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PASSAGE THREE OF THE DAY: "The national Forensic Science Service (FSS) used to operate as a government-owned company providing expertise to all police forces and agencies. But it was axed in 2012 because the Government argued its £2m-a-month losses were unsustainable, and since then work has been farmed out to private operators or moved in-house by police forces."
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STORY: "Police use of forensics slashed by 99% as 'awful' crisis unfolds, by Northern Reporter Steve Robson, published by iNEWS on April 28, 2024.
SUB-HEADING: "Critics say the forensics industry has been in freefall due to funding cuts over the past decade and is behind rising unsolved crime and miscarriages of justice."
GIST: A crisis in forensic services where police forces spend a fraction of the time needed on tests is behind soaring rates of unsolved crimes and innocent people being wrongly convicted, experts have told i.
Fibre analysis can be used as evidence to indicate if a suspect was present at a crime scene and has helped crack some of the country’s most high-profile cases including the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence in 1993 and the killing of eight-year-old Sarah Payne in 2000.
But the specialism is one of a number of techniques that is rarely being used by police due to a lack of funding – with one forensic scientist suggesting its use by forces has been cut by 99 per cent since 2017.
According to Freedom of Information data shared with i, forces paid for less than 1,000 hours of fibre analysis per year between 2018 and 2020 – the equivalent of around 30 hours for each of the 43 forces in England and Wales.
Tiernan Coyle, a scientist with 25 years’ experience, who worked on cases such as the murder of Damilola Taylor, said this is not enough.
“When I ran a lab between 2006 and 2017, we needed at least 6,000 hours for four full-time scientists,” Mr Coyle told i. “The current level of work is not even enough to employ one scientist.”
There are similar concerns around toxicology tests after Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of police forces found some were having to cap the number of tests they were able to carry out at as little as nine a month.
Officers told the inspectorate of their frustration that blood sample analysis “was effectively rationed to managed available budgets and the capacity of the forensic service providers to deal with demand.”
This week the parents of an eight-year-old girl killed when a Land Rover crashed into her school say the Met Police told them their case has been delayed due to a lack of available forensic officers.
In an interview with i, Sajjad Butt, the father of Nuria Sajjad, said the delay is “unacceptable” and is prolonging the family’s trauma as they wait for answers.
Critics say the traditional forensics industry – which also involves analysing blood samples, DNA and fingerprints – has been in freefall due to Government funding cuts over the past decade and is behind soaring rates of unsolved crime and miscarriages of justice.
The national Forensic Science Service (FSS) used to operate as a government-owned company providing expertise to all police forces and agencies.
But it was axed in 2012 because the Government argued its £2m-a-month losses were unsustainable, and since then work has been farmed out to private operators or moved in-house by police forces.
With chief constables also grappling with budget cuts, spending fell significantly, from around £120m in 2008 to as little as £50m in 2019, according to a House of Lords report.
More than 2.1m crimes went undetected between 2022 and 2023 according to the latest Home Office figures for England and Wales, the equivalent of 39 per cent of all offences recorded.
Theft (73pc) and burglary (74pc) are the crimes least likely to be solved, followed by criminal damage and arson (59pc).
i analysis of the figures also reveals the number of homicides where no suspect has been charged has steadily been on the increase, from 65 of the 567 offences recorded in 2012-23 (11.4pc), up to 152 of 591 offences recorded in 2022-23 (25.7pc).
Prosecutors are currently trying to contact around 1,700 drivers who were wrongly convicted of drug-driving offences due to “unreliable” blood tests carried out by a private firm called Synlab.
And earlier this month, the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) said it would be carrying out a review of 5,500 cases of murder and rape where the offender claims to be innocent to see if it has missed DNA evidence.
Cases solved thanks to forensics
Stephen Lawrence
Following a cold case review that began in 2006, scientists found clothing fibres and hair from the teenager on the clothes of the two killers, Gary Dobson and David Norris. A tiny speck of blood was also found on Dobson’s jacket which matched Stephen’s DNA.
Damilola Taylor
Ricky and Danny Preddie were prime suspects within days of the 10-year-old’s killing in 2000. But scientists missed blood on a trainer and jumper at the time and they weren’t spotted until a review of the case in 2003. A fibre from Damilola’s trousers was found within the blood spot on the white Reebok shoe. The pair were convicted of manslaughter.
Pembrokeshire murders
In 2006, the ‘queen of forensics, Prof Angela Gallop was called in to help a cold case team review the murders of siblings Richard and Helen Thomas, aged 58 and 54, in a remote farmhouse in 1985, and four years later holidaymakers Peter and Gwenda Dixon, aged 51 and 52, on a coastal path. Police had a prime suspect in local career criminal John Cooper and hoped improved DNA capabilities would provide a breakthrough. But after failing to find any fresh DNA evidence, Prof Gallop convinced police to expand their tests to include fibre and textiles. Incredibly, they found the ‘golden nugget’ they were looking for in the shape of fibres from the glove Cooper was wearing on a tree branch he had used to conceal the body of Gwenda Dixon.
