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Dr. John Plunkett died this week. He spent nearly 20 years arguing in court against bad forensic science, for which he was maliciously prosecuted and received false ethics complaints. Through his efforts, 300 innocent people were exonerated. (This sentence from fark.com)
Like a lot of other doctors, child welfare advocates and forensic specialists, John Plunkett at first bought into the theory of Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS). It's a convenient diagnosis for prosecutors, in that it provides a cause of death (violent shaking), a culprit (whoever was last with the child before death) and even intent (prosecutors often argue that the violent, extended shaking establishes mens rea.) But in the late 1990s, Plunkett — a forensic pathologist in Minnesota — began to have doubts about the diagnosis. The same year his study was published, Plunkett testified in the trial of Lisa Stickney, a licensed day care worker in Oregon. Thanks in large part to Plunkett's testimony, Stickney was acquitted. District Attorney Michael Dugan responded with something unprecedented — it criminally charged an expert witness over testimony he had given in court. Today, the scientific consensus on SBS has since shifted significantly in Plunkett's direction.
[...] According to the National Registry of Exonerations, 16 SBS convictions have been overturned. Plunkett's obituary puts the figure at 300, and claims that he participated in 50 of those cases. I'm not sure of the source for that figure, and it's the first I've seen of it. But whatever the number, Plunkett deserves credit for being among the first to sound the alarm about wrongful SBS convictions. His study was the first step toward those exonerations.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Wednesday April 11 2018, @11:42PM (4 children)
Bullet Lead analysis
Hair strand comparison
bite-mark analysis
Bootprint analysis
Dog scent "hits"
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Thursday April 12 2018, @01:44AM (3 children)
Oh yes - the dogs. My son was stopped, the cop wanted to search his vehicle. Son says "No, I don't want you in my car!" "Well, we'll bring a dog, then we'll have probable cause." Notice the phrasing - it was a foregone conclusion that when the dog was brought out, the cops would have their probable cause. Dog arrives, the handler walks him around the car three times, and the dog displayed zero interest in the vehicle. Finally, handler walks up to the driver's side door, takes a ball, and bounces it a couple times. The dog perks up - he thinks there is a game to be played. The game turned out to be, handler bounces ball, says "fetch", then bounces ball off of the driver's side door. Dog lunges for the ball, and we have probable cause.
Those idiot cops knew that there were no drugs in the car. They just wanted to establish their dominance. "We'll search any damned vehicle we want to search!"
(Score: 2) by linuxrocks123 on Thursday April 12 2018, @01:52PM (2 children)
Had drugs been found, and if he could prove through the cops' dashcam video or otherwise that things happened the way he said they did, he would have had a good case at an evidence suppression hearing.
If he happens to have video through his own dashcam (yes, it is possible to get your own dashcam), it might be a good idea to forward that video on to the ACLU. I'm sure they'd put it to good use.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday April 12 2018, @02:05PM (1 child)
Unfortunately, the boy didn't have a camera turned on. He thought of it, at some point, but at that time, the phone was in the car, out of reach.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 13 2018, @03:21AM