U.S. Attorney General Jeff Session's war on science/forensics: (Part Sixteen): New York Times come up with '21,587 reasons to fix forensic science' - and explains why Session's decision to scrap the forensic science commission was a mistake.'..."Many in law enforcement are cheering, but Americans who care about due process, and the epidemic of wrongful convictions, should be worried."

EDITORIAL: "21,587 reasons to fix forensic science," published by The New York Times on April 27, 2017.

GIST:  "Last week, prosecutors in Massachusetts agreed to throw out more than 20,000 drug convictions dating back to 2003 because a single crime lab chemist, Annie Dookhan, admitted in 2012 that she had doctored or completely made up drug test results for years. It was the biggest dismissal of its kind in American history. And it should have happened years earlier. Instead, prosecutors dragged their feet like sullen children avoiding homework, making one excuse after another for why they shouldn’t have to do the right thing and dismiss convictions based on obviously tainted evidence. The scandal is far from the only one to come out of forensic labs, and for a simple reason: Prosecutors and other law enforcement officials, who oversee the labs, want to win cases. As a result, they cling to techniques that are of questionable value at best, if they aren’t provably useless. A 2015 review by the F.B.I. found that its forensic hair-sample analysts testified wrongly in favor of the prosecution 96 percent of the time. And even reliable scientific practices require strict protocols and aggressive oversight to protect against the Annie Dookhans of the world. The reliability of these labs — many of which are overworked and understaffed — will only suffer more because of the Trump administration’s knee-jerk bias for law enforcement. On April 10, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that he would disband the nonpartisan National Commission on Forensic Science, which was established four years ago to make forensic science independent from the win-at-all-costs mind-set of so many prosecutors.........This scandal is another example of why Mr. Sessions’s decision to scrap the forensic science commission was a mistake. The commission, which included scientists, law enforcement officers and judges, was often hamstrung by internal disagreement, but still managed to produce important certification requirements and reporting standards that would have made future lab scandals harder to pull off and easier to detect or prevent. Many in law enforcement are cheering, but Americans who care about due process, and the epidemic of wrongful convictions, should be worried."

The entire editorial can be found at:

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/04/27/opinion/21587-reasons-to-fix-forensic-science.html?_r=0&referer=https://www.google.com/

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith. Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at: http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy; Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog;