Report: 'Nearly Every' FBI Forensics Expert Gave Flawed Testimony In 'Almost All Trials' Over A 20-Year Period

from the when-convictions-are-prized-over-accuracy dept

Mon, Apr 20th 2015 7:56am — Tim Cushing

The FBI seems to be more interested in securing convictions than finding the truth. An investigation into questions about the agency's hair analysis commenced in 1996, but years of foot dragging by the FBI means the full truth has only come to light over the past couple of years. What's detailed in a report compiled by the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and The Innocence Project is an almost surreally callous drive for sucessful prosecutions that potentially put dozens of innocent people behind bars.

The Justice Department and FBI have formally acknowledged that nearly every examiner in an elite FBI forensic unit gave flawed testimony in almost all trials in which they offered evidence against criminal defendants over more than a two-decade period before 2000.

Of 28 examiners with the FBI Laboratory’s microscopic hair comparison unit, 26 overstated forensic matches in ways that favored prosecutors in more than 95 percent of the 268 trials reviewed so far…

This isn't to say that nearly every case reviewed will be overturned. For some, it's too late. Of those reviewed, 28 pertain to prisoners with death sentences -- of which nearly all have already died... or been put to death. For others, their convictions may not have hinged on apparently questionable DNA evidence.

What's uncovered here is just the beginning. There are nearly 1,200 more cases to review. For many of those, it will likely be several years (and several lawsuits) before the truth comes out. Of those 1,200, nearly 700 are being met with stonewalling by local law enforcement and prosecutors, who have refused to provide requested transcripts and other court materials.

Part of this widespread failure is undoubtedly due to the FBI's desire to rack up convictions. (The same is true for those entities it worked with -- local law enforcement agencies and prosecutors.) But a larger portion of this can be chalked up to the FBI's own desire to keep its "slam dunk" forensics analysis from being questioned by anyone inside or outside of its labs. For four decades (1972-2012), the FBI refused to provide any guidelines for the use of, not just hair DNA evidence, but almost any forensic evidence, in court.

The FBI is waiting to complete all reviews to assess causes but has acknowledged that hair examiners until 2012 lacked written standards defining scientifically appropriate and erroneous ways to explain results in court. The bureau expects this year to complete similar standards for testimony and lab reports for 19 forensic disciplines.

Judging from how analysts performed in court, the lack of guidance was apparently construed to mean "put people in jail," rather than unbiased scientific analysis. This news follows on the heels of a highly critical report condemning the agency's faith in "bite mark analysis," a practice that is increasingly being perceived as junk science -- foisted on law enforcement by self-described "experts" with no hard data to back up their findings. The courts, so far, have often indulged bite mark experts, despite a National Academy of Sciences report finding that bite mark analysis provides "no evidence of an existing scientific basis for identifying an individual to the exclusion of all others."

These are people who have the power to effectively end someone's life and they've been instrumental in ensuring that problems tracing back to the early 1970s -- and first examined 25 years later -- remained buried until it could no longer be ignored.

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Filed Under: convictions, doj, fbi, forensic evidence, testimony

61 Comments

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Groaker (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 8:20am

Forensic nonesense
The FBI has been in chronic scandal for its forensic malfeasance for decades. Whether for claiming a test could distinguish between different fertilizers, when it couldn't tell the difference between nitrogen in fertilizer, and nitrogen in urine. To completely made up tests in bullet analysis, and endless more schemes to convict people with only the cachet of the FBI supporting the tests.
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That Anonymous Coward (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 8:24am

Gameification of the system always results in cheating.
The problem is they are playing this game with peoples lives.

They get points for convictions, not for actually finding justice. We've seen prosecutors who hide evidence, lie in court, investigators who have "unique" ways to look at evidence... and not a damn thing ever happens to them. Somehow we let them undermine the entire system and not face any of the blowback when they get caught.

Perhaps it is time that we seriously look at reform, by removing rewarding convictions over the fair pursuit of the truth. We have cases not brought because it might be to hard to win, and cases where people unable to fight back are being railroaded & legally murdered because someone needed a feather in their cap more than to find the truth.

We give them more if they convict more, and we are shocked that they are cutting corners... perhaps we need to stop being blind to the problem we created.
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Rich Fiscus (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 8:25am

To butcher a quote, from The Usual Suspects:
To a cop, the explanation is never that complicated. It's always simple. If you got a dead body and you think his brother did it, you're gonna find out you're right.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 8:27am

So... still no rioting on the streets? Noone is even just a little bit upset?
Damn your government can really get away with anything, no wonder they dont even bother to make their bullshit believable.
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Richard (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 8:30am

The real problem
The real problem is the scientific illiteracy of lawyers, judges etc. In fact even many scientists are not very good with statistical evidence hen it is to be used in court rather than the lab.

Probably the best people to employ to see through these lies would be magicians. I'd employ Penn Jillette on my defence team any day!
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 8:36am

Response to: Anonymous Coward on Apr 20th, 2015 @ 8:27am
Please tell us the utopia from which you hail
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 8:37am

Re:
This is why people do not trust the system and take plea bargins for reduced sentences.

Also why anyone that has been through the system faces a high recidivism rate because the system is designed to keep criminals criminal.

Next up are the police shootings and people blowing cops away to avoid getting mixed up in a corrupt system

But what law enforcement will never tell you is that they like it this way.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 8:38am

Re: The real problem
The real problem has been the same since the beginning.

Political BS. Science, religion, and culture falls to its BS
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Kitkat, 20 Apr 2015 @ 8:41am

The FBI should change their name to Federal Investigatory Bureau, because they are a bunch of FIBbers.
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redrum, 20 Apr 2015 @ 8:46am

There's a documentary about this
I've seen a show on PBS about a scam for "certifying" expert witnesses, how fingerprint and ballistics investigations can be flawed, bite-mark as identifier BS, and it ended with a good explanation on jury nullification. I'd highly recommend it if you see it on.
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jupiterkansas (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 9:03am

Re:
All rioting in the streets will do is give them an excuse to ramp up enforcement, extend jail terms, and condemn more people.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 9:11am

Re: Forensic nonesense
You know you're in trouble when NCIS is more accurate than your own testing.
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Jeff Green (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 9:16am

And now ...
There would seem to be a large number of "slam dunk" convictions available to the FBI and law enforcement agencies.
For perjury, or will the desire to obtain easy convictions now evaporate?
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forensic scientist, 20 Apr 2015 @ 9:24am

Re: The real problem
I think you meant 'statistical evidence Chicken'
NOT 'statistical evidence hen'

I am a forensic scientist so I would know . . .
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tqk (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 9:24am

Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Apr 20th, 2015 @ 8:27am

So... still no rioting on the streets? Noone is even just a little bit upset?

Please tell us the utopia from which you hail

What's that got to do with anything? It's a valid question. Their country doesn't brag about Exceptionalism and having the duty to export freedom to the rest of the lesser civilized world, threatening WWIII in the process.

Is the USA your country, or your rulers' and tyrants' country?
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 9:29am

Re: And now ...
You will probably find that those giving testimony in court believed what they were saying. Those who trained them to find the evidence, and know about the flaws in the approach never gave testimony. Therefore there is no-one guilty of perjury.
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tqk (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 9:30am

Re: Re:
I imagine Spartacus heard the same objections.

Do the math. 320(?) million US citizens vs. 1 million cops + far flung military, minus cops and military who won't fight citizens.

Your country has become like a rabid dog.
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David, 20 Apr 2015 @ 9:55am

Re:
It's up to the Juries. We, as jurors, need to be more aware that the 'experts' are fallible as well. Especially if that 'expert' has a vested interest in the outcome of the case.
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jupiterkansas (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 10:03am

Re: Re: Re:
Seriously? Spartacus' choice was to riot in the streets or fight to the death in the arena. He figured he was dead either way - oh, and he wasn't exactly victorious either, was he?
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That Anonymous Coward (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 10:11am

Re: Re:
We have watched juries excuse cops because of magical thinking that cops are trustworthy & always honest.

People who have problems with cops are tossed off of juries, leaving people who have never had a firsthand experience with them that might have shown that the badge is not always clean and shiny.

People still have blind faith in the system, and I am sure we can find people who will defend them against this report. They told us he was bad, so it must be true.
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sorrykb (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 10:15am

Re: There's a documentary about this
Was it "Frontline: The Real CSI"?

It's available online (at least if you're in the U.S. - Don't know how the PBS site works in the rest of the world):
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/real-csi/
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 10:46am

Surely all of those people will AT LEAST be fired without EVER being hired in a similar position for the government again?
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Uriel-238 (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 11:21am

The valid reason why no-one is rioting in the streets.
Our obedience to authority is as instinctive to the human brain as confirmation bias, or the notion that we should throw rocks at people with different-colored skin.

That is to say human beings have to actually work to think critically of people in power. If left to their own devices, it's easier and more assuring to presume that they got into office because they are somehow more qualified than the rest of us. Even when it's Joffrey or Caligula or Palpatine.

And that is why people are adamant that all these people getting murdered by cops in the streets all somehow deserved to die. Because it's easier and natural to think it's a just world and the law officer executes his job perfectly.