It is understood senior police officers do not believe problems with forensics is the ‘root cause’ of unsolved crime and miscarriages of justice as they instead point to wider issues in the criminal justice system.
But Mr Coyle said: “The demand on the criminal justice system side for these samples has increased enormously, while the skills and the labour workforce isn’t there anymore to be able to cope with it.
“We’ve got a government that is completely absent from any kind of forensic science policy or strategy, they’ve left the building.
“People view miscarriages of justice as, quite rightly, the ones where you’ve got somebody convicted who is clearly innocent.
“But you’ve also got miscarriages of justice in all the cases where the police are not submitting work to forensic science laboratories at all and those prosecutions are being discontinued for lack of evidence. That’s a miscarriage of justice.
“You’ve also got the other side where they don’t do enough forensic work, and the guy gets off scot-free as well.
“All of this is wrapped up in the performances of police forces as a functioning body.
“You can see it in murder rates perhaps not being solved, unsolved murder rates going up.
“You can see it in sexual offences, for example, you wonder how many of those are being processed in the way that the used to and the amount of time it takes for cases to get to court, if they get to court at all.”
How many hours of fibre forensic tests are police forces carrying out?
Total hours carried out by forces between 2018-2021
0
817
British Transport Police
0
City of London
0
Mr Coyle's comments follow outrage over the exoneration of Andrew Malkinson, a man who spent 17 years in prison for a rape he didn't commit following an investigation by Greater Manchester Police (GMP).
The CCRC twice declined to carry out the DNA testing which would have cleared Mr Malkinson years earlier.
The Court of Appeal heard how GMP botched the original investigation into the brutal sex attack in 2003, and destroyed the victim's clothing, making it more difficult for Mr Malkinson to launch his appeal and for the true offender to be caught.
Emily Bolton, founder and director of the charity APPEAL which supported Mr Malkinson's case, told i: "Advances in forensic science have the potential to exculpate more people who’ve been wrongly convicted – but only if proper resources are put in place to cover the work of forensic scientists, appeal lawyers and the costs of DNA testing.
"Andy Malkinson’s case raises questions about the decision to axe the Forensic Science Service and the danger of relying more heavily on the police to retain forensic exhibitions and samples.
"The police lost or destroyed the victim's clothing in Andy’s case, but fortunately samples from her clothing had been retained separately by the Forensic Archive Limited, which meant testing could go ahead."
Mr Coyle believes both sides of the crisis can be traced back to the Government's decision to axe the FSS.
"I think the best way to describe where we are with forensic science at the moment is - it's pretty awful," he said.
"And there doesn't seem to be much hope on the horizon that things are going to change for the better."
Crime on the increase
The warning over forensic capabilities comes amid an increase in certain types of crime, according to the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
Offences involving firearms increased 9 per cent in the year ending 2023, compared to the year ending 2022.
Offences involving knives or sharp instruments are up 7 per cent, robbery is up 13 per cent, theft is up 18 per cent and shoplifiting is up 37 per cent to a record high.
The three largest companies accredited to carry out work for police force - Cellmark, EcoFins and Key forensic services - have all complained about a lack of work making it difficult to survive.
In 2018, Key forensics collapsed into administration but survived thanks to a £1.8million loan from the Mayor of London's office and is now owned by CorpAcq.
Paperwork obtained by i reveals how administrators, Scott Bevan and Simon Chandler, of Mazars LLP, had to warn all 43 police forces and the Home Office of a "potentially catastrophic" impact on the criminal justice system if the company was liquidated.
It would have meant potentially crucial evidence in thousands of court cases being locked away from police forces or even destroyed.
The near-miss was highlighted by a House of Lords commitee in 2019 which warned the Home Office needed to act to improve the stability of the forensic sciences market.
Dr Carole McCartney, professor of law and criminal justice at Leicester University, said miscarriages of justice are "happening more frequently, and will continue to happen more frequently."
"There's a real risk that because of things like dodgy forensics or toxicology, mistakes are made, and they can end up having a really significant impact," she said.
She believes the CCRC review may find that it is unable to carry out fresh DNA tests because evidence has not been kept by police.
'I've not even had an apology'
Mark Cooper, a 40-year-old heating engineer from Eastbourne, was wrongly convicted of driving while under the influence of cannabis in 2020.
He told i he never believed he was unfit to drive when pulled over by Sussex police, but pleaded guilty because he was an occasional cannabis smoker at the time.
"I didn't think the science could be wrong" Mr Cooper said.
By the time the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) wrote to him about the "unreliable" test result in December 2023, he had already served a 12-month driving ban which had cost him his job and damaged his relationship with friends and family.
