His case is one of dozens around the U.S. to come under scrutiny because of entrenched but now-discredited beliefs about how arson can be detected. The Arson Research Project at the Monterey College of Law in California has highlighted at least 31 convictions based at least partly on debunked fire investigations, including that of a Texas man executed in 2004, and experts believe there are many more.
“There was just no science behind” the old assumptions about arson, said Paul Cates of The Innocence Project, a group that works to overturn wrongful convictions, primarily through the use of DNA. “A lot of this was just guesswork and voodoo.”
Flashback: The FBI’s Bullet Lead Analysis Used Flawed Science
Isn’t there grounds for a class-action suit of some sort with this?
Me being a retired Fire-fighter. I would love to see how they came up with info.
This is why America needs a long-term moratorium on the death penalty. That, and its horrific ‘justice’ system that’s a really a railroad operated by prosecutors.
For a quick fix, they should copy our system and then improve from their.
There is a very lengthy appeals process that has allowed proven killers, Ted Bundy comes to mind, to live over a decade while making appeals before their sentences were carried out. Plenty of time to right any wrongs.
That said, if investigators are permitted to offer questionable evidence as expert witnesses when the evidence itself is guesswork then it undermines both trials and appeals.
Lastly, to exercise capital punishment as a legal sanction or not is a State Power, something Canadian provinces haven’t ever had(maybe I’m misremembering) and our Canadian Criminal Code wouldn’t translate very well to the United States given the division of powers, States Rights, which are written into the U.S. Constitution, your fondness to see Obama arrogate this kind of power unto himself and declare a moratorium on the death penalty notwithstanding.
I have to agree dustoff, there’s been too many goofy theories over the years in fire science that were based on BS.. 2 that spring to mind were 1, bed springs softening in high heat, indicating accelerants, and 2, alligator crazing on wood, which meant a hot/accelerant fire.. both could be explained by, a) cheap metal springs, and the species of wood.. Plus that, with modern furniture, the presence of hydrocarbon based residue is almost a given in any structural fire, as plastics are the main materials..
You want to see alligator crazing on wood, just burn a piece in your campfire or fireplace. No accelerant required. Offhand, I would say that accelerants don’t make a hotter fire; they make a more voluminous fire, and get more of the building burning faster. Both gasoline and fuel oil burning in the open air, or a restricted space, use up oxygen so fast that the resulting fire tends to be cold and sooty, as evidenced by a column of black smoke.
First it was fingerprints that were supposed to be infallible evidence,then it was DNA, now arson detection. A lot of people have gone to jail based on this evidence that was perfection itself.
In light of this, how can any person ever claim that “the science is settled” on anything, especially when the “science” is only computer models?
The conviction rates in American criminal trials
are some of the highest anywhere in the world.
Anyone innocent with a murky alibi charged with
a serious crime and getting an offer of a “good
plea bargain” deal has to do some serious
thinking. Surviving in a hellhole prison for a
few years or pleading innocent, get convicted
and try serving a few decades?
It isn’t proper comparing the inquisitorial trial systems most of the world uses with the adversarial trial system used almost exclusively by Anglosphere nations. Also, it should be noted that Americans get more jury trials than trials in other adversarial system nations and American juries are more impressed by experts than judges usually are in nations that rarely get juries. In Canada for instance, even in a murder trial, the accused can choose to forgo a jury and be tried before a judge alone.
What ever happened to police work? You know the cop with years of experiance knowing liars from lilies.
Using discredited methods like Fingerprinting, DNA, polygraph tests that even Hillary disparages. Now its cameras in every corner, even than you can’t make out the figures.
These are just tools. Only the lazy rely on them. Like I averred, what happened to solid investigation before all these whizz bang gadgets?
Its like mechanics rely on Machines instead of knowing engines. Doctors that put there faith in machines instead of diagnosis. Being a Physician was an art at one time. Now it to has become reliant on plugging people into gadgets.
Its all short cuts instead of true knowledge.
The tools do the thinking for them these days.
The Innocence Project has found too many innocent people were executed. I don’t know what the US needs to do to change to become more like us in the criminal justice system. Maybe they need to do it at the state-level.
Yeah well, Canada’s system sucks the big one too……Truscott, Marshall, Milgard, Moran….and all them folk convicted on that power-tripping coroner’s testimony…..
Scary when ya think about it.
Alright, LAS, I’ll check out the Innocence project and get back to you.