Ergo the lack of riots.
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Uriel-238 (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 11:24am

So much for all the potential careers of CSI wannabes.
And I had once fantasized of a law enforcement system that relied entirely on forensic evidence, since human witness accounts were so unreliable.

Disappointed, real world. Disappointed.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 11:27am

The deck will be shuffled
And, provided you're young enough but carry the sufficient 'wisdom' that the agencies are looking for, you'll still have the same job you had but will be under different management.

Nothing will change cause the government can play political chairs faster than the populace.
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tqk (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 11:28am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
... oh, and he wasn't exactly victorious either, was he?

Wasn't he? Besides, they made a tactical mistake. They should have just kept on going into Gaul, perhaps coming back with an army exclusively of warriors, instead of turning on Rome dragging women and children and other non-warriors with them.

They shook Imperial Rome to it knees and made it fear for its very existence. That's pretty damned good in my books. It's provided an example for the ages which is still admired to this day a couple of millennia on.

Note, Rome did eventually fall, so what would the point be in continuing to prop up a cancerous system? Just to live for another day as slaves?

Sic semper tyranis.
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Dirk Ruffly (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 11:36am

DNA evidence ... NOT
In two places you refer to the evidence in question as DNA evidence, but in fact this story deals with microscopic comparison of hair. That is, determining if a hair in evidence is substantially identical to a sample from alleged victim, perpetrator, witness, etc. DNA is not in play here.

This kind of comparison evidence has always been questionable, although seldom actually questioned in court.
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jupiterkansas (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 12:57pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
It's a horrible example.

"Your government is corrupt so you should lead an armed revolution and end up getting crucified like Spartacus."

Right, where's my sabre?

All violence will do is put some other tool in power while others die. I'd like to think there are better options.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 1:00pm

What does FBI stand for?
Fibbing Bastards for Incarceration?
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 1:07pm

Re:
To a large extent this is driven by management science, they can't measure the delivery of justice but can measure the number of convictions. Management want numbers so they use convictions as a measure of effectiveness.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 1:27pm

Microscopic hair and fiber analysis is not DNA analysis. It's comparing hair and fibers in terms of characteristics (width, structure, color, chemical composition, etc.) typically looking for a match or mismatch of samples taken from a suspect and hairs recovered from a crime scene. As such, it's been criticized for not being science-based (peer reviewed studies etc.). It's an important distinction to make, because DNA analysis is one of the forensic techniques that has been scientifically derived outside of the forensics community.
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John Fenderson (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 1:32pm

Re: Re:
Yes, I have more than a small whiff that this may be the case as well. It's a classic management error: placing exaggerated importance on certain measurements simply because they are the only measurements you can make.

A bit like software companies optimizing UIs to minimize mouse clicks at the expense of actual usability, because mouse clicks are what they can measure.
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E. Gads, 20 Apr 2015 @ 3:40pm

Hoover, a mighty fine vacuum cleaner
This three letter agency has been a crooked fraud from the get-go! Hoover himself sucked, big time (literally), although he had a big vocabulary and connections to blackmail most politicos, but somehow could not ferret out one of his own passing info for cash to the Chinese for over 30 years. His specialty was covering up and committing crimes in the process to obtain, influence, and retain power. Highly effective. Modern version highly efficient at scams and stings manufactured to target the mentally enfeebled. Should be replaced by a legit, honestly inspired organization that truly respects morality and rule of law as intended.
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Coyne Tibbets (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 4:19pm

FBI forensciethug: "Why worry about it? It's not like this testimony has any effect on people's lives.

"What's that? These were people? No, they were thugs, guilty of crimes.

"What do you mean, 'biased'? Listen: in the FBI, that's as objective as we get!"
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tqk (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 4:35pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
All violence will do is put some other tool in power while others die. I'd like to think there are better options.

It needn't be violent. In fact, you've already tried it once before. Seceed from the Union. Break the USA up into multiple separate countries. Agree to disagree and go your separate ways peacefully. Face it, the north hates the south and vice versa. What does Seattle have in common with Tampa? Damned near nothing. Texas would be better off on its own. Washington DC can revert back to swampland.

If it keeps on the way it's going, the USA is bound to start WWIII with somebody. That's what I worry about. Do the world a favor and dissolve into your component parts.

It may already be a fait accomplis. The dollar's going to implode soon. Russia's given up trying to align with Europe because of your NeoCon-Israeli masters' sabre rattling. They're now creating the Leninberg-Shanghai trade axis with China instead.

