PUBLISHER'S NOTE: This Blog is interested in false confessions because of the disturbing number of exonerations in the USA, Canada and multiple other jurisdictions throughout the world, where, in the absence of incriminating forensic evidence the conviction is based on self-incrimination – and because of the growing body of scientific research showing how vulnerable suspects are to widely used interrogation methods such as the notorious ‘Reid Technique.’
Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog:
PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Bahena-Rivera has been granted $3,200 in state taxpayer money by 8th
Judicial District Judge Joel Yates this week that will pay for an expert
witness to help the illegal alien fight the murder charge, according to the Gazette.The illegal alien, Yates said in his decision, qualifies for taxpayer-funded stipends to fight the murder charge, the Gazette reported, and the accused killer’s defense team is expected to ask for more taxpayer money before the trial: Lawyers for Cristhian Bahena Rivera, 24, who is charged with first-degree murder, said the stipend was needed to hire a forensic expert with Criminal Case Consultants in Buffalo, N.Y.
The expert can provide insight on interrogation techniques and
analytical investigative methods given the “length, context, language
barriers and other factors involved in the police interrogation” of
Rivera, Chase Frese, Rivera’s lawyer, said in the motion."
STORY: "Illegal Alien Accused of Murdering Mollie Tibbetts Granted $3.2K in Taxpayer Money for Expert Witness," by reporter John Binder, published by Breitbart on March 20, 2019.
SUB-HEADING: "The illegal alien accused of murdering 20-year-old college student Mollie Tibbetts in Brooklyn, Iowa, has been granted $3,200 in state taxpayer funds for an expert witness in the upcoming murder trial."
GIST: "In August 2018, Cristhian Bahena-Rivera, an illegal alien from Mexico, was charged with
Tibbetts’ murder after police said he admitted to confronting and
chasing down the young woman. Tibbetts’ body was found in a cornfield in
Poweshiek County after a statewide search for her. The illegal alien
lived in a region of Iowa that was surrounded by sanctuary cities, as
Breitbart News noted, and worked on a dairy farm using a stolen ID and Social Security card after allegedly crossing the U.S.-Mexico border as a child. Bahena-Rivera has been granted $3,200 in state taxpayer money by 8th
Judicial District Judge Joel Yates this week that will pay for an expert
witness to help the illegal alien fight the murder charge, according to the Gazette.The illegal alien, Yates said in his decision, qualifies for taxpayer-funded stipends to fight the murder charge, the Gazette reported, and the accused killer’s defense team is expected to ask for more taxpayer money before the trial: Lawyers for Cristhian Bahena Rivera, 24, who is charged with first-degree murder, said the stipend was needed to hire a forensic expert with Criminal Case Consultants in Buffalo, N.Y.
The expert can provide insight on interrogation techniques and
analytical investigative methods given the “length, context, language
barriers and other factors involved in the police interrogation” of
Rivera, Chase Frese, Rivera’s lawyer, said in the motion. [Emphasis
added]The stipend is required for the expert to begin looking into these issues but it doesn’t cover costs of testimony at trial or travel expenses, Frese, in motion, said. The defense will make separate requests for those funds if necessary. [Emphasis added] Eighth Judicial District Judge Joel Yates
approved the stipend Tuesday, saying a financial affidavit filed with
the court shows Rivera is indigent and qualifies for public funds,
which will be paid by the state. If additional funds are needed, the
defense will have to obtain court approval, he added. [Emphasis added] This is the latest request by Bahena-Rivera’s defense team for public
funds and accommodations for the illegal alien in the murder trial.
This month, Bahena-Rivera asked that his murder confession be thrown out as evidence, claiming he was not read his Miranda rights by police at the time. In its farthest reaching request, the illegal alien’s defense team said the jury selection pool should be moved out of Poweshiek County —
where the alleged murder occurred — because the area is home to too many
white Americans, Breitbart News reported.
Instead, Bahena-Rivera wants the jury selection moved to a neighboring
county with more Hispanic Americans, claiming that a majority-white
county is unfair. Before the jury selection request, the illegal alien’s attorneys said Bahena-Rivera had a “constitutional right” to receive $5,000 in state taxpayer money to hire an independent investigative team to fight the murder charge. According to prosecutors, Bahena-Rivera was the last person who saw
Tibbetts jogging on the evening of July 18, 2018, in Brooklyn, Iowa,
security camera footage reveals. That is the night Tibbetts went
missing. The illegal alien told police that Tibbetts was jogging when he saw
her, according to prosecutors. That is when he said he approached
Tibbetts and started talking to her. After Tibbetts told Bahena-Rivera
that she would call the police if he did not stop following her, the
illegal alien allegedly chased her and says he “blacked out” after this. Police believe Bahena-Rivera stabbed Tibbetts to death, then drove to
a cornfield where prosecutors say Bahena-Rivera placed cornstalks over
her to hide her body. The illegal alien has been held on a $5 million
bond, and the murder trial is set for September."
Read Des Moines Register story ' Prosecutor: Mollie Tibbetts murder suspect never mentionned language barrier in interview," by reporter Luke Nozicka, published on March 20, 2019, at the link below: "The farmhand accused of killing
University of Iowa student Mollie Tibbetts never indicated he did not
understand questions during his lengthy interview with investigators, prosecutors say.
In
a court filing Wednesday, the Iowa Attorney General's Office disputed
that there was a language barrier between Cristhian Bahena Rivera, 24,
and the Spanish-speaking officers who interviewed him for 12 hours
before he was charged with murder. The
statement came in a response to Bahena Rivera's request for public funds
to be used for an expert in interrogation methods. Prosecutors said
they understand the need for the expert but disagreed with his
assertion he required one because of the interview's "length, context,
language barriers and other factors." Scott
Brown, an assistant attorney general, said prosecutors were not aware
of any "significant" language barrier because officers talking with
Bahena Rivera at Yarrabee Farms in Brooklyn, where he worked, used an
interpreter. Officers who then conducted a "large
majority" of Bahena Rivera's interview at the Poweshiek County Sheriff’s
Office in Montezuma were fluent in Spanish, Brown wrote. The lead
officer's first language is Spanish, he said. Bahena
Rivera requested authority of $3,200 in public funds to use the New
York expert, Brian Leslie, who the defendant's attorneys said
specializes in interrogation techniques and analytical investigative
methods. The state did not resist the request.
