PUBLISHER'S NOTE: In a recent post, I quoted from a press release issued by the Northern California Innocence Project (NCIP) which read in part:
"We wanted share some great news with you: yesterday afternoon the Tehama County Superior Court overturned the wrongful conviction of NCIP client Larry Pohlschneider, 46, after nearly 15 years of wrongful imprisonment! Mr. Pohlschneider's attorneys and the Tehama County District Attorney agreed that his 2000 conviction should be vacated and the charges dismissed due to the ineffective assistance of Mr. Pohlschneider's trial counsel... "Today marks the first step toward freedom and complete vindication for Mr. Pohlschneider," said NCIP volunteer attorney Thom Seaton. "An innocent man was pulled into a child-molestation case because of junk science which led police wrongly to focus on him as an additional perpetrator -- despite the fact that the true, sole perpetrator, Albert Harris, had been charged, confessed, and ultimately pled guilty to the crime." "Tragically, junk science passing as expert testimony is a contributing factor in 22 percent of wrongful convictions and NCIP is actively working to free innocent people and establish policies to prevent wrongful convictions like Larry's," said NCIP Legal Director Linda Starr."
I undertook to our readers to ascertain what sort of "junk science" had led police wrongly to focus on him as an additional perpetrator -- despite the fact that the true, sole perpetrator, Albert Harris, had been charged, confessed, and ultimately pled guilty to the crime.
In essence, I learned that a nurse practitioner, backed up by a doctor, claimed that she could tell from her examination of the child's genitalia that the child had been sexually abused after the time that the acknowledged abuser (Albert) was out of the house. Based on that groundless and false "medical" evidence the police began looking for another molester and through their aggressive questioning got the children to implicate Larry Pohlschneider. Although the children all recanted at trial, but medical evidence carried the day with the jury. The so-called "medical" evidence, had proven to be utterly without any scientific foundation. Sadly, it is the kind of evidence - read junk science - all too often uncritically led by prosecutors from nurse practitioners, general practitioners, and members of sexual assault response teams, who claim that a medical exam shows things that indicate abuse where it is just not true that those things indicate abuse at all, even if they are present.
Harold Levy; Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.