Bite the bullet. Save the world. It needn't mean civil war.
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jupiterkansas (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 5:21pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
The media wants you to think the US is all red or blue, when it's really purple. Every community has a mix of opinions. There might a bigger difference between Seattle and Vancouver than there is between Seattle and Tampa.

Diversity is the United States' greatest strength, and controversy is what drives us. You are free to voice whatever opinions you want, and your neighbor is free to contradict you. That's how it works for most people here. Yes, there's hate and bigotry and disagreement, but there's also acceptance and community and caring. It's a nation of immigrants, and most people are open to anyone from anywhere, and respectful of other cultures and traditions, even though I know our history doesn't read that way. Maybe some European countries are better than us, but Europe's history is just as bad as ours.

The danger of the U.S. isn't its people or its diversity - it's simply it's considerable power. That alone makes it a threat to the rest of the world.
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Uriel-238 (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 5:31pm

A tale of two colors.
Partisanship within the US is hardly about people agreeing with (or even considering) the platforms, but is about having sides to choose. We are as loyal as sports teams are to their alleged hometowns.

Most of us who are moderate are so not because we are apathetic about issues (when we think about them), but because we have strong opinions that don't necessarily mesh with the painted lines.

But the interesting thing to me is that the place where the people disagree with the state (trade, copyright, control of the internet, et. al.) seem to fall into the same patters from nation to nation.

I think WWIII is going to be a civil war, a war of peoples against the states that want to retain power against the common will.
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madasahatter (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 6:41pm

Re: Re:
Juries can only decide based on the evidence and testimony they have. If these are flawed the jurors are liable to convict an innocent person because, essentially, they were lied to and had no point of reference to prove the lie. If OJ Simpson did not have money he would have convicted because "minor" issues like improper sample chain of custody would never have come out. In science, the analysis is only as good as the sample it is provenance.
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madasahatter (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 6:51pm

Re:
Fiber evidence and similar evidence is used to exclude not to prove. Say you find there are 30 sort of viable suspects for a crime. Fiber evidence proves that 25 could not have done the crime, you are now left with 5 good suspects to investigate.

Now multiple different types of fibers (hair, carpet, clothing) combined could narrow the list done to 1 or 2 people. But you should have other evidence to tie the case together.

The real scandal is not the dodgy fiber evidence but how much of the other evidence is equally dodgy.
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Padpaw (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 6:55pm

Re:
there has been several cases of the police openly executing unarmed and unresisting people on live tv, and no response from the general public yet.

The only thing I can say is if your in the US get the hell out.

The people entrusted to carry weapons and uphold laws are acting like sociopaths and criminals.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Apr 2015 @ 7:09pm

Re: Re:
"Fiber evidence and similar evidence is used to exclude not to prove."

Maybe that's the way it's *supposed* to be used, but reality can be different.
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jupiterkansas (profile), 20 Apr 2015 @ 7:56pm

Re: A tale of two colors.
In some ways we're still fighting World War II, which is really began with World War I. There is always war somewhere. It's basically longstanding political divisions trying to adjust to modern industrialized society.
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dave, 20 Apr 2015 @ 9:17pm

back on topic...kinda
read John Grisham's non-fiction "The Innocent Man" re: Ron Williamson...good read. They play fast and loose with hair analysis and hand prints to screw a guy for life.
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Apr 2015 @ 1:09am

Re: Re: A tale of two colors.
it's basically longstanding political divisions trying to adjust to modern industrialized society.

That is a problem, the world is entering a post industrial age and the politicians are still trying to deal with the previous age.
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toyotabedzrock (profile), 21 Apr 2015 @ 2:05am

So how many of these experts gave non hair related testimony and should their objectivity be questioned in those other cases?
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toyotabedzrock (profile), 21 Apr 2015 @ 2:05am

So how many of these experts gave non hair related testimony and should their objectivity be questioned in those other cases?
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Apr 2015 @ 2:39am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
When was the last time a third party got in power?
From here it seems like your politics are comparable to a shit smeared coin which is flipped every couple of years.
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Apr 2015 @ 2:42am

So, false evidence presented as absolutely credible proof of guilt, a jury that has no idea what they are supposed to do and usally brutally overshoots with the punishment, corrupt judges and lawyers on both sides...
I dont know whats worse, going to court or just simply being shot on the street.
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jupiterkansas (profile), 21 Apr 2015 @ 8:08am

Re: Re: Re: A tale of two colors.
Some of the world is entering a post industrial age, but a significant part is still industrializing.
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Uriel-238 (profile), 21 Apr 2015 @ 9:22am

First-past-the-post elections.
CGP Grey does an excellent job of explaining the problem that arrises with first-past-the-post elections, namely that people are driven to vote defensively against the worst evil rather than voting for their preferred candidate.

