Forensics under fire : are bad science and dueling experts corrupting criminal justice? / Jim Fisher.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Fisher, Jim, 1939-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Criminal investigation--United States.

Criminal investigation.

Crime scene searches--United States.

Crime scene searches.

Forensic sciences--United States.

Forensic sciences.

Evidence, Criminal--United States.

Evidence, Criminal.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (340 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

New Brunswick, N.J. : Rutgers University Press, c2008.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Television shows like CSI, Forensic Files, and The New Detectives make it look so easy. A crime-scene photographer snaps photographs, a fingerprint technician examines a gun, uniformed officers seal off a house while detectives gather hair and blood samples, placing them carefully into separate evidence containers. In a crime laboratory, a suspect's hands are meticulously examined for gunshot residue. An autopsy is performed in order to determine range and angle of the gunshot and time-of-death evidence. Dozens of tests and analyses are performed and cross-referenced. A conviction is made. Another crime is solved. The credits roll. The American public has become captivated by success stories like this one with their satisfyingly definitive conclusions, all made possible because of the wonders of forensic science. Unfortunately, however, popular television dramas do not represent the way most homicide cases in the United States are actually handled. Crime scenes are not always protected from contamination; physical evidence is often packaged improperly, lost, or left unaccounted for; forensic experts are not always consulted; and mistakes and omissions on the autopsy table frequently cut investigations short or send detectives down the wrong investigative path. In Forensics Under Fire, Jim Fisher makes a compelling case that these and other problems in the practice of forensic science allow offenders to escape justice and can also lead to the imprisonment of innocent people. Bringing together examples from a host of high-profile criminal cases and familiar figures, such as the JonBenet Ramsey case and Dr. Henry Lee who presented physical evidence in the O. J. Simpson trial, along with many lesser known but fascinating stories, Fisher presents daunting evidence that forensic science has a long way to go before it lives up to its potential and the public's expectations.

Contents:

Forensic pathologists from hell : bungled autopsies, bad calls, and blown cases

A question of credibility : bad reputations and the politics of death

The sudden infant death debate Dr. Roy Meadow, Munchausen syndrome by proxy and Meadow's law

Infants who can't breathe : illness or suffocation?

Swollen brains and broken bones : disease or infanticide?

Fingerprint identification : trouble in paradise

Fingerprints never lie : except in Scotland

Shoe print identification and foot morphology : the lay witness and the Cinderella analysis

Bite mark identification : do teeth leave prints?

Ear-mark identification : emerging science or bad evidence?

Expert versus expert : the handwriting wars in the Ramsey case

John Mark Karr : DNA Trumps the graphologists in the Ramsey case

Hair and fiber identification : the inexact science

DNA analysis : backlogs, sloppy work, and unqualified people

Bullet identification : FBI style overselling the science

The celebrity expert : Dr. Henry Lee.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 387-324) and index.

ISBN:

1-281-39722-9

9786611397227

0-8135-4424-6

OCLC:

476163937