Bahena
Rivera's attorneys, Chad and Jennifer Frese, have called the
interrogation a "marathon interview." Bahena Rivera fell asleep twice at
the sheriff's office after having worked a full day at the farm, they
said. In
their response, state prosecutors said Bahena Rivera was allowed to use
his cell phone for a "large portion" of the interview, during which he
was given food and drink. Frequent breaks were also taken, according to
the attorney general's office. After the
interview, Bahena Rivera, an undocumented immigrant, led officers to
Tibbetts' body, which was hidden in a Poweshiek County cornfield,
authorities said. Bahena Rivera's attorneys dispute that
characterization but have declined to elaborate. Bahena
Rivera was charged with first-degree murder in the stabbing death
of Tibbetts, 20, after he took investigators to her remains Aug. 21,
authorities said. He confessed to abducting Tibbetts while she was on a
run July 18 outside of her hometown of Brooklyn, investigators said. The month-long search for Tibbetts gained national and international attention. Earlier this month, Bahena Rivera's lawyers filed a motion to suppress his interview, arguing he was not told about his right to an attorney or his right to decline to cooperate beforehand. They argued any confession he made was therefore involuntary. Chad Frese
told the Des Moines Register his client was "Mirandized" — shorthand in
the legal profession for formally explaining a suspect's rights, under
the U.S. Supreme Court decision Miranda v. Arizona — nine to 10 hours
into the interview. A hearing on the issue has been set for June. His attorneys also requested his trial be moved out of Poweshiek County and into a county with more minority representation. Bahena Rivera's trial is set to begin in September. If convicted, he will be sentenced to life in prison without parole." The farmhand accused of killing
University of Iowa student Mollie Tibbetts never indicated he did not
understand questions during his lengthy interview with investigators, prosecutors say. In
a court filing Wednesday, the Iowa Attorney General's Office disputed
that there was a language barrier between Cristhian Bahena Rivera, 24,
and the Spanish-speaking officers who interviewed him for 12 hours
before he was charged with murder. The
statement came in a response to Bahena Rivera's request for public funds
to be used for an expert in interrogation methods. Prosecutors said
they understand the need for the expert but disagreed with his
assertion he required one because of the interview's "length, context,
language barriers and other factors." Scott
Brown, an assistant attorney general, said prosecutors were not aware
of any "significant" language barrier because officers talking with
Bahena Rivera at Yarrabee Farms in Brooklyn, where he worked, used an
interpreter. Officers who then conducted a "large
majority" of Bahena Rivera's interview at the Poweshiek County Sheriff’s
Office in Montezuma were fluent in Spanish, Brown wrote. The lead
officer's first language is Spanish, he said. Bahena
Rivera requested authority of $3,200 in public funds to use the New
York expert, Brian Leslie, who the defendant's attorneys said
specializes in interrogation techniques and analytical investigative
methods. The state did not resist the request. Bahena
Rivera's attorneys, Chad and Jennifer Frese, have called the
interrogation a "marathon interview." Bahena Rivera fell asleep twice at
the sheriff's office after having worked a full day at the farm, they
said. In
their response, state prosecutors said Bahena Rivera was allowed to use
his cell phone for a "large portion" of the interview, during which he
was given food and drink. Frequent breaks were also taken, according to
the attorney general's office. After the
interview, Bahena Rivera, an undocumented immigrant, led officers to
Tibbetts' body, which was hidden in a Poweshiek County cornfield,
authorities said. Bahena Rivera's attorneys dispute that
characterization but have declined to elaborate. Bahena
Rivera was charged with first-degree murder in the stabbing death
of Tibbetts, 20, after he took investigators to her remains Aug. 21,
authorities said. He confessed to abducting Tibbetts while she was on a
run July 18 outside of her hometown of Brooklyn, investigators said. The month-long search for Tibbetts gained national and international attention. Earlier this month, Bahena Rivera's lawyers filed a motion to suppress his interview, arguing he was not told about his right to an attorney or his right to decline to cooperate beforehand. They argued any confession he made was therefore involuntary. Chad Frese
told the Des Moines Register his client was "Mirandized" — shorthand in
the legal profession for formally explaining a suspect's rights, under
the U.S. Supreme Court decision Miranda v. Arizona — nine to 10 hours
into the interview. A hearing on the issue has been set for June. His attorneys also requested his trial be moved out of Poweshiek County and into a county with more minority representation. Bahena Rivera's trial is set to begin in September. If convicted, he will be sentenced to life in prison without parole."
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.
PASSAGE ONE OF THE DAY: "Do you
see in this courtroom the person you saw fire the fatal shot?” asks the
prosecutor. “Yes,” says the eyewitness, pointing to the defendant,
adding for good measure, “I will never forget his face.” But in
fact the eyewitness is frequently wrong: inaccurate eyewitness
identifications appear to be the single greatest contributor to wrongful
convictions. For example, they were introduced as evidence in over
70 percent of the more than 360 cases that the Innocence Project, using DNA
analysis, later proved were wrongful convictions. Nearly a third of
these cases, moreover, involved multiple misidentifications of the
defendant. By comparison, the next-most-frequent contributor to wrongful
convictions, misleading testimony by forensic “experts,” was present in
45 percent of these cases, and the third-most-frequent factor, false
confession, was present in about 30 percent of them."
PASSAGE TWO OF THE DAY: "Eyewitness identification thus
presents the legal system with a challenge unlike any other. In many
cases, the only direct evidence of who committed a crime is the
testimony of an eyewitness. Yet modern science suggests that much of
such testimony is inherently suspect—but not in ways that jurors can
readily evaluate from their own experience. The result, alas, is a
likelihood of wrongful convictions."
COMMENTARY: "Our Lying Eyes," by Jed S. Rakoff, published by The New York Review of Books April 18, 2019 issue. " (Jed S. Rakoff is a United States District Judge for the Southern District of New York.
GIST: "An
eyewitness’s identification of an accused defendant often provides some
of the most dramatic and powerful evidence in a criminal case. “Do you
see in this courtroom the person you saw fire the fatal shot?” asks the
prosecutor. “Yes,” says the eyewitness, pointing to the defendant,
adding for good measure, “I will never forget his face.” But in
fact the eyewitness is frequently wrong: inaccurate eyewitness
identifications appear to be the single greatest contributor to wrongful
convictions. For example, they were introduced as evidence in over
70 percent of the more than 360 cases that the Innocence Project, using DNA
analysis, later proved were wrongful convictions. Nearly a third of
these cases, moreover, involved multiple misidentifications of the
defendant. By comparison, the next-most-frequent contributor to wrongful
convictions, misleading testimony by forensic “experts,” was present in
45 percent of these cases, and the third-most-frequent factor, false
confession, was present in about 30 percent of them. While
some eyewitnesses have had prior contact with the person they identify
as the perpetrator of a crime (as when a neighbor sees a husband abusing
his wife), many have had none and only see the defendant once, when
they witness the crime. But in some respects this makes their testimony
stronger, for they have no motive to lie. The defendant was a complete
stranger to them, and they simply had the misfortune to have been a
passer by or, worse, a victim. In either case, the encounter was not
something they were likely to forget—and the jury generally finds their
testimony believable. Why
are eyewitnesses so often wrong? Improper police practices sometimes
play a part, as when a police officer conducting a line-up urges the
eyewitness to “take a good look at number 3,” or when the eyewitness
only tentatively identifies the person in the line-up that the officer
suspects is the culprit and the officer says, “Good work.” But the chief
causes of inaccurate eyewitness identifications are shortcomings
inherent in human perception and memory that cannot be eliminated
easily, if at all. Some of these are obvious. The ability of an
eyewitness to perceive the face of a culprit will be affected by
lighting, by distance and angle, by the acuity of the eyewitness’s
eyesight, by the amount of time the eyewitness looked at the culprit,
and by distractions such as a gun. Similarly, memories tend to fade over
time, which may affect how accurately an eyewitness can remember a face
seen many hours, days, or even weeks earlier. Considerable
research indicates, however, that many people overrate their ability to
perceive and remember faces they saw only once, and that what they
remember mostly relates to some general characteristic, such as that the
culprit was square-jawed or had a mustache.1
The research also shows that there are many other factors that can
influence and distort an eyewitness’s perceptions and recollections. For
instance, careful studies going back as far as the 1980s have
demonstrated what is now called the “other-race effect”: “eyewitnesses
are less likely to misidentify someone of their own race than they are
to misidentify someone of another race.”2 While theories vary as to why this is so, it is now pretty much beyond dispute. Another
less-than-obvious factor is the result of the well-known tendency of
memories to merge over time in order to “fill in the gaps.” An
eyewitness who does not know the identity of the perpetrator, say, will
thus often be asked by police to view a line-up or photo array that
includes one or more possible suspects, to see if the eyewitness can
pick out any of them as the culprit. At the time of this viewing, the
eyewitness may have only a somewhat blurred memory of the crime, but
will typically study the line-up or photographs with care before making a
selection (if any). By the time the eyewitness testifies at trial,
however, the rough memory of the perpetrator from the actual time of the
crime will often have merged with the memory formed from the much more
careful scrutiny of the line-up or photographs, so that the eyewitness
honestly thinks he remembers a particular detail, like a scar on the
defendant’s face, from the time of the crime, even though his perception
of that detail came from his viewing of the line-up or photographs.
More generally, as summarized in a recent article in The New York Times,
“memories formed during a traumatic event become an amalgamation of a
person’s understanding of the world, the people around them and the
snippets they were able to encode into their brain.”3 Common
assumptions can also potentially distort an eyewitness identification.
For example, even if a well-trained police officer makes a point of
telling an eyewitness not to assume that any of the people being viewed
in a line-up or photo array is a suspect, most eyewitnesses will assume
that one or more are indeed included, and this will increase the
likelihood that the eyewitness will make an identification. To
be sure, not all police line-ups and photo arrays are conducted so
carefully, and many of the legal developments of the last few decades
regarding eyewitness identifications have focused on requiring less
suggestive police procedures, such as having a line-up or photo array
conducted by an officer not involved in the investigation of the crime.
The purpose of this reform is to eliminate the possibility that the
officer will suggest, if only through body language, that the eyewitness
should make a particular selection. But such reforms, though salutary,
are largely irrelevant to solving the more basic problems of human
perception and memory that appear to be the main cause of so many false
identifications. Some of these misidentifications have been astonishing. Consider the following three cases. In
1984 Kirk Bloodsworth was convicted and sentenced to death for the rape
and murder of a nine-year-old girl in Baltimore. While no physical or
circumstantial evidence linked him to the crime, no fewer than five
eyewitnesses placed him with the victim or at the scene of the crime. At
the time, DNA testing had not yet made its way into the
criminal justice system; the first US case involving its use by
prosecutors was in 1988, and defense lawyers did not begin to use it
until a few years later. Finally, in 1993, DNA analysis of
the semen extracted from the girl’s underwear showed that the culprit
was not Bloodsworth but someone else, who eventually confessed.
Thankfully, Bloodsworth had not been executed, and he was set free that
year. Also in 1984, a college student named Jennifer Thompson was
raped in Burlington, North Carolina. When shown an array of six photos,
she tentatively identified Ronald Cotton as her assailant, initially
stating, “I think this is the guy.” At the time of trial, however,
Thompson testified that she was “absolutely sure” that Cotton was the
man who had raped her. Cotton was convicted and sentenced to life
imprisonment. Over a decade later, DNA testing of the semen
taken from her vagina right after the crime proved to be that of
another man, who was then charged, and Cotton was set free. In 1974 James Bain was convicted in Florida of raping a nine-year-old boy. Although this was long before DNA
testing was available, blood found in the semen taken from the boy’s
underwear was type B, and Bain’s blood was type AB. Nevertheless, the
jury convicted him, chiefly on the basis of the boy’s identification of
Bain, which he had consistently provided from the initial photo array
through the trail. Years later, after DNA testing became available, Bain filed handwritten motions in court four times asking for DNA
testing of the semen, but all four were denied. Finally, however, after
Bain obtained assistance from a lawyer and the Innocence Project of
Florida, DNA testing was granted—and it completely
exonerated him. He was released in 2009, having served thirty-five years
for a crime he did not commit. In each of these cases, had it not been for DNA testing, the defendants would still be in prison, or dead. But DNA
samples are either unavailable or irrelevant to the investigation and
prosecution of most crimes. It may reasonably be inferred, therefore,
that numerous defendants currently imprisoned were wrongly convicted on
the basis of inaccurate eyewitness testimony. And it may be further
assumed that while some of these inaccurate identifications may have
been the product of suggestive police procedures, many more were the
result of shortcomings in perception and memory that are endemic to the
human species. How should the legal system deal
with this seemingly intractable problem? The fact that eyewitness
identifications are frequently unreliable was recognized by the Supreme
Court as early as 1967 in cases like United States v. Wade, Gilbert v. California, and Stovall v. Denno,
which focused on the need to have defense counsel present at line-ups
in order to avoid unfairness. It was not until a decade later, in 1977,
that the Supreme Court, in Manson v. Brathwaite, addressed
the issue of whether eyewitness identifications might be the product of
overly suggestive police techniques, such as, in Manson, showing the eyewitness a single photograph. The emphasis in Manson
and in most subsequent cases was on identifying and eliminating such
practices, since they were the aspect of eyewitness inaccuracy that
could most readily be fixed. While much remains to be done in this
regard, progress has been made. At least nine states now require that
line-ups and photo arrays be “blindly” administered, i.e., by a police
officer who has no familiarity with the investigation. Many states and
localities also require the police managing the line-ups and photo
arrays to read from a script that minimizes suggestiveness. Further
still, eleven states now require that the eyewitness’s initial degree of
confidence in making an identification be recorded and made available
to the defense. While further reforms are required—such as videotaping
the suspects in the line-ups (and perhaps the eyewitness reactions) and
training the police who administer the line-ups and photo arrays to
avoid even unconscious suggestiveness—at least police procedure is an
area where concrete steps can be taken to minimize inaccuracy. But
neither the courts nor the police have done much to deal with the
bigger problem of eyewitness inaccuracy caused by fundamental problems
in an ordinary person’s perception and memory. Although the Manson
decision invited federal trial courts to exclude eyewitness testimony,
not just for police suggestiveness but also for inherent infirmities,
this invitation coming as it did before most of the research on the less
obvious weaknesses of perception and memory had been undertaken has in
practice rarely led to such exclusion. More recently, however, a
few state courts, most notably in New Jersey, have begun experimenting
with a different approach: either instructing jurors about the more
subtle limitations on human perception and memory that affect eyewitness
identification or allowing experts to testify about them. Regretfully,
preliminary studies have concluded that the effectiveness of these
approaches is modest. Jurors seem to interpret a judge’s special
instructions on the subject of eyewitness identification as a veiled
message that the judge does not believe the eyewitness; they therefore
do not try to distinguish between identifications that are more or less
likely to be affected by the factors referenced by the judge, but rather
disregard them all. Expert testimony, for its part, often devolves into
a battle between experts on both sides, which, according to these
studies, the jury resolves by ignoring every one of them.4
In both cases, the result is that jurors still do not undertake the
admittedly difficult task of distinguishing reliable from unreliable
eyewitness identifications. In my opinion, these approaches also
ignore the fact that the overwhelming majority of criminal cases—more
than 95 percent—are resolved by plea bargains or other dispositions not
requiring any fact-finding by a judge or jury. Instead, resolving
criminal cases has become primarily the responsibility of prosecutors,
who now have nearly unfettered discretion to decide who shall be
charged, what the charges will be, and how they should be resolved.5
While this is unfortunate, it is also unlikely to change in the
foreseeable future. Thus the best thing that can now be done to mitigate
the frequent inaccuracy of eyewitness identifications is to educate
prosecutors, through training early in their careers, about the dangers
of inaccuracy that persist even when police procedures have been
unassailable. It may be that courts could not order such training
(though the legislative and executive branches easily could); but the
courts could suggest its adoption with an emphasis that might be
persuasive. One other modest mitigating factor should be
mentioned. For many everyday crimes, like robbery, the presence of
surveillance cameras in stores and buildings has made the police
somewhat less dependent on eyewitness identification. The broader use of
such surveillance cameras should therefore be encouraged. Of course,
this is only a partial solution, not only because those committing
crimes often seek to avoid detection by, for example, wearing masks, but
also because it remains the case that most violent crimes are committed
by unmasked individuals in places such as alleys and private homes
where videotaping is not occurring. Eyewitness identification thus
presents the legal system with a challenge unlike any other. In many
cases, the only direct evidence of who committed a crime is the
testimony of an eyewitness. Yet modern science suggests that much of
such testimony is inherently suspect—but not in ways that jurors can
readily evaluate from their own experience. The result, alas, is a
likelihood of wrongful convictions."
