary. Another 1,379 went to trial and were found guilty (1.9%).

So 1669 defendants went to trial, and 1379 were found guilty, roughly 80%.

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/06/14/fewer-tha...

Re: Forensics Gone Wrong: When DNA Snares the Innocent (2016)

#18

Post by giantg2 »

sixothree wrote: post #12
theGnuMe wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes but technically the jury are the ones who convicted.

I would argue the jury was lied to here. Having been a juror on a murder trial, I witnessed first hand how much people are willing to believe prosecutors. In my case there were very obvious timeline issues and jurors just looked past it without a second thought.

It seems that many of the smart people have excuses to get out of jury duty, potentially skewing the pool to the low side. Although it's also possible that many of the smarter people who are selected have biases they aren't aware of or don't want to know about.

Re: Forensics Gone Wrong: When DNA Snares the Innocent (2016)

#20

Post by bnralt »

opwieurposiu wrote: post #5

[flagged]

We’ve had numerous cases here where prosecutors declined to press charges or gave a small amount of time as part of a sweetheart plea deal, and the criminal went on and killed someone. We’ve also had cases where the judge let a violent criminal out before trial and they killed someone. Should we make the judges and prosecutors culpable in those situations as well?

If you have strong penalties for the criminal justice system being too aggressive but none for the system being too lenient, your going to end up getting a lot of people killed by violent criminals who should be behind bars.

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