Forensic Science has become a big part of our culture - in our homes through popular television programs and more realistically, throughout our criminal justice system. The extent of the use of DNA evidence is growing in the variety of uses ranging from murder and sexual assaults to burglaries. I n Denver a new grant is paying for equipment and a specialist who will focus on 500 burglary cases. Police say it could have a big impact on the number of career criminals targeting Denver residents. Denver is one of five cities picked to test the program by the U.S. Justice Department. Its $418,000 grant will pay for a full-time DNA analyst, a prosecutor to focus on burglaries and thefts, and a researcher to track the program's effectiveness. Source: http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/5099206/detail.html At the same time, DNA testing is working its way into yet different areas, including the Violence Against Women Act and the Innocence Project. As part of the reauthorization and expansion of a 1994 law aimed at protecting women from sexual predators, two US senators are asking their colleagues to approve a measure that would place DNA information from people arrested for alleged crimes but never charged in a national database. Exonerated arrestees would have to go through a yet-to-be-defined opt-out process to remove their names and DNA from federal records. Introduced early last month by Senator Jon Kyl (R-Arizona) as an attachment to the Violence Against Women Act of 2005 (VAWA), the DNA Fingerprint Act would remove barriers to including the genetic material of arrestees in a federal criminal database operated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The Judiciary Committee approved the measure on a voice vote that Texas Sentor John Cornyn (R) helped orchestrate, according to a statement by Kyl's office. The FBI database, the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), contains the genetic material of around 2.6 million people, most of them convicted of a crime. Source: http://newstandardnews.net/content/?action=show_item&itemid=2444&printmode=true Since it was founded in 1992, the Innocence Project, which litigates and investigates claims of wrongful conviction with forensic evidence, has contributed to 165 cases being returned and the convictions being exonerated. Unfortunately, even with the work the Innocence Project does, many cases will never be solved because of the evidence being lost or destroyed. Barry Scheck, professor of law and director of the Innocence Project at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in New York said DNA testing has changed the criminal justice system during the last decade. DNA testing has proven that the U.S. judicial system convicts and sentences innocent people. Many experts believe wrongful convictions are much more commonplace than perceived. Scheck said at the Innocence Project, 75 percent of all cases go unsolved because of lack of biological evidence. In the cases that there was enough evidence to actually pursue, however, 40 percent of the people turned out to be wrongfully convicted. Source: http://www.iowastatedaily.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2005/10/04/4341fe41506e6 One case of wrongful conviction that I found very interesting - quite possibly due to the human factor that came through in the story - was that of Marvin Anderson , who was found to be innocent, because in 1977, before the invention of DNA testing, a scientist by the name of Mary Jane Burton insisted on always saving a piece of evidence that was tested in her lab. In 1982, a man by the name of Marvin Anderson was sentenced to 210 years in prison. On June 18, 1997, after 15 years behind bars, Anderson was released on parole. In 2001, Anderson 's attorney, Peter Neufeld of the Innocence Project, wrote a letter to Paul Ferrara, director of the state's Department of Forensic Science, and asked him to dig up Anderson 's case file. The sophisticated DNA testing that was not available back in 1982 revealed what Anderson and his loved ones had known all along: He was innocent. On Aug. 21, 2002, Gov. Mark R. Warner granted Anderson a full pardon. He became the first Virginian to be cleared by genetic testing. Burton 's samples were found in the case files of two other men convicted of rape. DNA testing cleared them both. Julius Ruffin, who had always maintained his innocence, was freed after 21 years in prison, pardoned by the governor. And after 23 years and three days behind bars, Arthur Lee Whitfield walked out a free man. Source: http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/20051008-0915-savedfromthegrave.html As always, with the increased demand for DNA testing, many labs remain extremely backlogged. Scientific advances, especially in DNA testing, have so swamped the Tucson police lab that cases on average can stall for nine months before DNA evidence is tested. That means crimes are going unsolved or unconnected, lawyers are going to trial without potentially damning - or redeeming - evidence and some trials are being delayed. And the situation is bound to get worse as new technology and more police officers and investigations strain the already-stretched system. Despite a 61 percent increase in city funding for the forensic division over the past four years and a 75 percent increase in DNA testing personnel during the past five years for the department, it takes, on average, nine months to complete a DNA test. The tests themselves can be completed in as little as two days. The delays occur because of the