The entire commentary can be read at: https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2019/04/18/our-lying-eyes/ 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.
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: Now that the ill-fated Motherisk program at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto has been totally shuttered up, I find it fascinating to look at how Cansford Labs, a drug and alcohol testing laboratory located in the U.K., analyzed the Motherisk debacle, as set out in a Blog published on the company's web site which offers, '5 reasons why the Motherisk scandal shouldn’t happen again."
PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "When things go as wrong as they did at Motherisk, it’s important not
to stick our heads in the sand. Especially when it involves vulnerable
individuals.
But Motherisk was an aberration. A tragic and disastrous aberration. The
science of hair sample testing remains a powerful tool when the
analysis is done correctly, appropriately, with quality control and
assurances and interpreted by qualified experts. Indeed, it’s only right that for vulnerable individuals, that nothing
but the best will do. A fact that Motherisk seemingly forgot."
POST: "5 reasons why the Motherisk scandal shouldn’t happen again," by Lolita Tsanaclis, published on The Cansford Labs Blog m- The drug and alcohol testing blog - on December 6, 2017.
GIST: In the interconnected scientific
community, the reverberations of what happens in one corner of the globe
can be felt all across it, especially when these reverberations have
profound implications on people's lives. A recent example is the Motherisk scandal in Canada. We were shocked
and saddened, when we first heard of the case last year, and now that
more information has come to light we decided to study it to understand
how and why it happened. For a comprehensive look at the scandal, CBC has an excellent investigative report (below). In
short, Motherisk was a clinic operating within Toronto’s Hospital for
Sick Children which became a renowned centre for hair sample testing.
Between the late 1990s and early 2015, the clinic conducted hair-strand
drug and alcohol tests in a lab under the direction of Dr. Gideon Koren. The results of Motherisk’s hair tests were often used in custody and
child protection cases in part to decide whether a parent was fit to
care for a child.So what exactly is the controversy? As it turns out, for more than two decades Motherisk performed flawed
drug and alcohol testing on thousands of vulnerable families across
Canada, skewing decisions in over 35,000 child protection cases. Families were torn apart. As Susan Lang, the independent reviewer who
investigated the scandal, said: “losing your child is the capital
punishment of child protection law.” What went wrong? Lang’s report
exposed a litany of flaws in how Motherisk conducted its tests. The
picture that emerges, very clearly, is a case of flawed process, not
flawed science. 1. The tests were preliminary: The tests performed by Motherisk relied on the unconfirmed results of its enzyme-linked immuno-sorbent assay (ELISA) tests. ELISA is often used as a screening tool before more in-depth tests
are undertaken. It can be used in toxicology as a rapid presumptive
screen for certain classes of drugs. It’s useful if you need to screen a
large number of samples when the presumption that only a small
percentage will test positive. But it’s not definitive and the results
can be erroneously interpreted. The Motherisk Lab did not follow-up its presumed positive ELISA results with follow-on in-depth tests. Therefore, the results simply could not be relied upon to provide the absolute certainty needed. As Craig Chatterton, a forensic toxicologist and a proponent of hair
sample testing, correctly explains in the CBC report on Motherisk, a
preliminary test like ELISA can be spot on - but, tragically for the
families implicated, it can be 100% incorrect, too. Susan Lang’s report went on to say "No forensic toxicology laboratory
in the world uses ELISA testing the way MTDL [Motherisk] did. 2. Motherisk had no written standard operating procedures: Having standard, professional operating procedures in place is one of
the central pillars of any testing environment, not just hair sample
testing. In this regard, Motherisk failed egregiously. The Lang report found no evidence of any written
standard operating procedures at Motherisk. This raises serious doubts
about the reliability and, crucially, the standardisation of its testing
procedures. Both forensic and clinical laboratories should have standard
operating procedures in place for each of the tests they perform.
Motherisk had no clear, documented procedures which means the processes
could have varied substantially in each individual case, calling into
question, rightly, the integrity of the lab’s results.3. No transparency: Motherisk’s next misstep was the lack of formal process and
documentation meant that it was almost impossible for any third party to
robustly assess its results. When the entire process isn’t adequately captured, it becomes easy for the lab to skirt over anomalies and simplify conclusions. At Cansford Labs, for instance, we share the evidence in full. This
is an absolutely vital component when the test will be involved in a
highly sensitive matter like child custody. The fact that Motherisk offered no insight into how its results were arrived at beggars belief.4: Inadequate training and oversight: The inadequacy and transparency issues within Motherisk seeped all the way into the employees at the lab. From reading the Lang report, Motherisk scientists were operating
without any forensic training or oversight. The ELISA tests were
inadequate, but even if they weren’t, the individuals interpreting the
results weren’t properly trained. Nobody at Motherisk, including, rather incredibly, Dr. Koren himself, had the proper training. The lack of training manifested in all manner of amateurish mistakes.
Staff routinely failed to wash hair samples before analysis, for
example. One mother tested positive for alcohol because her
alcohol-laced hairspray had not been washed off the sample. With the
right training and process, these issues could easily have been avoided.5. A compromised chain of custody" In the CBC report into Motherisk, one mother recalls how her second
test was conducted after she disputed the first test’s results: “With my
second test, the hair was done in the social worker’s office with the
scissors out of her desk, tape off her desk and cardboard from the
trash.” Her sample tested positive for crystal meth, but laughably when she
next saw her “hair sample”, the hair that allegedly belonged to her was
longer and a different colour.
It should go without saying, but any robust testing process
requires professionalism throughout. It’s not just about testing the
sample, but also about how the sample is collected and treated. The chain of custody is of paramount importance. Trusted professionals need to be present at every stage of the process, guided by the lab that will do the testing, and the procedures need to be the same for every single case. Motherisk was an aberration: When things go as wrong as they did at Motherisk, it’s important not
to stick our heads in the sand. Especially when it involves vulnerable
individuals.
But Motherisk was an aberration. A tragic and disastrous aberration. The science of hair sample testing remains a powerful tool when the
analysis is done correctly, appropriately, with quality control and
assurances and interpreted by qualified experts. Indeed, it’s only right that for vulnerable individuals, that nothing
but the best will do. A fact that Motherisk seemingly forgot."
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.
STORY: "Durham novelist Michael Peterson denies killing his wife in latest Dr. Phil episode," by reporter Jessica Patrick, published by WRAL on April 22, 2019.
