Conviction Integrity Units: An Interesting Example in Brooklyn

I’ve written before about Conviction Integrity Units (CIUs) in prosecutors’ offices (take a look here and here).  CIUs are groups of lawyers within prosecutors’ offices — just like a major crimes unit or a narcotics unit, though probably much smaller than either of these — with the job of investigating questionable past convictions from that same office.  CIUs do this when presented with evidence that raises real doubts about the guilt of a convicted defendant in one of the office’s past cases.

The first CIU was established by Dallas DA Craig Watkins, who had then just been elected against a backdrop of more than 20 exonerations of people wrongfully convicted under the past leadership of his agency.  (The latest story about Watkins and the exoneration of wrongfully convicted people in Dallas — examining a fascinating twist on exonerations — is here.)  Just a couple of years later, Patricia Lykos, then the newly elected DA in Houston, established a CIU in her office.  From Texas, the idea has begun to spread.

Both the Dallas and Houston CIUs have one thing in common: they were launched by new DAs to investigate cases that originated under former administrations.  No doubt this is easier than investigating mistakes that have happened under one’s own watch.

That’s what makes this story out of the Brooklyn DA’s office so interesting.  Charles Hynes, the elected DA of Brooklyn, established a CIU that will be looking at cases in which prosecutors obtained convictions during his own six terms in office.  For example, at the end of March, David Ranta, 58, was released after spending 23 years in prison for the killing of a rabbi in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.  The original conviction came under Hynes’ leadership; when Ranta was released, Hynes gave credit for the release to his CIU.

CIUs accomplish something very fundamental: they make the task of uncovering mistakes in the justice system into a routine operation.  On the other hand, as readers of this blog have correctly pointed out, CIUs are a lot like internal affairs divisions in police departments: the DAs are investigating themselves.  This is easier to credit when the head of the office is not the same person who was at the helm when the mistakes were made.  It is also why CIUs  are still rare when the head of the office has been serving a long time — long enough to be the one responsible for the mistakes under investigation.

What the National Registry of Exonerations Report Says About Law Enforcement Resistance to Science

The National Registry of Exonerations, a joint project of the law schools at University of Michigan and Northwestern, reported last week that in 2012, law enforcement cooperated in some way in a higher percentage of cases than in the past.  Does this mean less resistance of science by law enforcement?

The answer is that we can’t tell from this data.  But the report is worth looking at nonetheless.

Here is what the report says about law enforcement cooperation (I have removed the bullets, spacing, etc.):

In  2012 there was a dramatic increase in the number and the proportion of exonerations that prosecutors or police participated in obtaining.  Of the 63 exonerations in 2012, prosecutors or police initiated or cooperated in 34, or 54%. Over the past 24 years, prosecutors and police have cooperated in 30% of the exonerations we know about (317/1050). Last year for the first time they cooperated in a majority of exonerations, and the number of such cases is a large increase from the previous high (22 of 57 in 2008, or 39%).

This is all to the good.  But there are some aspects of the findings that counsel caution.  First, the author(s) of the report freely admit they don’t know why  this is happening.  It could have many causes.

This increase [in cooperation] may be due to a confluence of related factors: changes in state laws that facilitate post-conviction DNA testing, the emergence of Conviction Integrity Units in several large prosecutorial offices, and, perhaps, a change in how law enforcement officers view the possibility of false convictions at trial.

And just to be clear, it’s good that they admit that it’s not clear what the cause or causes could be.  Too often, those working with statistics take an opposite tack.

As far as resistance to science, however, the report may indicate that the cases where science and forensics matter most still do not get cooperation for law enforcement.  The first clue is that 57% of the exonerations in 2012 were homicide cases, and another 24% were sexual assaults — 81% in all.  These are the types of cases in which resistance science on eyewitness identification, interrogation, and  forensics can matter the most.  These cases also have the highest public profile.  And there, perhaps, is the rub: “Official cooperation is least common among exonerations for highly aggravated and publicized crimes – murders with death sentences and mass child sex abuse prosecutions – and most common among exonerations for robberies and drug crimes.”

The best way to answer whether this increased cooperation represents any lessening of the resistance to science would be to look at the individual exoneration cases for 2012: do they feature law enforcement cooperation over these science-based issues, or is it something else — for example, information on a witness interviews illegally withheld from the defendant in a previous trial?

Perhaps we will see that in the next report from the Registry.

The Failed Evidence of Arson: Science Begins to Catch Up, and a Man is Freed After 42 Years

When I’m in Cincinnati for talks on Failed Evidence tonight, April 4, at 7:00 pm at the Clifton Cultural Arts Center and tomorrow, April 5, at noon at the University of Cincinnati School of Law, one topic sure to come up is an article from the April 3 New York Times, “Advances in Science of Fire Free a Convict After 42 Years. ”   Louis Taylor was serving 28 life sentences for the deaths caused by a fire in a Tucson, Arizona hotel in December of 1970.  Taylor, then just 16 years old, was convicted of arson based on faulty forensic science.

Mr. Taylor has been release from prison.  He is now 58 years old.

The story highlights the state of arson investigation, past and present.

