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Weird Science and Evidence Procurement

Faulty forensic science can lead to wrongful incarceration, lawsuits and a host of other disasters. Sussing out the credible evidence from the creative.

By Ken Brownlee, CPCU | Updated on July 27, 2012
“There is no scientific proof that fingerprint identification is 100-percent certain.”

That was the conclusion of one of the FBI’s own fingerprint analysts cited on a recent PBS Frontline story about the “real CSI.” In fact, much of what passes in criminal courts as “expert testimony” is little more than semi-educated guessing, with the exception of DNA evidence, which is scientifically based. 

“It isn’t like what one sees on the television dramas,” the program’s reporter advised, telling the story of a Portland, Ore., attorney, who just happened to be Muslim, who was arrested and held in jail because his fingerprint matched—according to the experts—that of one of the terrorists that blew up a commuter train in Atocha Station in Madrid. He was being prepared for prosecution when an Algerian was arrested in Spain for the bombing, based on the same fingerprint. And where is the scientific evidence that no two fingerprints are identical? The same place as the evidence that no two snowflakes are identical: in modern mythology.

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