GIST: "A new Dr. Phil episode airing on Monday will examine Mike Peterson, a Durham novelist maintaining his innocence after the Dec. 9, 2001, death of his wife, Kathleen. In the episode, which airs at 3 p.m. on WRAL, Dr. Phil interviews
Peterson, who denies killing his wife and explains the circumstances
surrounding her death. WRAL News covered the Peterson case,
which led to a 2004 Netflix documentary, from start-to-finish. Two years after Kathleen Peterson was found dead at the bottom of a
staircase in the couple's upscale home, Mike Peterson was convicted of
first-degree murder. "They convicted me because of blood," a preview of Monday's episode
shows Peterson telling Dr. Phil, explaining that investigators said
there was far too much blood under his wife for a fall down the stairs. In the episode, Dr. Phil is expected to ask Peterson questions like,
"How can you explain the blood?" and "Did you want your wife
dead?" In December 2011, Peterson was released from prison and a new trial
was ordered after it was revealed that a blood analyst with the State
Bureau of Investigation, one of the key witnesses, had given misleading
testimony. After years of continuing legal battles, Peterson agreed to enter an Alford plea in February 2017 to a charge of voluntary manslaughter. After the plea, Peterson was sentenced to time served and walked out
of a Durham County courtroom a convicted felon but a free man."
Read also the Raleigh News and Observer story 'Michael Peterson has a story to tell, and a question to answer: ‘Who am I?’ (April 21, 2019) by reporter Andrew Carter at the link below.
STORY: "For months, we have talked about the book. He had
hoped to have it ready in mid-November, then after Christmas. In
February, he sends an email announcing that the website to download it
is ready. “There will also be an Amazon Kindle and print
book available in a few days,” he writes. “Out of respect for you, I
will not send this information to other media for a little while,
including that bitch from London at the Daily Mail who banged on my
door, then did a 10-page hatchet job on me. ...” It’s a jarring description of a female reporter
who arrived at Peterson’s apartment in Durham one day last summer, at
the height of the craze over the documentary. It’s jarring, especially,
coming from a man who spent eight years in prison after being convicted
of killing his second wife. Peterson is 75 now, and for nearly two decades
his life has been consumed one way or another by what happened on Dec.
9, 2001, when Kathleen Peterson was found dead at the bottom of the back
staircase in their home, covered in blood. Peterson has insisted that
he was innocent.
At the trial,
a jury convicted him. In prison, he lost his appeals. Then came the
revelation that Duane Deaver, a former SBI blood spatter analyst,
exaggerated his expertise and misled the jury. Peterson’s conviction was
thrown out in 2011. For years after, he lived in purgatory, unsure if
prosecutors would retry him, unsure if he’d go back to prison for the
rest of his life. Finally, in 2017, he accepted an Alford plea, which
allowed him to plead guilty to manslaughter in exchange for a sentence
of time served. He walked out of court a free man — as free as
anyone can be after a murder conviction, after accepting legal
responsibility for his wife’s death, and after a civil judgment that
ordered him to pay one of his stepdaughters, Caitlin Atwater, $25
million, money he doesn’t have and never will. “I can’t own anything,” he says to me one day in his apartment, “because I would lose it.” He rents the place. He leases his car. He says
four New York City publishers were interested in his book, but they
backed off when they understood his legal predicament. He speaks about
everything as if he’s come to terms with it, and yet he finds fault in
the logic. “I owe her now with interest, probably $35 or $40
million dollars for what (Caitlin) considers me killing her mother,”
Peterson says. “Well, I didn’t do that. So should I owe her that money?” That’s why the book is free: Because in some
ways, Peterson still isn’t. What is freedom to a man many think should
still be locked away?He seems to appreciate the mystery surrounding
him. A lifelong storyteller — a novelist who wrote freelance political
columns for The Herald-Sun in Durham in the mid-to-late 1990s — Peterson
embraces the drama. The link in the email he sent me goes to his website for the book. There’s an “About the Author” section. “Kathleen once told me that I was every character
in every book I’d written; she said she could identify me in them all,”
Peterson writes, before listing several characters. “… ‘None of them
are all bad,’ I said. ‘True,’ she answered, ‘but none are all good
either.’ “I think she was on to something. So who am I?” The question posed in his book’s introduction
sets up Peterson’s story. He’s often telling one. A few minutes after
knocking on his door in mid-November, our first meeting, I’m following
him inside, past the living room, to a small nook next to the kitchen. Stacks of memorabilia cover a table: photographs
from his time in Vietnam, where he served in the Marines; one of him in a
hospital bed after an injury. Near the top is a copy of Time magazine.
He opens it to the page where there’s a blurb about “The Staircase.” The article describes him as “suspiciously
laid-back.” He wonders what that means. He doesn’t like it. Peterson has
kept everything he could find that has been written about the
documentary. Some of the stories, he doesn’t appreciate. He keeps those,
too. “Suspiciously laid-back.” He asks again what that’s about, shaking his head. Peterson knows that some people just think he’s
guilty, that he belongs in prison. He lives with that, just as he lives
with the contrast between the life he’s still learning to live and the
one that was his before Dec. 9, 2001. Back then, he was known as a successful novelist
with a passion for politics. People delighted in his war stories. He
counted doctors and lawyers and politicians among his friends. Very few
of them remain in his orbit. Now the memories of what was occupy the
same space as those from prison. In one moment, Peterson can tell stories about
being a student at Duke University and meeting B. Everett Jordan , the
Democratic senator from North Carolina. In another, his mind redirected,
Peterson can describe the men he met inside Nash Correctional
Institution. He has stories about inmates with names like Johnny Blood, Banger, Jay Bird, The Dwarf. He can tell stories about Rae Carruth,
the former Carolina Panthers player who served time in Nash, too. They
shared the same attorney, David Rudolf. Peterson says he and Carruth
became friends. “Some major, major, major characters in prison,”
Peterson says. “A lot more interesting than the cocktail crowd I used to
hang out with.” Peterson feels the rejection from that crowd.
After his conviction was overturned in 2011, there was no welcome-home
party. There was no home. The large house that he shared with Kathleen,
the one off of Cedar Street in Durham’s Forest Hills Neighborhood, was
but a memory to Peterson. So were a lot of his friendships. “People I had known, people that Kathleen and I
had known well … none of them reached out to me,” Peterson says, sitting
inside of an apartment that’s about 4 miles away from Cedar Street. “At
first I thought, my God, I’m out of prison, you know, my conviction was
overturned – I didn’t kill Kathleen ...” “I thought, ‘Oh, what is it, you know? Was it
because it came out (in the trial) that I was bisexual and they were
going to be contaminated, that it was contagious or something?’ I don’t
know. But then I realized, hell, I don’t want to be a part of their life
— not remotely interested in their life.” People are interested in his. In March, the “Dr.
Phil” show flew Peterson to Los Angeles for a taping of the show, which
will air over two episodes April 22 and 23.
(“We did not bond, ... he thinks I was guilty,” Peterson writes in an
email to me about his interview with psychologist Phil McGraw.) He says he has hundreds of friend requests on
Facebook. During a recent trip to the airport, he says he often felt
stares. Not long ago, at Target, he says a man in the parking lot asked
for a selfie. He says two more did at the library. “Happens all the time,” he says, “because, obviously, of Netflix.” He says he had no idea before “The Staircase” was
released that Netflix had purchased the documentary. Peterson hasn’t
made any money from it and, even if he had, it wouldn’t be his to keep.
In the months after it began streaming last June, his case again became a
spectacle. He says he hasn’t watched the documentary. He has
difficulty remembering when the filming ceased, or even when he
accepted the plea deal that formally ended his case. “I keep losing track of time,” he says. In prison, time slows down in some ways and
accelerates in others. Peterson spent eight years there, yet emerged
looking like he had spent 20 or more. In an email before our in-person
introduction, he offers a warning: “Don’t be frightened when you see me.
