Steven Avery provided 16 alibi witnesses but a forensic examiner’s testimony that his hair matched that found on his shirt matched the victim and her own strong evidence led to his conviction. “Although you know me … I’m in the hole again”—solitary. A DNA test that might usually have been able to link a suspect to the car was of no use. He has since refused to acknowledge the clear results of the DNA evidence. His DNA was also found to match that found in three other murders that took place around the time of the Mitchell murder. As stated by The Honourable Justice Vincent who undertook a review of the case: But he puts on a brave phone voice for him as he explains the options. In Tapp’s case, Hampikian has pushed for the use of a new, controversial DNA technique that he believes may yet identify the real killer and exonerate Tapp. In 2006, he faked DNA evidence that was used to solve the murder of Jessica O’Grady. The main reasons for wrongful conviction are strikingly similar in many cases. False or misleading forensic evidence was a contributing factor in 24% of all wrongful convictions nationally, according to the National Registry of Exonerations, which tracks both DNA and non-DNA based exonerations. It has exonerated scores of people convicted based on more flawed disciplines like hair or bite-mark analysis. Sean Hodgson’s blood type matched blood found at the scene and he initially confessed to the murder although he retracted his confession during his trial. Only after 14 years and DNA … Hayes was convicted of the rape and murder of a co-worker based partly on faulty DNA evidence. The Problem: The misapplication of forensic science contributed to 52% of wrongful convictions in Innocence Project cases. Cases where the courts got it wrong. The Florida Supreme Court threw out Hayes’s conviction and the DNA evidence in 1995 (Hayes v. Florida, 660 So. Nevertheless, the Italian court found Knox and Sollecito guilty. He spent eight months in prison, on remand, facing murder charges after his DNA … A faulty analysis of hair evidence is surprisingly common across many of the stories of people set free by DNA, analysis often claim to be able to match hair with a particular suspect on the basis of characteristics but this is almost impossible. “I’m having a good time at summer camp,” Tapp says gamely. A few weeks later a police officer came across the 18 year old Kirk Odom and, thinking he looked similar to the sketch of the suspect arranged for the victim to be shown a photograph. In court both brothers protested their innocence claiming that they confessed under duress. An eyewitness put the three men near the site of the crime but the defense attorney failed to point out a major timing obstacle in the evidence. In November 1983 15 year old Lynda Mann was found raped and strangled on a deserted footpath in Narborough. Cathy Woods was released in September 2014 and all charges against her were dismissed in March 2015. DNA evidence on its own may not be sufficient to establish the guilt of the accused, it has to be weighed against all evidence presented before the court. Indeed, White's DNA matched 11 of the 13 alleles found in a DNA mixture at the crime scene that did not belong to the victim. It is also not uncommon for the convictions to be the result of a false confession made at the time of arrest and subsequently retracted or due to false testimony by police informers seeking to gain advantage in their own cases. Cole died in prison in 1999 having maintained his innocence from the first to the last. While the majority of those whose convictions have been overturned have been male there are some women whose innocence has been proved beyond doubt. Tyrone White has served his reduced sentence and walked free. In at least 26 cases, the technician missed biological evidence that could have been useful for a rape trial. (Usry, meanwhile, has become so interested in Tapp’s case that he announced plans to make a film about it.). Last spring, after Italian DNA experts reviewed the case, an Italian high court pronounced both innocent. In 1995 the DNA evidence in the crime was examined and was shown to be from an unknown person, this evidence was not enough to exonerate Avery. A saliva sample found on the victim was known at the time of arrest, not to belong to Govinda Mainali but the prosecution withheld this evidence (as entitled to do under Japanese rules at that time). He worries that Tapp won’t go free until his parole in 2026. Police had a forensics lab produce a profile of 35 loci on the Y chromosome from semen found at the crime scene; then they obtained a subpoena to have Ancestry.com, the largest genealogy company in the world, compare the profile with a Y chromosome database that the company had bought in 2012 from a Mormon genealogy foundation. White confessed; as part of a plea bargain he implicated Robinson, against whom he had a grudge. In the case of Angie Dodge, Idaho Falls police checked the crime scene DNA against FBI’s database and did not find a match. They collected five soda cans from the office of BSU's dean of arts and sciences after lunch and put them in individual evidence bags. In some cases the analysts responsible for reviewing the evidence applied their techniques in the wrong way or gave a faulty interpretation. Hampikian's critique was signed by nine other prominent geneticists and made public. Steven Avery and the victim co-operated with the authorities to work on a new eyewitness identification protocol for Wisconsin. Yet in recent years Hampikian and other geneticists have begun to question the technology. Despite DNA evidence that showed the semen in the rape kit was not a match, Deskovic was convicted and sentenced to 15 years to life in prison. His