Bulletin: Arkansas: Overstated FBI hair match crisis: (The Emperor's clothes); Focus on Arkansas; At least three Arkansas prisoners were convicted, in part, using faulty science and tenuous testimony. Now a review is underway to see if additional Arkansans were convicted with the now discredited expert testimony, advocates for the prisoners say.

At least three Arkansas prisoners were convicted, in part, using faulty science and tenuous testimony, and a review is underway to see if additional Arkansans were convicted with the now discredited expert testimony, advocates for the prisoners say. Paul Cates, a spokesman with The Innocence Project, said at least three convictions in Arkansas courts -- one of them a federal case -- relied on microscopic hair analysis, a type of forensic analysis that scientists have since debunked. Officials from the FBI and Department of Justice acknowledge that the testimony was unreliable, and they are working with Cates' group and other advocates to review thousands of cases in which the discredited testing was used, according to an FBI announcement from late April. The Innocence Project, which is part of a broader Innocence Network, is a New York-based legal group that seeks to free inmates who were wrongly convicted. Since 2000, lab analysts have relied on DNA, rather than microscopic, testing of evidence. Cates said it's possible that more cases will be discovered as law enforcement officials and defense teams painstakingly review more than 3,000 cases spread across 41 states. "It's not an easy task to go back and look back at literally thousands of cases to put this stuff together," Cates said. "It's not like there is a transcript bank on this ... but to the government's credit, they are doing it."
http://www.nwaonline.com/news/2015/jun/08/forensic-testing-faulty-for-3-in-state-/