I look like hell and am hobbling around on a walker.” He has just had surgery on his feet, a procedure
he describes as long overdue to repair an old military injury. His feet
look gnarly, with little metal pins, like small nails, sticking out of
each one of his toes. He’s in pain. He looks older than 75. His eyes are
still a piercing blue, but often there’s a hint of fear in them, as if
he’s anxious about something. They’re set back in the sockets. Peterson lives alone. The relative isolation
doesn’t bother him. It didn’t, either, in prison, where he says he took
five trips to “the hole” — solitary confinement. He says the longest of
those lasted approximately 34 days. He earned those trips, he says,
because he was often “antagonistic to authority. “Sometimes I welcomed it as, thank God, you know.
I’m away from all these other assholes out there. I don’t have to deal
with anything. It’s good. So solitude never has bothered me. I mean,
writers are, by choice or necessity, solitary individuals. … “And I have this terrific imagination and I can just, you know, make up life.” Statements like that are enough to give pause.
Peterson has a history of embellishment. Twenty years ago, he ran for
Durham mayor, and built part of his campaign on his military record. In
Vietnam, he had earned a Silver Star and a Bronze Star with Valor.
Peterson also claimed two Purple Hearts. His military record, however,
contained no evidence of those, and after a News and Observer reporter
confronted Peterson during his campaign, he acknowledged that he had
fabricated a story about a leg injury. When he tells a story these days, it’s difficult
to know where the exaggerations might lie. His stories from prison are
filled with accounts that are nearly impossible to verify. He has
stories about coaching Carruth on a prison softball team, and becoming
close. Peterson has others about helping inmates earn their GEDs, which
he says earned him respect from Nash’s leader of the Bloods, the
notorious gang. In another story, Peterson has lost his wedding
ring. He was allowed to wear it, and one day after a shower he noticed
it was gone. He knew the ring would be a lucrative commodity in a place
where even postage stamps are like cash. An hour passed. A younger
prisoner found Peterson and presented the ring. “He cleaned the shower, which is the worst job you can have,” Peterson says.
He still wears the ring. He says it reminds him
of Kathleen, but also of incarceration, and “that poor kid who had
nothing, and returned it to me.” “So I will never take it off,” he says. In some ways, Peterson tells me, it was more
difficult to leave prison, to readjust to the outside, than it was to go
in. He has been out now for about eight years, which is about as long
as he spent inside. He still finds pleasure in simple things: the
space and quiet of an empty room, the freedom to slowly sip a cup of
coffee in the morning. His back window overlooks trees and greenery — a
contrast to the dirt track and patch of cement that filled the narrow
view from his cell. He cried a lot there, at first. One night he went to the ballet with his first wife, Patty Peterson.
(They’re still close.) Peterson broke down at the performance. He
visited a psychiatrist: “I want you to un(expletive) my head,” Peterson
says he told him. The doctor told him to cry. “What’s wrong with crying?” Peterson asks now.
“What’s wrong in going in and remembering the sorrow for Kathleen, the
sorrow for your children? My mother was dead. My father who died while I
was in prison. All of these things, it’s okay to cry about that. “And it’s called catharsis. And it’s also called book-writing. So that’s what I did.” In Peterson’s mind, he is a victim who wrongly
spent eight years in prison, and who, out of fear of going back, pleaded
guilty to manslaughter. If he could have profited off of his book, he
says he would have donated the money to three charities, including the
Innocence Project. Peterson’s social circle is small. His friends
now have been his friends for a long time. They’re the ones who visited
in prison, who stood by while others turned away. “I felt like that’s what happened to Michael,
that he got accused and then all of a sudden everybody just sort of got
on the bandwagon and figured he was guilty because he was accused,” says
Miner, who for years controlled Peterson’s visitation list at Nash.
“... So why did I want to stay friends with him? Well, because he needed
a friend.” We’re heading to Raleigh for a lunch visit with Nick Galifianakis,
who was a U.S. Congressman in the late 1960s and early ‘70s before he
unsuccessfully ran for Senate, losing to Jesse Helms when Helms won the
first of his five terms. I’m in the middle of the backseat, where Patty,
to my right, offers me lozenges and tries to buckle my seat belt. “You’re in the most dangerous position in the vehicle,” she says. She’s a retired teacher. Peterson drives, and quickly the conversation turns to politics. “I know we all would agree in this car here, that the world be different if Nick had beaten Jesse Helms,” Peterson says. His mind takes him back to that Senate race in
the early ‘70s. Peterson’s service in the Marines had just ended. He and
Patty had just bought a house on University Drive in Durham. It was
close to the 1972 presidential election, when Richard Nixon defeated
George McGovern in the largest landslide in history. “Patty went canvasing for McGovern,” Peterson says. “Do you remember that, Patty? You went up on Oak Drive.” “Never to be forgotten,” she says. She and Peterson are friends, despite their
divorce and all that came after. Patty knows it seems a bit unusual. She
was close, like sisters, she says, with, Elizabeth Ratliff, who was
Peterson’s neighbor when he and Patty lived in Germany in the 1980s.
Ratliff, like Kathleen in 2001, was found dead at the bottom of a
staircase. Peterson then raised Ratliff’s young daughters,
Margaret and Martha, as his own. During the trial, the suspicion
surrounding Ratliff’s death was used against Peterson. Elizabeth
Ratliff, Patty says in the car, “was my dearly beloved friend.” Patty
tries to explain her relationship with Peterson. “I lecture myself every day,” she says. “Try to
be a better human being. Try to be kind. As my children and all of my
students know, we must have a kind heart for others and I said this to
all of my students, the highest aspect of human intelligence is
compassion and love for others.” Peterson parks outside the senior living facility
where Galifianakis lives with his wife, Louise. The building has the
feel of a luxury hotel. Inside the unit, Galifianakis, 90, is lounging
in a chair, the TV tuned to CNN, where they’re talking about the latest
with President Trump, and his claims of a crisis at the border. Peterson walks in and makes a joke that his old
friend should run for president. They share a moment, and Galifianakis,
who is the uncle of actor and comedian Zach Galifianakis, asks Peterson
about his book. Nick Galifianakis had visited Peterson in prison
and worked with Peterson’s defense. The conversation jogs Galifianakis’
memory: “Oh, I’ve got to tell you this,” he says with excitement. And so
begins a story about a lunch Galifianakis shared with friends, one of
whom asked about notable cases he had tried. “I got into a discussion with him,” Galifianakis says, “about my friend, your neighbor.” “Oh, Larry,” Peterson says. “Larry Pollard.” “Larry Pollard,” Galifianakis says. “And I told him about Larry and the owl.” Larry Pollard is another lawyer. He still lives in Durham on Cedar Street, not far from where Peterson and Kathleen lived. Pollard invented what has been called the Owl Theory, and in some ways has devoted his life to it. It’s the theory that an owl attack led to Kathleen’s death. Not even Peterson took it seriously, at first.
Now, in a strange way, both men feel empathy for the other; Pollard
because he feels Peterson didn’t kill his wife, and Peterson because of
the reaction Pollard has received for years. “That man has suffered more than anybody, except
me, during my trial and afterwards,” Peterson says. “He was ridiculed,
dismissed as a lunatic. And then it came out oh, wait a minute, there
might be more to this.” The Owl Theory has become a fascination. Peterson
listens to Galifianakis go on about it. He tells Peterson that not long
ago Pollard brought over a large stuffed owl, the same kind he believes
attacked Kathleen. He brought over a book with evidence he’s collected
over the years. One of the pieces, Pollard says during a phone
call later, he calls “my smoking feather.” During that phone call,
Pollard talks for about an hour, most of it unprompted by any question.