conviction was subsequently overturned but by that time he had served 10 years in prison. The man, who had submitted a cheek swab at the urging of his Mormon pastor, was too old to fit the killer’s profile. After all, the prosecution's case was based on DNA evidence; Knox's genetic fingerprints were found by Italian police on the handle of a kitchen knife, which also had the victim's DNA … Gary Dotson was the first convict in the US to have his conviction overturned on the strength of DNA evidence. ‘The Ford Heights Four’ were convicted of the 1978 murder of a young couple and the brutal gang rape of the woman. An informant claimed to have heard Dennis Williams and Willie Rainge boasting about the murder. A man with Parkinson’s disease who was unable to walk more than a few feet without assistance was convicted of a burglary based on a partial DNA profile match. Timothy Cole was sentenced to 25 years for the rape of a student in 1985. There was … DNA evidence is so powerful because it has firm roots in science and is backed by statistics. During the third trial, the defense presented evidence that the initial blood splatter expert had falsified his credentials and had no history of working with blood splatters. The analyst further claimed that pubic hair samples were a match for Gary Dotson and not for the victim (hair analysis is not reliable). On the same day the new protocol was adopted a young photographer Teresa Halbach was brutally murdered, Steven Avery and his nephew were convicted of the crime. While the DNA profiles were being entered, Sotolusson's name and the cellmate's name were switched accidentally. Read more of our special package that examines the hurdles and advances in the field of forensics. None of the other victims of similar attacks recognized Timothy Cole so he was tried for only the single rape. "The problem is someone typed in the wrong name," Assistant District Attorney J. Charles Thompson said. The student was taken to a field where she was subjected to a prolonged rape before being returned to town. In 1979 Cathy Woods, who suffered mental health problems, had confessed to the 1976 murder of Michelle Mitchell whose body was found with her hands tied and throat slit. In 2013, geneticist Michael Coble of the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg, Maryland, set up a hypothetical scenario in which a mix of DNA from several people had been found on a ski mask left at a crime scene after a series of robberies. DNA analysis can become even trickier when a mix of DNA from various potential suspects is found in a single crime scene sample. Tapp says: “I appreciate everything you guys are doing, and thank …” but the line cuts off before he can finish his sentence. “You know my offer still stands. So why are so many innocent people judged to be guilty of crimes they did not commit? Each locus contains a “short tandem repeat,” a bit of DNA that is repeated multiple times. Additionally, a Dutch forensic expert found Boney’s DNA under Kim Camm’s fingernails and her DNA on his sweatshirt, two pieces of evidence which sealed his conviction. Cage was convicted at a bench trial in Chicago in 1994. The Innocence Project came across Deskovic’s case in 2006, and conducted further testing with newer technology on the semen in the rape kit. In 1995, on the expiry of the statute of limitations, a convicted sex offender, Jerry Johnson wrote to police to confess the crime but these letters were not acknowledged by the police or prosecutor’s office. There he was arrested for the 1997 murder of a businesswoman/prostitute Yasuko Wantabe who was strangled to death in a brutal attack that attracted prurient headlines across Japan, mostly related to the lifestyle choices of the poor victim. “The idea that you could free someone with a little bit of this snotlike stuff was a notion that seemed thrilling to me,” he says. Two of those men pleaded guilty to the crime in 1997. The victim, horrified at the miscarriage of justice, worked closely with his family to exonerate him and has spoken out to raise awareness of the possibility of misidentification by witnesses. Following his exoneration it was announced that all convictions which relied on hair analysis will be reexamined. He said another 36 cases were affected but did not need a replacement statement as the new figures were not below the original value. Coupled with confessions from the murderers and DNA evidence, Williams, Adams, Rainge, and Jimerson were finally exonerated after 17 years in prison. At the time the murder took place DNA sampling was not available as a tool in investigations. Greg Hampikian lab, Explore; Boise State University professor. Timothy Cole had extensive alibi evidence which was disregarded as was the fact that he did not smoke due to having asthma (the perpetrator smoked during the attack). Further testing, in 2002, of hairs recovered from the victim showed that they were a match for a man convicted for a sex attack shortly after the one by Lake Michigan, the perpetrator bore a striking similarity to Steven Avery who was released in 2005. They said Tapp held Dodge's arms down while one or two other men assaulted and killed her. Hampikian, who holds joint appointments in biology and criminal justice at BSU and heads the Idaho Innocence Project, has been helping people like Tapp for more than 20 years. Govinda Mainali traveled from his native Nepal to work in Japan. In other instances, such as the notorious Amanda Knox conviction in Italy, he has shown how DNA evidence was false or misconstrued. In June 1985 a young lady was sexually assaulted by a man on the shores of Lake Michigan. Per UK regulations, however samples were taken and stored against the possibility of tests being available in the