Third party candidates at their strongest tend to be spoilers for the primary candidates to which they have the most common ground, essentially giving the election to the other guy.

And it's what we in the US got and it won't change because that's what sustains the corporate oligarchy.
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Apr 2015 @ 11:02am

Re: First-past-the-post elections.
The problem is not so much the first past the post system, but rather the party system. This results in people holding their noses while voting for a candidate, because to vote for someone else might let the other party gain control of the government.
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nasch (profile), 21 Apr 2015 @ 11:30am

Re: Re: First-past-the-post elections.
The problem is not so much the first past the post system, but rather the party system.

I would say a problem (certainly not the only one) is the two party system, which is caused by the first past the post election rules.
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nasch (profile), 21 Apr 2015 @ 11:31am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
The media wants you to think the US is all red or blue, when it's really purple. Every community has a mix of opinions.

However, we continue to sort ourselves more and more into communities that all think the same way.
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Apr 2015 @ 12:02pm

Let me see if I have this straight
If I lie in court, under oath I will go to jail. If the FBI lies in court, under oath I will go to jail. Somehow that doesn't seem fair.
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John Fenderson (profile), 21 Apr 2015 @ 1:23pm

Re: Re: First-past-the-post elections.
The first-past-the-post problem is what allows the two-party problem to continue. That's why most third parties in the US are so strongly in favor of things like instant runoff voting.
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Uriel-238 (profile), 21 Apr 2015 @ 1:25pm

Isn't this the part of the movie where the Emperor says "Young fool... Only now, at the end, do you understand..."
Our feeble skills are, indeed, no match for the power of the dark side.
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Anonymous Coward, 21 Apr 2015 @ 2:40pm

FBI is corrupt? Can't be!
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GEMont (profile), 23 Apr 2015 @ 12:58am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Revolution is, after all, the motion of a point on a turning wheel, which always ends up in exactly the same place it started from, no matter how often or how fast the wheel spins.

---
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Tom Scott, 23 Apr 2015 @ 10:14am

Corrupt from top to bottom
Scratch the surface of any government agency from a township to the Federal government and you will find institutionalized, codified crime and corruption. Look at our full prisons, prisons for profit, cops killing anyone they want, claiming they were "In fear for my life" and walking. DEA sex scandles, the FBI, cops and DAs corrupting evidence and lying their way through trials for a conviction. No wonder people are beginning to shoot back.
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GEMont (profile), 23 Apr 2015 @ 5:20pm

The Great Deception
The real problem with politics is that it is the opposite of what it appears to be.

It is a social system mechanism designed specifically to insure the ease of maintenance, control and exploitation of the larger poor labor pool population by the smaller population of wealthier people who control the national social infrastructure and the various operations that employ the poor.

It is the Custom of a civilization, that its Poor are the Customers of its Rich.

The movie; "Gangs of New York" is an excellent description of how governments form and why.

As long as people believe the myths, and ignore what is happening right in front of them, government and the parasites that own it, will thrive and human evolution will not.

Considering the ease which government affords the wealthy to corral, cajole, and control human populations, the only real recourse from this eternal social trap is, and always has been apparently, to "Get Rich Or Die Trying".

---
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jaquer0 (profile), 23 Apr 2015 @ 5:47pm

How to stop this: firing squads for officials who murder
"Flawed testimony" is just a pretty word for perjury. Perjury is a felony. Felonies that lead to the death of persons also constitute murder, a federal crime subject to the death penalty. Dozens of the cases where perjured testimony was presented by FBI personnel were death penalty cases and at least some of the defendants have already been executed.

The mainstream corporate media is all about "this testimony didn't necessarily convict those people, there would have been other evidence" and "they were really guilty as charged."

If you were on a jury in the case of a mafia hit man, would you accept claims that "my bullet wasn't the lethal one" and "the SOB had it coming" as convincing defenses?

I say put these lying scumbags on trial for capital murder and then execute them on the White House lawn with a firing squad and see how quickly the rest start to think twice about committing perjury.

But further: formal or informal organizations that systematically engage in criminal conduct are "Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations." The members are also members of criminal conspiracies. ALL members of a criminal conspiracy that results in murder are also subject to murder charges.

I'm not saying shoot ALL the FBI agents on the White House lawn. Not enough room. Let's do a bunch on the national mall in front of Congress, others in front of state capitols.

It might have the helpful effect of reminding state governments and congresscritters that if they act as collaborators with criminal conspiracies, they might well meet the same fate.

"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." --Thomas Jefferson

There's been too much blood from patriots; time for some from tyrants.
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