REPORT: Hi everyone. I have some significant news to share about the Joe Bryan case. As you may remember, the Texas Forensic Science Commission has been investigating the reliability and integrity of the bloodstain pattern analysis that helped prosecutors secure Joe’s conviction. Last Friday, the commission shared its findings, and it’s fair to say that the results were jaw-dropping. The commission found that the testimony of Robert Thorman, the bloodstain pattern analyst who testified at Joe’s trials, was “not accurate or scientifically supported.” And that was just the beginning. “Thorman’s testimony was egregiously wrong,” Celestina Rossi, the bloodstain pattern analyst retained by the commission to examine the case, told me. “If any juror relied on any part of his testimony to render a verdict, Mr. Bryan deserves a new trial.” Here’s the full story. The commission’s findings will likely reverberate through the evidentiary hearing that begins on Aug. 20, in Comanche, Texas, at which Joe’s attorneys will ask that he be granted a new trial. And the commission’s conclusions may put pressure on the Bosque County District Attorney’s office to allow DNA analysis of untested evidence in the case to move forward—an effort prosecutors have thus far blocked. As you reflect on all this, it’s worth noting that Texas is in the middle of a heat wave, and most inmates, like Joe, do not have access to air conditioning. The temperature in Huntsville, where Joe is incarcerated, will be hovering just below 100 degrees all week. Inside the concrete walls of the prison where he is housed, the temperature in the summer is frequently much higher than it is outside. An inmate like Joe, who is 77 and has congestive heart failure, is particularly susceptible to health problems when confined in sweltering conditions. So what happens next month in Comanche is important. You’ll be hearing more from me then. In the meantime, thanks for your continued interest in this story. Best, Pamela.
The entire update can be read at the link below:
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?tab=wm#inbox/164cbf4a4283761b
Read related ProPublica report on this major development at the link below:
Influential Texas Commission Says Blood-Spatter Testimony in Joe Bryan’s Murder Case Was “Not Accurate or Scientifically Supported.” The findings of Texas Forensic Science Commission will make it harder to deny a new trial to Bryan, a high school principal convicted of murdering his wife. The case was the subject of an investigation by ProPublica and The New York Times Magazine.
"An influential state commission said the blood-spatter analysis used to convict a former Texas high school principal of murdering his wife in 1985 was “not accurate or scientifically supported” and the expert who testified was “entirely wrong.” The findings of the Texas Forensic Science Commission, a national leader in forensic science reform, called into question the conviction of Joe Bryan, who has now spent more than 30 years in prison. Bryan was the subject of a two-part investigation by ProPublica and The New York Times Magazine in May that questioned the accuracy of the bloodstain pattern analysis used to convict Bryan, as well as the training of the experts who testify in such cases. The findings, which were released during a commission meeting Friday, give fresh urgency to the pleas of Bryan, now 77 and in poor health, for a new trial. Bryan had been attending a principals’ convention in Austin, 120 miles from where the murder occurred, in the days surrounding the murder. He has always maintained that he was in Austin, asleep in his hotel room, at the time of the crime. Created by the Texas Legislature in 2005, the commission — made up of seven scientists, one prosecutor and one defense attorney — does not investigate the guilt or innocence of defendants, but rather the reliability and integrity of the forensic science used to win their convictions. Earlier this year, its inquiry into the Bryan case broadened into a re-examination of bloodstain-pattern analysis, a forensic discipline whose practitioners regard the drops, spatters and trails of blood at a crime scene as clues that can sometimes be used to reverse-engineer the crime itself. The commission examined the training of some of the discipline’s practitioners, who have been admitted as expert witnesses in courts around the country despite having completed no more than a weeklong course in bloodstain interpretation. Robert Thorman, a police detective from Harker Heights, Texas, with 40 hours of training in bloodstain-pattern analysis, was a key prosecution witness in the Bryan case. His testimony about a blood-speckled flashlight found by the victim’s brother in the trunk of Bryan’s car four days after the murder was the linchpin of the prosecution’s case. Yet what connection the flashlight had to the crime, if any, was never clear. In 1985, a crime lab technician working before the advent of DNA analysis determined the blood on the flashlight to be type O, which corresponded not only to Bryan’s wife, Mickey, but also to nearly half the population. To secure a guilty verdict, prosecutors needed to tie the flashlight to the crime scene. Based on his assessment of photographs of the flashlight, Thorman testified that the flecks of blood on its lens were “back spatter” — a pattern that indicated a close-range shooting. With the help of prosecutors, he wove a narrative that suggested the flashlight had been present at the crime scene — specifically, that the killer was holding the flashlight in one hand at the time that he shot Mickey Bryan. At Friday’s meeting in Austin, bloodstain-pattern analyst Celestina Rossi provided a highly critical assessment of Thorman’s interpretation of both the crime scene and the flashlight. “Thorman’s testimony was egregiously wrong,” Rossi said after the meeting. “If any juror relied on any part of his testimony to render a verdict, Mr. Bryan deserves a new trial.” After the publication of the story by ProPublica and The New York Times Magazine, the Texas Forensic Science Commission asked Rossi, a locally prominent bloodstain-pattern analyst, to re-examine the case. The commission had previously retained another analyst, whose findings about the complex case were brief and did not fully answer the commission’s questions."
https://www.propublica.org/article/texas-forensic-science-commission-blood-spatter-evidence-testimony-murder-case-joe-bryan?utm_source=pardot&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dailynewsletter
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/