backlog of cases. And demand is growing. The delays in testing mean suspects are not being quickly identified in crimes such as serial burglaries, serial sexual assaults and robberies, which often are connected through DNA analysis, Leavitt said. The backlog also delays the cases in court, prosecutors here said. Source: http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/breaking/100605crimelab.php Again in the past couple of weeks, DNA testing has helped to solve crimes, including a one-car accident investigation in Vermont . Last year, on the day after Christmas, Charles Berry of Florida , Mass. , reported that his car had been stolen. Police found the car in Stamford where it had been crashed into a guardrail. Although Berry claimed the car had been stolen from a home in Readsboro, his statements conflicted with his girlfriend's, according to police. That was when they asked him for a sample of his saliva. The saliva, police said, was recently found to be a DNA match with the blood on the car's airbag. As a result, Berry was cited for leaving the scene of an accident, giving a false report to police and negligent operation. He is scheduled to appear in Bennington District Court on Nov. 7. Source: http://www.benningtonbanner.com/Stories/0,1413,104~8676~3084276,00.html New Jersey - An alleged serial rapist, accused of terrorizing women in New Brunswick , Edison and North Brunswick , was charged with another sexual assault. Bruce Sterling, 34 , of New Brunswick was charged with one count each of first- and second-degree sexual assault, burglary and criminal restraint. The charges were filed in connection with an April 24 attack on a 21-year-old Rutgers University student. Source: http://www.thnt.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051008/NEWS0102/510080388 Boston - Less than a month after two young women were raped and beaten in the early morning, police said they have caught the perpetrator, a 33-year-old Arlington man who allegedly lured the victims into his car with the offer of a ride. Police arrested Kevin Bennett , who authorities say has a criminal record that goes back to 1991 and includes more than 70 charges, after they linked his DNA to evidence recovered from the victims. Daytona Beach , FL - Thanks to a fingerprint and DNA evidence, officials were able to charge Romer L. Williams of Martin County with the murder of Mildred Oliver. Source: http://www.news-journalonline.com/NewsJournalOnline/News/EastVolusia/03NewsEAST051006050.htm Virginia - Nearly 17 years after three people were abducted and shot to death in Northern Virginia - a CIA financial officer behind an Arlington elementary school and two college students in a Reston field - police think they have found their killer on death row in a California prison. Preliminary tests show that DNA taken from convicted killer Alfredo Prieto, 39 , matches samples from the two crime scenes, according to court records. Source: http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/nation/3387506 Ft. Myers , FL - Clarance Wendell Templeton was sentenced to 15 years of probation in July for sexually molesting a 15-year-old girl. Source: http://www.news-press.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051012/NEWS01/510120448/1075 Seattle - A cap left at the scene of a drive-by shooting last year has led police to a 20-year-old Seattle man, who was charged Thursday with second-degree murder. Master Anthony-Jones is charged in the shooting of Damien Johnson, 24, in April 2004. Police say DNA testing linked it to Anthony-Jones, who is now in prison for an unrelated drug crime. Source: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/244636_dna14.html Texas - San Antonio police made an arrest in an 18-year-old murder case Thursday evening after using a particular DNA testing technique for the first time. Rolando Gutierrez Sandoval , 44, was charged in the stabbing death of a woman he barely knew based on a "reverse DNA" test, which analyzed samples from his estranged wife and two children. The samples were compared with bloodstains from the clothing of Graciela Aguilar Castillo, 44, who was found dead in her driveway on Aug. 14, 1987. Investigators did not want to take samples directly from Gutierrez, who holds Mexican citizenship, because they were afraid he posed a flight risk, a police spokeswoman said. Source: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA101405.02B.roundup.1d4efec2.html DNA is used to link criminals to crimes everyday in courts throughout the country, but Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters took DNA evidence a step further this week. Three small stains on the back of 11-year-old Shauna Howe's leotard remained a mystery for years after her murder outside Oil City . Those stains have since been determined to be semen, and they are expected to be at the center of testimony when the trial of Oil City brothers Timothy O'Brien, 39, and James O'Brien, 33 , continues today in Venango County court. State police have said DNA tests conducted at an FBI crime lab in 2002 found the semen matched a DNA sample taken from James O'Brien. None of Shauna's clothes tested positive for semen at the time she was murdered, but technology has progressed since then and the substance was later identified, state police said. Source: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05288/589345.stm Editor: Karen Daurie Karen.Daurie@DNALabsInternational.com If you would like to be removed from our mailing list, please click on http://www.dnalabsinternational.com/remove_newsletter.html |