A few years ago, the National Academy of Sciences turned its attention to the misuse of science in courtrooms, saying that pseudoscientific theories had been used to convict people of crimes they may not have committed. By then, a small group of fire engineers had already begun to discredit many of the assumptions employed in fire investigations, like the practice of using the amount of heat radiated by a fire to assess if an accelerant had been used.

Unlike DNA evidence, which can exonerate one person and sometimes incriminate another, the evidence collected in some arson investigations does not yield precise results. Often much of the evidence has been lost or destroyed. In the case of the hotel fire here, all that is left are photographs, reports and chemical analysis, all of them assembled to prove arson.

As a result, “we can’t definitely say what really caused the fire,” said John J. Lentini, a veteran fire investigator who wrote a report on Mr. Taylor’s case. “But what we can do is discredit the evidence” used to support the charge.

The case recalls the story of the trial and execution of Cameron Todd Willingham in Texas, executed in 2004 for the deaths of his children in a fire.  Experts call the arson in that case terribly flawed — just as in Mr. Taylor’s case.

The science surrounding investigation is light years ahead of where it used to be, even a decade ago.  It’s time that all of the old cases in which verdicts depended on outmoded and discredited methods of arson investigation be re-examined, and if necessary overturned.

“Failed Evidence” Discussions in Cincinnati, April 4 and 5

On Thursday April 4, and Friday April 5, I’ll be in Cincinnati for two discussions of Failed Evidence: Why Law Enforcement Resists Science (2012).  Both are free and open to the public.

On April 4, I’ll be discussing the book at 7:00 p.m. at the Clifton Cultural Arts Center, 3711 Clifton Avenue, Cincinnati OH 43220.  The event is sponsored by the ACLU of Ohio.

On April 5, I’ll present at talk at the University of Cincinnati College of Law at noon.  The address is  2540 Clifton Ave, Cincinnati, OH 45221.  The event is in Room 114.  The event is sponsored by the Lois and Richard Rosenthal Institute for Justice/Ohio Innocence Project.  The event has been approved for CLE credit for attorneys.

Discussion of “Failed Evidence” at Ohio State’s Moritz College of Law, Wednesday, March 20

I’ll present a talk on my book Failed Evidence: Why Law Enforcement Resists Science (2012) at Ohio State’s Moritz College of Law in Columbus on Wed., March 20.  The talk will be at noon in Room 246 of Drinko Hall, 55 W. 12th Avenue
Columbus, OH 43210.  The event is free and open to the public.

More information on the event is here.

Picking a New Chief, Part 2: Pittsburgh Mayor Announces He Will Leave the Choice to His Successor

In a post last week, I discussed the choice of a new chief of police in Pittsburgh.  Nathan Harper, the Chief of the Bureau for seven years, had been forced to resign by Mayor Luke Ravenstahl amidst an ongoing FBI investigation into police department finances.  (Mr. Harper has not been charged; the investigation continues.)  Then, just days later, the Mayor announced that he would not run for re-election in November.  With all of this happening, I was among a group of people who testified before the City Council last week on the selection of the new chief.  There was broad agreement on a central point: outgoing Mayor Ravenstahl should not appoint a new chief.  Instead, an acting chief should serve until the next may makes the permanent appointment.  The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported:

Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl said Monday that he would not appoint a permanent chief to the embattled police bureau during his remaining 10 months in office and instead will leave the choice to his successor.  ”It wouldn’t be fair in my mind to the next mayor to not have him or her have the chance to choose their chief, especially given all the recent activity around the bureau,” he said.

According to a story on WESA FM, Pittsburgh public radio, Ravenstahl said he would not appoint the next chief because with ten months left in his term, the decision would be “extremely rushed” and therefore should be left to his successor.

Whatever the reason, I think this is a good decision.  I can’t conceive that we would be able to attract top-quality candidates for the post knowing that the administration will change in the next year.  Who would take the job under those circumstances?  One reader suggested appointing a new chief as soon as possible, and writing a contract that would essentially guarantee the new chief a term that would extend into the new mayor’s term even if the mayor didn’t like it.  But that won’t work.  The chief (as I imagine is true in most places) serves at the pleasure of the mayor as a matter of law.  No contract can change this.

Thus the naming of the new chief will have to wait for the outcome of the mayoral election.  In the meantime, the federal investigation continues, and more revelations appear in the press by the day.  The only thing for sure is that the next chief is likely to start with a mandate for clean up and change.

 

“Failed Evidence” Reviewed in Chemical & Engineering News

Failed Evidence: Why Law Enforcement Resists Science (NYU Press, 2012) has been reviewed in Chemical and Engineering News, the publication of the prestigious American Chemical Society.  The review, entitled “Why Criminal Law Ignores Science,” is both enthusiastic and nuanced.  Here’s a slice or two:

The [criminal justice] system desperately needs changes, and it needs them fast. In his book, “Failed Evidence: Why Law Enforcement Resists Science,” David A. Harris, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh, discusses the three most common causes of wrongful convictions, makes recommendations to help right the ship immediately as well as long term, and takes on law enforcement and prosecution that refuse to implement any meaningful changes—even in the face of scientific proof that doing so would decrease the number of wrongful convictions.

