"GEARIN: (REPORTER); THERE WILL BE AN INVESTIGATION, BUT SO FAR NO-ONE CAN SAY HOW THE WOMAN'S DNA SAMPLE WAS CONTAMINATED BY FARAH JAMA'S DNA GATHERED IN THE UNRELATED CASE. PROSECUTORS DO SAY IT HAPPENED AT THE POINT OF COLLECTION, NOT THE POINT OF ANALYSIS.
KIMANI BODEN: (DEFENCE LAWYER)BOTH SAMPLES CAME TO THE SAME MEDICAL OFFICER WITHIN A SPAN OF 24 HOURS. I BELIEVE PERSONALLY THAT THE MIX UP MAY HAVE HAPPENED THERE. BUT AS TO PRECISELY WHEN IT OCCURRED, WE DON'T KNOW.""
REPORTER MARY GEARIN: AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION;
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BACKGROUND: According to the Australian, Farah Jama was found guilty of raping a 40-year-old woman at a nightclub in Melbourne's outer-eastern suburbs after the victim was found unconscious. She had no memory of the crime but Mr Jama's DNA was later found on the victim. The then 20-year-old denied ever being near the nightclub on that night, saying he was reading the Koran to his critically ill father at his bedside in their home in the northern suburbs. The only evidence police had was the DNA sample of Mr Jama, which was coincidentally taken 24 hours before the alleged crime after he was investigated over another unrelated matter but not charged. Prosecutors told the Victoria Court of Appeal earlier this week that it had since been discovered that the same forensic medical officer who took the first DNA sample of Mr Jama had coincidently taken the DNA sample from the 40-year-old rape complainant 24 hours later. They said it had emerged that the officer had not adhered to strict procedure when taking the sample and therefore they could not “exclude the possibility” of contamination. Therefore they argued the guilty verdict was unsafe and satisfactory and should be quashed. His lawyer Kimani Adil Boden hailed a “momentous” day for Mr Jama, whose case he described as “tragic”. “He's been in custody for close to one-and-a-half years on charges he didn't commit. “Justice has finally been done, however, at a price.” Victoria's police chief responded to Mr. Jama's release by banning all forensic officers from submitting DNA evidence or providing statements to the courts until further notice.
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The Australian Broadcasting Corporation interview with Ferah Jama, his lawyer and others, is preceded by the following introduction: " It's been a week to test the public's faith in the science of DNA and the procedures of police. A bungle that led to a wrongful conviction of a Melbourne teenager has led to a freeze on the use of DNA evidence."
Transcript:
KERRY O'BRIEN, PRESENTER: It's been a week to test the public's faith in the science of DNA and police procedures.
A retired judge has been asked to investigate how DNA evidence gathered by Victoria's police led to the wrongful conviction and gaoling of a young man on a rape charge.
The contaminated DNA was the only evidence against him, yet that didn't seem to raise alarm bells for police or prosecutors. It's cast a shadow over future use of DNA evidence.
To add to the police problems, the Victorian Ombudsman has raised serious doubts about the handling of evidence in drug cases as well.
Mary Gearin reports from Melbourne.
JEREMY GANS, MELBOURNE UNIVERSITY LAW SCHOOL: This is a complete tragedy. This is the big fear, this is what everyone worried about, that eventually this potential error in DNA would lead to someone wrongly going to prison.
KIMANI BODEN, DEFENCE LAWYER: My trust has been shaken. It's pretty difficult to sort of imagine that such an error of such magnitude can occur in a sophisticated state, sophisticated society such as Victoria and Australia.
MARY GEARIN, REPORTER: At 22, Farah Jama is trying to get his life back on track, after 16 months in prison for a rape he did not commit. He's become a textbook case for the disastrous consequences of blind belief in DNA evidence.
FARAH JAMA, : My reaction was I couldn't talk, I couldn't breathe, what they accused me of and what find me guilty of, and I remained innocent and now I'm out, so ...
KIMANI BODEN: He's a great guy and what's happened to him was a tragedy.
MARY GEARIN: On 15th July, 2006 a woman fell unconscious in a nightclub in Melbourne's east. She had no memory of being sexually assaulted. In any case, police forensics took vaginal swabs. Farah Jama, who'd just finished his Year 12 exams was tried and convicted for this presumed rape.
FARAH JAMA: I feel really depressed and that's not the guy of me, like, doing those kind of things, and I feel really, really bad, depressed, and my family, especially my family, embarrassed of what they accuse me of.
MARY GEARIN: Farah Jama had always maintained on the night in question he was at home with his ill father. It just so happens that 24 hours before that samples of his DNA were gathered in a completely separate and unrelated investigation in which he was not charged. The DNA came from a semen sample as well as a mouth swab he agreed to give police.
FARAH JAMA: I let them take my DNA to prove then that I haven't done anything wrong, so - and then this matter happens and then they said, "We have your DNA," and I was like, "I haven't done this."
