The Benchmark of Evidence in Criminal Cases Called into Question

According to a New York Times article, scientists in Israel have shown that DNA evidence can be falsified and misrepresented. This has resulted in much head scratching about what has to this point been considered the infallible grail of scientific evidence. DNA evidence is used to exonerate people across the country who were convicted of serious crimes at a time when scientific evidence was young and unreliable. DNA profiles that don’t match the convicted have been considered the bedrock of true innocence. According to the National Registry of Exonerations, DNA evidence set twenty-two people free in 2014, and hundreds since 1989. But the lead author of this study, Dan Frumkin, suggested that a person with basically an undergraduate background in biology could just “engineer a crime scene.”

DNA Can be Counterfeited from both Blood Sample and DNA Profile

To demonstrate how DNA can be tampered with, scientists have dickied samples of one person’s blood and saliva to show up as the DNA profile of someone else. They also showed how a person’s DNA profile in a database could be used to fabricate a DNA sample of that person without any biological specimen needed. The implications are troubling. The article points out how easy it might be to lift someone’s DNA from a cigarette butt or a drinking straw and then recreate it in a lab. A person’s blood or saliva would be much easier to plant on a crime scene than a fingerprint. As the criminal justice system’s reliance on DNA evidence grows, this report shows the potential danger of such a reliance.

When a person’s life is at stake, everything should be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. Lab reports in drug cases and DWI cases should be closely scrutinized. There is a need to vigorously question all scientific evidence. This includes DNA, the supposed gold standard.

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