He makes several invitations to see the evidence he’s collected,
including the stuffed owl. He knows how all of this sounds: “It has
caused me to lose friendships, lose respect, be ridiculed in the press,”
he says. Galifianakis asks Peterson if he’s seen the stuffed owl. “Oh, God yes,” Peterson says. Now Galifianakis remembers, too, that Pollard
brought a small souvenir: a little owl figurine. It’s cartoonish-looking
— an owl hatching out of a pumpkin. It looks like a fall decoration. Louise, would you get that little owl thing?” Galifianakis asks his wife. “You mind getting it?” “Yeah, I do,” she says, shooting him a look before rising off the couch. “Behind you,” Galifianakis says. “There’s a little owl sitting on that thing there.” She brings it over to Peterson. He holds it and
looks at it, this cartoonish owl, a representation of the bird that,
perhaps, could have attacked his wife 18 years ago, leading to the end
of her life and forever altering the direction of his. Peterson grows
quiet but not for long. He hands the owl back and rises from his chair.
He leads the group downstairs for lunch. There, they talk about war and
prison and growing old. Peterson has finished his book but his stories
continue."
https://turnandturn.com/2019/04/22/michael-peterson-has-a-story-to-tell-and-a-question-to-answer-who-am-i-raleigh-news-observer/---------------------------------------------------------- Read Wikipedia entry at the link below: "Retrial hearing: "In August 2010, following a series of newspaper articles critical of
the investigative tactics of State Bureau of Investigation agents,
Attorney General Roy Cooper
led an investigation, which resulted in the suspension of SBI analyst
Duane Deaver, one of the principal witnesses against Peterson, after the
report found his work among the worst done on scores of flawed criminal
cases. T. Lawrence Pollard subsequently filed affidavits[23]
to support a motion that Superior Court Judge Orlando Hudson order the
state Medical Examiner's Office to turn over all documentation related
to Kathleen Peterson's autopsy to Peterson's attorneys. However, Judge
Hudson barred Pollard from filing further motions on behalf of Peterson
because Pollard did not represent him. A new motion was filed in August
2010 by David Rudolf, one of Peterson's original attorneys who acted pro bono in proceedings challenging the SBI testimony.[16][24][25] Deaver was fired from the SBI in January 2011, after an
independent audit of the agency found he had falsely represented
evidence in 34 cases, including withholding negative results in the case
of Greg Taylor, a North Carolina man who spent 17 years in prison on a
murder conviction based on Deaver's testimony.[26]
A bloodstain-analysis team that Deaver had trained was suspended and
disbanded. In the 2003 Peterson trial, Deaver testified that he had been
mentored by SBI bloodstain specialist David Spittle, had worked 500
bloodstain cases, written 200 reports, and testified in 60 cases. During
the retrial hearing, SBI Assistant Director Eric Hooks testified that
Deaver had written only 47 reports. SBI agent David Spittle testified
that he could not recall mentoring Deaver who, since completing a
two-day training course in the 1980s, had testified in only four cases,
the Peterson case being the third. The SBI cited the bloodstain analysis
given in the fourth case as the reason for firing Deaver.[27] On December 16, 2011, Peterson was released from the Durham
County jail on $300,000 bail and placed under house arrest with a
tracking anklet. His release on bond followed a judicial order for a new
trial after Judge Hudson found that SBI blood analyst Duane Deaver had
given "materially misleading" and "deliberately false" testimony about
bloodstain evidence, and had exaggerated his training, experience, and
expertise.[28][29][30] Former North Carolina Attorney General Rufus Edmisten said that any evidence gathered after Deaver arrived at the scene might be deemed inadmissible in a new trial.[31] In July 2014, Peterson's bond restrictions were eased.[32] In October 2014, the court appointed Mike Klinkosum to represent
Peterson, replacing David Rudolf, who had been working pro bono on the
case since Peterson's conviction was overturned. Rudolf had stated that
he could no longer afford to represent Peterson without being paid.[33] On November 14, 2016, Peterson's request for the second trial to
be dismissed was refused, and a new trial was scheduled to begin on May
8, 2017.[2]
However, a news report on February 7, 2017, indicated that a resolution
had been negotiated by Rudolf (once again representing Peterson) and
the Durham County DA." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Peterson_(criminal)
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.
https://www.wral.com/durham-novelist-michael-peterson-denies-killing-his-wife-in-latest-dr-phil-episode/18339234/ red the Peterson case,
which led to a 2004 Netflix documentary, from start-to-finish. Two
years after Kathleen Peterson was found dead at the bottom of a
staircase in the couple's upscale home, Mike Peterson was convicted of
first-degree murder. View all of WRAL's coverage of the Peterson case.
"They convicted me because of blood," a preview of Monday's episode
shows Peterson telling Dr. Phil, explaining that investigators said
there was far too much blood under his wife for a fall down the stairs.
In the episode, Dr. Phil is expected to ask Peterson questions like,
"How can you explain the blood?" and "Did you want your wife
dead?"
In December 2011, Peterson was released from prison and a new trial
was ordered after it was revealed that a blood analyst with the State
Bureau of Investigation, one of the key witnesses, had given misleading
testimony.
After years of continuing legal battles, Peterson agreed to enter an Alford plea in February 2017 to a charge of voluntary manslaughter.
After the plea, Peterson was sentenced to time served and walked out
of a Durham County courtroom a convicted felon but a free man. A timeline is available here.
PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "The tragedy, in a lot of this, is when legislators
get involved in things that aren’t proven and then legislate
requirements that impede care or are basically, potentially, lies,” said
Mitchell Creinin, a professor at the University of California, Davis.
“Without good science, we never know if something’s real or not. I mean,
you wouldn’t want your doctor to tell you to take an aspirin to treat
your cancer.” Four
states have laws on the books requiring doctors to tell people who want
abortions that the procedure can be reversed. Another eight have
introduced bills this year that would do the same. There’s just one problem: There’s no conclusive evidence that the treatment behind the so-called “abortion reversal” works."
STORY: "There’s no proof “abortion reversals” are real. This study could end the debate," by reporter Carter Sherman, published by VICE on April 18, 2019.
GIST: "Four
states have laws on the books requiring doctors to tell people who want
abortions that the procedure can be reversed. Another eight have
introduced bills this year that would do the same.