MARY GEARIN: When the Crown dropped its case against him this week, it admitted that putting the DNA evidence aside, all other material indicated it was highly improbable that Farah Jama was guilty of the crime.
KIMANI BODEN: The venue was for people over 28 years of age. Mr Jama was 19 at the time. He gave an explanation as to where he was on the evening. That was corroborated by members of his family.
JEREMY GANS: In this case good evidence to suggest that Mr Jama was innocent, his complete denial, his denial of having even heard of the suburb where the incident happened, his alibi, including three family members - all of that was brushed aside purely because of the DNA.
MARY GEARIN: There will be an investigation, but so far no-one can say how the woman's DNA sample was contaminated by Farah Jama's DNA gathered in the unrelated case. Prosecutors do say it happened at the point of collection, not the point of analysis.
KIMANI BODEN: Both samples came to the same medical officer within a span of 24 hours. I believe personally that the mix up may have happened there. But as to precisely when it occurred, we don't know.
MARY GEARIN: Farah Jama's case is the third in six years in Victoria involving DNA contamination.
JEREMY GANS: It's a complete disaster. I'm not aware of any other jurisdiction in Australia or even mostly outside some of the worst labs in the US that have had this record of error, and it shows that the lessons of the past are not being learnt in Victoria. And that's a much graver danger, because it shows a culture that is refusing to accept that there's a genuine, serious problem in these cases.
MARY GEARIN: Police have maintained that the contamination in Farah Jama's case was an unfortunate one-off event not linked to its lab procedures.
SIMON OVERLAND, VICTORIA CHIEF POLICE COMMISSIONER: We have very rigorous procedures to guard against contamination, but there will be an independent review. I welcome that independent review to come and look and make sure that the problem is not with us. I'm confident it's not. But it's important that there's, again, independent oversight of that so that we maintain confidence in the processes that we have.
MARY GEARIN: But in that same press conference Victoria's Police Commissioner announced no DNA evidence will be presented to courts until further notice, not because of contamination issues, he says, but how it is interpreted.
SIMON OVERLAND: Up until very recently there was a limit to what we can see. With the advance in the science, we can see more at smaller amounts. And the statistical models that we have are not able to cope with that advance.
ANGELA VAN DAAL, FORENSIC SCIENCES, BOND UNIVERSITY: I'm struggling to understand what they're talking about because there is not really anything new that's new technology that's come into the DNA field for some time now.
MARY GEARIN: Forensic science expert Angela van Daal said she tried and failed to find out the exact nature of Victoria Police's new problems. But she does know the tendency to try to glean more and more information from less and less DNA is becoming highly contentious. Victoria's prosecutors announced a review of such cases a few months ago.
ANGELA VAN DAAL: I think the fact is that people in laboratories around the world are doing it without realising that that's what they're doing. As soon as they use very low levels of DNA, they are working in that range where there are potential problems in generating a true and accurate profile reflective of the person or persons that it came from.
MARY GEARIN: DNA is not just a problem in Victoria. Just this week, NSW defence lawyer John Sutton was debating the merits of asking one of his clients to supply police with a DNA sample.
JOHN SUTTON, AUST. DEFENCE LAWYERS ALLIANCE: DNA evidence is presented to juries, to members in the street as something that is infallible. It is not. It is a statistical argument.
JEREMY GANS: Well, everyone in the DNA world complains about what's known as the 'CSI' effect. No-one knows if it's true or not. But it's the idea that these shows push that lab workers can see the truth.
MICHAEL MCNAMARA, LAW INSTITUTE OF VICTORIA: Very hard to convince a jury when a scientist stands up and says, "Look, this is the case." And they see television shows and the television shows fix everything in an hour, and they say that DNA's the be all and end all of the case.
MARY GEARIN: The mistake that put Farah Jama behind bars was not revealed by the review into 6,000 cases the Victoria Police announced last year. It all came down to his appeal lawyer's pursuit of a DNA retest. Now he and other defence lawyers are advising their clients not to give police their DNA even to prove their innocence.
MICHAEL MCNAMARA: Well, look at today's example: this man was convicted and gaoled because he did exactly that. He provided a sample which got messed up and was then used to convict him. So I'd have to say no, I wouldn't encourage it at all.
MARY GEARIN: So now defence lawyers, forensic and legal experts are calling for a much wider, more independent review than the one planned into Farah Jamas' case. Meanwhile Farah Jama still has nightmares about prison. His family, originally refugees from Somalia, are trying to return to normality as his case enters the legal annals.
JEREMY GANS: If anyone goes on the record as saying that in the light of this case we can trust DNA without a proper independent review, then we'll have learnt nothing from this miscarriage of justice and there will be more down the track.
KERRY O'BRIEN: Mary Gearin reporting from Melbourne.
Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;