"I went down to about £12,500-a-year working self-employed," Mr Cooper added.
"But I got lucky, someone who didn't have a trade behind them would have really struggled.
"As soon as you say you've got a driving ban, a criminal record, people don't want to know.
"People think less of you, especially for something like drunk or drug driving, and I didn't think I was.
"It's probably still going to hang over me for years to come even though I've had the conviction overturned."
In Mr Cooper's case, the CPS applied to Brighton magistrates for his case to be reopened. Paperwork shared with i shows Sussex Police then "withdrew" the alleged offence.
"I've not had any apology or anything," Mr Cooper said, adding that he had spent hours on the phone and visiting the court in person before he was able to find out what had happened.
Mr Cooper's solicitor Jasmine Moxey-Butler said the process of overturning such convictions needs to be improved.
"The courts are underfunded," she said.
"It doesn't feel as finalised as it should do [for people like Mr Cooper].
“I’m sure there’s people falling through the cracks, particularly those who may hot have representation.
“If there are 1,700 convictions out there where the basis of evidence is not good enough, are these people even going to know?”
A CPS spokesperson said: “Cases involving evidence from Synlab were prosecuted in good faith – as soon as we were made aware we reviewed every case affected by Synlab’s drugs testing results between April 2019 and December 2020, and wrote to the defendants in those affected cases.
“In Mr Cooper’s case we applied to the Magistrates’ Court to set aside the conviction and withdraw the charge and met with him ahead of the hearing to explain what this meant. Following the CPS’s application, Mr Cooper is no longer convicted of the offence.”
Chief Constable Nick Dean, NPCC lead for forensics told i: "Forensic science has changed the face of policing and new developments and techniques continue to identify and convict offenders.
"The way we use forensics changes all the time because science and technology is constantly evolving and so some methods naturally fall out of use.
"While still a legitimate disciple, fibre testing is seeing a reduction because it is more time consuming and less precise than using DNA.
"However it is up to investigators to use their skill and judgement to determine which method, or range of methods, will be best suited to each offence.
"Forensics can play an integral role in the criminal justice system but it alone can not put offenders behind bars and solve crime. There will always be a need for trained officers to compile a range of evidence and put the strongest possible case before the courts."
A Home Office spokesperson said: "We have provided £3.2 million to fund the work of the Forensic Capability Network which provides support to the NPCC and forensic scientists across police forces nationally.
"The Forensic Science Service was closed as a result of losing an estimated £2 million per month of taxpayers’ money and repeated failings in forensic science.
"The police are committed to pursuing all leads where there is a reasonable chance it could result in catching a perpetrator and solving a crime, where proportionate to do so."
How many hours of fibre forensic tests are police forces carrying out?
Total hours carried out by forces between 2018-2021
Avon and Somerset - 78
Bedfordshire - 0
British Transport Police - 0
Cambridgeshire - 0
Cheshire - 57
City of London - 0
Cleveland - 64
Cumbria - 55
Derbyshire - 156
Devon and Cornwall - 68
Dorset - 18
Durham - 108
Dyfed-Powys - 0
Essex - 41
Gloucestershire - 58
Greater Manchester - 49
Gwent - 110
Hampshire - 0
Hertfordshire - 0
Humberside - 30
Kent - 0
Lancashire - 57
Leicestershire - 95
Lincolnshire - 25
Merseyside - 0
Met - 220
Norfolk - 53
North Wales - 75
Northamptonshire - 0
Northumbria - 82
North Yorks - 90
Nottinghamshire - 107
South Wales - 215
South Yorks - 53
Staffs - 0
Suffolk - 0
Surrey - 89
Sussex - 4
Thames Valley - 817
Warwickshire - 0
West Mercia - 0
West Midlands - 64
West Yorkshire - 89
Wiltshire - 13
https://inews.co.uk/news/police-use-forensics-slashed-crisis-unfolds-3014701PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue/resource. 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.
SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL:
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985
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FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
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FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
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YET ANOTHER FINAL WORD:
David Hammond, one of Broadwater's attorneys who sought his exoneration, told the Syracuse Post-Standard, "Sprinkle some junk science onto a faulty identification, and it's the perfect recipe for a wrongful conviction.
https://deadline.com/2021/11/alice-sebold-lucky-rape-conviction-overturned-anthony-broadwater-12348801
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SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL:
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985
---------------------------------------------------------------
FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
—————————————————————————————————
FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
————————————————————————————
YET ANOTHER FINAL WORD:
David Hammond, one of Broadwater's attorneys who sought his exoneration, told the Syracuse Post-Standard, "Sprinkle some junk science onto a faulty identification, and it's the perfect recipe for a wrongful conviction.
https://deadline.com/2021/11/alice-sebold-lucky-rape-conviction-overturned-anthony-broadwater-12348801
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