future and, in 2008, the police and UK Forensic Science Service tested the samples collected at the time against Sean Hodgson’s DNA. The victim had been found clutching hairs probably from her assailant. The mishandling of DNA evidence led sex-crime investigators to not have available evidence that was could have been used to develop cases against rape suspects. Meanwhile, he had his students mimic part of the investigation in Italy. Last spring, Thomas got court permission to try another avenue: have a laboratory do “touch DNA” testing of swabs that had been taken from Dodge's hands. They're not wrong: DNA is the most accurate forensic science we have. A man convicted of murdering Adelaide schoolgirl Louise Bell, who was abducted from her bedroom in 1983, has argued on appeal that the guilty verdict was "unsafe and unsatisfactory" because forensic evidence cannot prove how his DNA got on her pyjama top. It appears that the police had received a tip off about the real perpetrators but ignored it; as a result of this the Ford Heights Four received a payout of $36m from the police officers. Timothy Cole became a suspect when he spoke with a police officer on campus and was subsequently identified in a photograph and then in a lineup. AAAS is a partner of HINARI, AGORA, OARE, CHORUS, CLOCKSS, CrossRef and COUNTER. List Land gets commissions for purchases made through links in this post. Gary Dotson had type B blood but so did the victim, the semen recovered tested as type A. Michael Phillips was arrested by armed police in a dawn raid on his property and taken from bed straight to the police station where the victim identified him in a line up. “I don’t think people are evil,” Hampikian says, “but once they’re convinced of a story they protect it.” On the phone with Chris Tapp, he's explaining why it’s been so hard to overturn his conviction. In 1994 the informant admitted to having made up his evidence to take advantage of a deal on charges against him for another crime, subsequently the four men were able to gain access to DNA evidence, the testing of which exonerated them and implicated another three men. He tried and failed to have his conviction overturned and decided to accept the fact that he would have to live with the stigma of his conviction for the rest of his life. Top 10 Stories of Wrongful Conviction Overturned by DNA Evidence. Its accuracy has made DNA evidence virtually unassailable. Like the Italians, Hampikian’s group looked for DNA at levels below the FBI-recommended minimum. They obtained a court order to sample Usry's DNA in 2014—but the test results excluded him. As a result the case was sent to the English Court of Appeal and Sean Hodgson was released in 2009. Dennis Williams and Willie Rainge were re-tried and found guilty once again and Verneal Jimerson was tried for the crime when Paula Grey reverted to her original testimony to gain release from prison. Studies have confirmed this. A landmark report published by the National Research Council in 2009 dismissed most forensics as unproven folk-wisdom but singled out DNA as the one forensic science worthy of the name. In his spare time he enjoys spending time with his wife, mountain biking in Southern California, and running. Michael Phillips maintained his innocence until offered a reduction in sentence to 12 years through a plea bargain (he was potentially looking at a 99 year sentence). Samples were taken but DNA tests were not done at the time of the investigation. (It could.) Several other rapes had occurred at around the same time. There is some strong evidence that the prosecutor in the original case ignored evidence pointing to the pair’s innocence. With a simple sample, analysts look at two sets of peaks at a given locus: one for the victim and one for the perpetrator. He noted that the bra clasp hadn’t been collected until 46 days after the murder, and not until several crime scene investigators had picked it up, passed it around and then put it back down on the floor to photograph its position—all of which could have caused Sollecito's DNA to end up on the clasp. The articles details the technician’s responsibilities. G eorge Perrot has spent almost 30 years in prison thanks to a single hair. Hampikian reviewed the lab’s procedures and data for the defense team. His involvement with forensic science was a multiyear courtship. Boulder Police Chief Greg Testa declined to comment on the DNA evidence, according to the report, but announced in September that more than 200 DNA samples had been submitted for analysis in the case. The Supreme Court of Canada set it aside in 1992, and Milgaard was subsequently cleared by DNA evidence five years later. These cases listed here are just some of the stories of men and women exonerated for crimes they did not commit through the analysis of DNA. The stories of these people should serve as a warning to society and to our police and prosecutors to ensure that a single crime does not give rise to two innocent victims. “I’m really sorry Chris, that’s a lot to deal with,” Hampikian says. She was convicted in 1980 and sentenced to life imprisonment. Samples were taken and showed the presence of both type A and type B blood. But the court is only allowing us a limited amount and we have to decide which test is the right one.”