PETER NEUFELD'S MESSAGE FOR CANADA: SET UP AGENCY TO REGULATE WHAT "SCIENCES" BELONG IN THE COURTS;

"A LOT OF THESE DISCIPLINES CAME INTO COURT WITHOUT EVER BEING SCIENTIFICALLY VALIDATED," NEUFELD, WHOSE AGENCY HAS REPRESENTED MORE THAN 100 CONVICTED PEOPLE EXONERATED THROUGH DNA TESTING, TOLD LAWYERS, JUDGES AND SCIENTISTS GATHERED AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO.

"THEY'RE NOT NOVEL. THEY'VE BEEN AROUND AND UPHELD BY COURTS FOR 30 OR 40 YEARS AND, IN THE CASE OF FINGERPRINT ANALYSIS, FOR AS MANY AS 100 YEARS, AND EVERYBODY JUST KEEPS GOING AROUND AND SAYING `FINE.'"

REPORTER TRACEY TYLER: THE TORONTO STAR;

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The conference exploring the links between expert forensic evidence and wrongful convictions sponsored by the Osgoode Hall Law School Professional Development Department and the University of Toronto's Centre for Forensic Science and Medicine, was everything I hoped for - and more!

Yesterday's conference will undoubtedly be grist for this Blog's mill over the next few days.

For now, here is Toronto Star Legal Affairs reporter Tracey Tyler's story on the address given by Peter Neufield, co-founder of the Innocent Project, which appeared under the heading "Ottawa urged to establish forensic watchdog, and the sub-heading "Standards must be set for `science' behind evidence, activist says."

"With a U.S. report throwing doubt on the validity of nearly every type of forensic evidence used in courtrooms, an expert on wrongful convictions is urging Canada to consider setting up a watchdog agency to regulate what is currently touted as "science," the story begins;

"You can't wait until evidence gets into a court of law to hope truth will prevail," Peter Neufeld, co-founder of the New York-based Innocence Project, told a conference in Toronto yesterday, the story continues;

U.S. lawmakers are expected to introduce a bill in Congress this summer to create a national institute to establish and rigorously enforce standards after a recent blockbuster report found no forensic method except DNA has been shown to be scientifically reliable.

That report, from the Washington-based National Academy of Sciences in February, put to rest any notion inspired by television shows such as CSI that forensic science is foolproof.

Whether it's fingerprinting or handwriting analysis, or evidence that purports to show a bullet came from a particular gun or that tire marks came from a certain car, most forensic methods have no body of research behind them to verify their ability to link a specific person to a piece of evidence or a crime, the report said.

"A lot of these disciplines came into court without ever being scientifically validated," Neufeld, whose agency has represented more than 100 convicted people exonerated through DNA testing, told lawyers, judges and scientists gathered at the University of Toronto.

"They're not novel. They've been around and upheld by courts for 30 or 40 years and, in the case of fingerprint analysis, for as many as 100 years, and everybody just keeps going around and saying `fine.'"

With judges often ill-equipped to assess the validity of what gets held up as science, U.S. legislators have begun moving to set up a national institute that would conduct research into various techniques and set qualification standards for experts.

"I would hope that at some point Canada can learn something from what the National Academy of Science has said ... and think about the possibility of some sort of national entity that can be set up here," Neufeld said.

Yesterday's conference, sponsored by Osgoode Hall Law School and the U of T's centre for forensic science and medicine, looked at forensic science lessons from the case of Steven Truscott – wrongly convicted of a 1959 murder – and the recent Goudge inquiry into pediatric forensic pathology in Ontario.

Dr. Michael Pollanen, Ontario's chief forensic pathologist, noted the province has moved swiftly with reforms to improve standards in forensic pathology after last fall's report by Justice Stephen Goudge into shortcomings that led to flawed child death investigations.

They include amendments to the Coroner's Act, which would allow for the creation of a registry of pathologists who are qualified to perform autopsies.

Pollanen said forensic science, like forensic pathology, is at a point where the knowledge behind it and its "institutional supports" need to be strengthened.

Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;