There’s just one problem: There’s no conclusive evidence that the treatment behind the so-called “abortion reversal” works. In
theory, an “abortion reversal” works like this: In a medication
abortion, a woman ends her pregnancy by taking two pills, mifepristone
and misoprostol, several hours apart. If a woman changes her mind,
however, after taking the mifepristone — which works to block
progesterone, a hormone that helps sustain pregnancy — proponents of
abortion reversal say that she can take repeated doses of progesterone
to reverse its effects. Such
a regimen is probably safe. But critics say it remains unproven, and
testing it out on patients just isn’t good medicine. Still, in Arkansas,
Idaho, South Dakota, and Virginia, doctors are required by law to
advise women that it’s an option if they change their mind about wanting
an abortion.In
theory, an “abortion reversal” works like this: In a medication
abortion, a woman ends her pregnancy by taking two pills, mifepristone
and misoprostol, several hours apart. If a woman changes her mind,
however, after taking the mifepristone — which works to block
progesterone, a hormone that helps sustain pregnancy — proponents of
abortion reversal say that she can take repeated doses of progesterone
to reverse its effects. Such a regimen is probably safe. But
critics say it remains unproven, and testing it out on patients just
isn’t good medicine. Still, in Arkansas, Idaho, South Dakota, and
Virginia, doctors are required by law to advise women that it’s an
option if they change their mind about wanting an abortion. “The
tragedy, in a lot of this, is when legislators get involved in things
that aren’t proven and then legislate requirements that impede care or
are basically, potentially, lies,” said Mitchell Creinin, a professor at
the University of California, Davis. “Without good science, we never
know if something’s real or not. I mean, you wouldn’t want your doctor
to tell you to take an aspirin to treat your cancer.” Politics, meet science Now,
Creinin says he’s about to find out whether abortion reversal is,
indeed, real. Thanks to a recent grant of more than $400,000 from the
Society of Family Planning, which supports abortion and contraception
research, Creinin is currently spearheading what’s thought to be the
first study on abortion reversal that uses randomized, double-blind
testing and placebos — all hallmarks of the most rigorous forms of
studies. It’s been approved by UC Davis’ institutional review board, and
registered with ClinicalTrials.gov. The progesterone protocol is
not recommended by the American Congress of Obstetricians and
Gynecologists, which says any claims about abortion reversal’s
effectiveness “are not based on science and do not meet clinical
standards.” Even
Creinin, who plans to spend a year on his study, doesn’t think it’s
possible. “It just doesn’t make any physiological sense,” he said. Mifepristone
helps end pregnancies because it binds tightly to the hormone receptors
that also attach to progesterone, he explained, and no amount of
progesterone can unwind those bonds. “If you have four bolts on your
door, if you think that coming with some extra keys is gonna help you
unlock the bolts when none of the keys necessarily work in the lock, it
ain’t gonna open the door,” he said. But mifepristone doesn’t
always work — when taken alone, it’s commonly cited as ending just
between 10 and 50 percent of pregnancies. Generally, if a woman changes
her mind about having a medication abortion, doctors will advise her to
simply not take the second pill. Creinin is now recruiting 40
women, who must already want surgical abortions, to undergo his study.
About two weeks before their planned abortion, study participants will
first take mifepristone and then either progesterone or a placebo.
They’ll be monitored until they get their surgical abortion, which the
women must still pay for themselves. “If there’s a difference
between the groups and it shows that the group with the progesterone
continued the pregnancy more and the group with the placebo lost the
pregnancy more, then that shows the progesterone does something,”
Creinin explained. He’s already started enrolling patients. A new idea, championed by states The
idea that medication abortions can be reversed has been championed for
years by California doctor George Delgado, who was the first to propose
using progesterone to halt them. While Delgado agrees that there
should be more medical research into what he calls “abortion pill
reversal,” he has concerns about Crienin’s approach. “He’s right: None
of the studies that we’ve published have been prospective, randomized
controlled trials, so that is a weakness, absolutely,” Delgado said. But
he’s worried that Creinin will use a less-effective progesterone
regimen and that his study’s sample size is too small. (Creinin says
that if Delgado is right about how effective the progesterone regimen
is, Creinin will have enough participants to prove whether it works.) Delgado
told VICE News that he’s designing his own randomized controlled study
and it will tentatively include 900 women. Each patient will be given
one of three treatments involving progesterone; none will receive a
placebo, as Delgado, who opposes abortion, considers that to be
unethical. He anticipates having results within two years. Delgado
first published a paper that claimed that progesterone could be used to
reverse a medication abortion in 2012. That paper focused on just seven
patients, four of whom ended up carrying their pregnancies to term
without neonatal complications or birth defects. (One patient was lost
to follow-up.) Delgado concluded that his progesterone regimen likely
had a success rate of 66 percent. In April 2018, Delgado published a
second, much larger paper. Out of 547 women who underwent a progesterone
regimen shortly after taking mifepristone and who were followed
throughout the study, 257 gave birth to live children. Many
researchers remained unconvinced that Delgado’s work was credible. In an
article published in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers
pointed out multiple flaws in the second paper, including that some
providers had excluded women whose pregnancies had already effectively
ended by the time they decided to undergo the progesterone protocol — a
move that potentially inflated its success rate. “It is poorly
designed and falls far short of providing sufficient evidence to
recommend this course of treatment,” Hal Lawrence, a doctor and ACOG’s
executive vice president and CEO, told VICE News of Delago’s second
study soon after its publication. “These are people in my opinion
who are just ideologically opposed to what we’re doing,” Delgado
countered Tuesday. “And so they’re trying to find anything they can to
criticize us and to defame us, and I think that’s very unfortunate,
because they don’t have the patients in mind.” But it's the law This
controversy hasn’t stopped anti-abortion legislators from enshrining
“abortion reversal” into state law, and some cases, expanding it. This
year, Arkansas Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson signed into law a bill
that will mandate that patients who’ve just taken mifepristone be
informed that their abortion can still be reversed. Bills that
would require doctors to counsel patients about abortion reversal have
also been proposed this year in Georgia, Kansas, North Carolina,
Nebraska, and Oklahoma; they’ve already been signed into law in Kentucky
and North Dakota, the Guttmacher Institute has found. Despite the need for more research into the treatment, Delgado says it’s safe enough to recommend. “There’s
no reason to withhold the treatment, pending the other studies, because
right now all the evidence shows that it is safe and effective,” he
said. “And this is how we’ve done any other new treatment throughout the
history of medicine.” VICE News reached out to several state
legislators who backed abortion reversal bills about Creinin’s study,
and its impact on their proposals. “If you talk to the doctors
who have done this, it’s pretty convincing, and see the babies — and I
have seen some of those babies — which are now thriving, growing people,
that’s pretty good evidence in my mind,” said North Carolina Sen. Joyce
Krawiec, a Republican. “But I would be very anxious to see the results
of [Creinin’s] study as well.” Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, a
Democrat, has not yet decided whether to sign an abortion reversal bill
that recently passed the state legislature, her office said. Creinin
knows that legislators don’t have to pay attention to the results of
his study, regardless of what he finds. But it’s important to test the
treatment anyway, he said, as a doctor who cares for women. While a
woman has never told him that she wanted to change her mind after taking
mifepristone — and at least one study has indicated that most women are
sure of their decision to get abortions — Creinin says it is possible. “Rather
than people doing shams of treatment and calling it ‘studies,’ the goal
is to really find out, ‘Is this real or not?’” Creinin said. “So that
if it’s not real, we can stop stupid laws from being passed. And so
that, if it is potentially real, then we can at least understand what
the right treatment is.”"
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.
Two Blogs Now: The Charles Smith Blog; The Selfless Warriors Blog: I created the Charles Smith Blog in 2007 after I retired from The Toronto Star to permit me to keep digging into the story of the flawed pathologist and the harm he had done to so many innocent parents and caregivers, and to Ontario’s criminal justice system. Since then it has taken new directions, including examinations of other flawed pathologists, flawed pathology, and flawed science and technology which has marred the quality of justice in courtrooms around the world. On International Wrongful Conviction Day in 2024, I was thrilled to have the Blog recognized by Innocence Canada, when I was presented with the, "Rubin Hurricane Carter Champion of Justice Award." The heart of the Blog is my approach to following cases which raise issues in all of these areas - especially those involving the death penalty. I have dedicated 'The Selfless Warrior Blog’ (soon to appear) to those exceptional individuals who have been ripped out of their ordinary lives by their inability to stand by in the face of a glaring miscarriage of justice. They are my ’Selfless Warriors.’ Enjoy!