. This is often more common when trying to identify someone from a different race, such difficulties can be compounded by differences in the photographs (positioning, lighting etc) of potential suspects shown to a victim. They found DNA from a member of the dean’s staff on one of the knife blades. While DNA evidence has been a unique tool of justice in uncovering so many wrongful convictions, it can also result in wrongful convictions. Hampikian conducted a similar study using DNA evidence from a real crime: the case of Kerry Robinson, a Georgia man serving 20 years for taking part in a gang rape. The DNA evidence for both men was profiled, and the profiles were entered into a lab computer, Hoffman said. In order to mount an appeal, Tapp’s lawyers must produce evidence that was not available at the time of the trial. An FBI analyst tasked with examining hair samples found on the victim claimed that they were ‘indistinguishable’ from Odom’s hair. Having had significant success (33 exonerations from 2007) they turned their attention to rape cases that occurred prior to routine DNA tests becoming mandatory for crime samples. It is quite frightening to think that without this DNA evidence over 325 innocent men and women in the US alone would still be behind bars, 20 of them on Death Row. That was the case with Amanda Knox, who was accused of stabbing her U.K. housemate Meredith Kercher to death during junior year in Perugia, Italy. He served his full term but was then re-arrested and made to serve a further 6 months for failure to register as a sex offender. In 2006, he faked DNA evidence that was used to solve the murder of Jessica O’Grady. Nevertheless he continued to protest his innocence in the affair and requested a re-trial. Justice was finally served when, in 2014, the two men were finally released after serving 30 years for a crime they did not commit. DNA Evidence Frees a Woman Convicted of Killing Her Daughter Lynn DeJac and her lawyer, Andrew C. LoTempio, at a hearing Wednesday in Buffalo. Kirk Odom was convicted on the basis of the identification and the hair analysis. A mere 25 or 30 cells will sometimes suffice. Michael Phillips made history as the first US man to be exonerated by a DNA test he did not request. Tapp’s attorney, John Thomas, says he is looking into legal approaches to expand the familial searching. At least two jurors publicly stated after trial that the shoddy DNA evidence persuaded them of Holtzclaw’s collective guilt. One of them, a 26-year-old white female, had three. In 2010 an analysis of DNA evidence not previously provided to the defense showed that it was linked to a local man, Roscoe Artis who was found guilty of a similar crime just one month after the murder of little Sabrina Buie. The evidence against him was overwhelming—palm prints, fingerprints, and his DNA on the victim and throughout her room—and he was eventually found guilty. Across the world, forensic DNA labs have had problems with cross-contamination of samples, mislabeling, misinterpretation of samples and in some cases outright fraud, including: The New York City Medical Examiner’s office had to review more than 800 rape cases from a 10-year period during which DNA evidence was mishandled by a lab technician. DNA evidence including semen and samples from her nails and body hair was taken from the victim but was not tested at the time of the original trial because the semen samples were allegedly too small for the then available techniques. But Italian prosecutors also charged Knox and her boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito with murder. The prosecution maintained that the 11-year-old girl had obtained the foreign semen through another sexual encounter prior, that was completely consensual. Police claimed that Cathy Woods had provided them with key information (all of which was available from the public accounts of the murder) and sent her to trial claiming that Cathy Woods had killed Mitchell in a fit of pique over rebuffed sexual advances. One man, a Mississippi resident with no criminal record, matched at 34 of the 35 locations. “Too much is left to the analysts’ discretion.”, Hampikian conducted a similar study using DNA evidence from a real crime: the case of Kerry Robinson, a Georgia man serving 20 years for taking part in a gang rape. On science and religion: “Theologians are willing to die for their beliefs but scientists are willing to let their beliefs die.”. But unlike DNA evidence, fingerprinting was adopted before the Supreme Court decided that attorneys and expert witnesses have to prove that evidence is scientific and reliable. Testing these kits might have yielded DNA evidence that could have advanced investigations. He worries that the court might reject the new evidence, as they have in previous appeals. Robinson had two alleles in common with DNA found on the victim's body, both “at the borderline of detection,” says Hampikian, who testified that Robinson was “absolutely excluded.”. The judge refused to allow evidence of other similar attacks that Cole could not have committed to be presented. “How’re you doing, Chris?” Hampikian begins. As the nation’s only Innocence Project director who’s also a scientist, “he’s absolutely essential to what we do,” said Aimee Maxwell, executive director of the Georgia Innocence Project in Decatur, which Hampikian co-founded. In 2004, he moved to BSU, where, in addition to teaching and doing research in genetics, he helped found the Idaho Innocence Project. "I can't be sending the wrong person to the gallows," said the judge, according to the New Straits Times. To reduce the risk of false matches even further, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) will soon release new guidelines calling for 20 or more locations. The wrongful conviction, plagued with racial profiling and highly suggestive eyewitness identification procedures, was vacated based on newly discovered DNA evidence (Queens, New York – November 19, 2020) Today, Jaythan Kendrick walked free after 25 years of wrongful conviction for a murder in Queens, New York. Yes, over 800 rape cases over a period of 10 years from 2001-2011.. 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