Putting the Science in Forensic Science

摘要

In 2009, a report from a committee of the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences found that "no forensic method other than nuclear DNA analysis has been rigorously shown to have the capacity to consistently and with a high degree of certainty support conclusions about 'individualization' (more commonly known as 'matching' of an unknown item of evidence to a specific known source)." Also in the report Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward (the "NRC report"), the committee found that many of the hallmarks of good science—strong statistical underpinnings, the identification of sources and rates of error, rigorous and detailed protocols, and well-documented analyses—were lacking in forensic science. These criticisms of forensic science and calls for reform— presaged by Donald Kennedy's 2003 Science editorial, "Forensic Science: Oxymoron?"—are not merely theoretical, as evidenced by the ever-escalating discovery of cases in which faulty forensics played a role in wrongful convictions and of scandals in forensic laboratories across the country.