This “resistance to sound, science-based police investigative methods” is the theme of “Failed Evidence.” The book is an easy and informative read best suited for policymakers, scientists, advocates, judges, prosecutors, law enforcement, defense attorneys, and anyone with a general interest in the American criminal justice system. Truth be told, anyone who might find themselves sitting in the chair of a juror should read Harris’ book before sitting in judgment of a fellow human.

….

Harris paints a picture suggesting that together we can make a difference. We will never be perfect, but we can do things much better. “Ignoring science, when doing so increases the risk of wrongful convictions, simply does not square with justice or fairness,” he writes. Positive change must happen and as Harris concludes, “Justice demands no less.”

You can read the full review here.

DNA Testing and Privacy: the Maryland v. King Argument in the Supreme Court

In yesterday’s post, I discussed Maryland v. King.  Those arguments,  heard at the Court on February 26, considered whether a state should be permitted to take a DNA sample from every person arrested (not convicted — arrested) for a felony.  I asked in my post that we put questions of  individual privacy aside, and instead ask whether such wide sampling would be a good idea from a crime-solving point of view.  (Some experts do not think so, as discussed in the post.)

Today, let’s put the question of privacy back into the equation, because that appears to be what the Justices will do.

In his recap of the Feb. 26 argument, Scotusblog’s Lyle Denniston tells us that the key points were posed by two of the Court’s conservative justices.  According to Denniston, Justice Samuel Alito clearly favored the idea that law enforcement should be able to take these samples.  DNA sampling “is the 21st century fingerprint” Alito said at least twice.  According to his way of thinking, there is no constitutional difference (in terms of the degree of intrusion on individual privacy) between taking a fingerprint and taking a DNA sample.

The other pole of the argument was taken up by conservative icon Justice Antonin Scalia.  When the lawyer for the state of Maryland used a long list of cases solved through DNA testing to support her argument in support of the law, Justice Scalia reacted forcefully.  According to the National Law Journal:  “Well, that’s really good!” Scalia exploded. “I’ll bet if you conducted a lot of unreasonable searches and seizures, you’d get more convictions, too. That proves absolutely nothing.”  In other words, the question isn’t whether the state’s action solves cases; some methods of solving cases are simply not allowed under the Constitution, even if they could be proven to work better than others.  The question is whether the Constitution — in this case, the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition of unreasonable searches — allows the state to do what it wants to do.

During Tuesday’s argument, Justice Alito commented that King could be “the most important criminal procedure case this Court has had in decades.”  That will depend on how the Court decides the case, which it will do sometime before the end of June.  But one thing we do know:  the debate between law enforcement’s desire to use all the tools it can to fight crime and the Constitution’s protections of the individual against state intrusion will go on.

Failed Evidence Reviewed by the American Criminal Law Review

The current issue of the American Criminal Law Review has a review essay of Failed Evidence: Why Law Enforcement Resists Science (2012).   According to the review, the book “engages…broadly with forensics” to explore “why law enforcement and prosecutors have shown such marked reluctance to incorporate a modern understanding of the scientific method.”  The review concludes that Failed Evidence “provides a thoughtful analysis of the scientific bases underlying forensics, current evidentiary and investigatory problems, and possible solutions. [The] suggestions are particularly well thought-out because they consider the problems faced by law enforcement when implementing ideal solutions in the real world.”

You can read the full review here.

U.S. Depts. of Justice, Commerce Will Create National Commission on Forensic Science

Four years after the National Academy of Science’s 2009 report Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward called for basic changes in the forensic sciences, U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology have announced they will create a national commission on forensic science.  The commission will have 30 members — forensic science practitioners, researchers, prosecutors, defense attorneys, and judges — who will develop policy recommendations for the Attorney General.  According to the Department of Justice announcement:

The commission will have responsibility for developing guidance concerning the intersections between forensic science and the courtroom and developing policy recommendations, including uniform codes for professional responsibility and requirements for training and certification.  The new initiative provides a framework for coordination across forensic disciplines under federal leadership, with state and local participation. The Department of Justice, through its involvement in the commission, will take an active role in developing policy recommendations and coordinating implementation.

For many who looked for action in the wake of the National Academy of Science’s 2009 report and saw very little, the creation of the commission will comes as a welcome step forward.   The National District Attorneys Association (NDAA), which took a fairly negative view of the 2009 report and its recommendations, is now reacting with a wait and see attitude.  The NDAA has not yet put out a formal statement in reaction to the announcement of the commission; according to Scott Burns, the Executive Director of the NDAA, the organization will do that once it gets the details on the commission, especially its composition.  So far, Burns told me, the NDAA is  “encouraged” by the fact that prosecutors will be part of the commission, though he stresses that he hopes to see more state and local prosecutors than federal ones.  Burns said that if the commission begins with the attitude that “the system is broken” and that its basics — fingerprints, tool marks, and the like — must be fixed, the NDAA will not look on it favorably.  On the other hand, if the commission starts with the attitude that “we can improve”  the system but that it basically functions well, that would be welcome.

I will write further on this as the story develops.