FBI Launches Massive Review of Use of Forensic Evidence in Criminal Case
Washington, D.C. July 11, 2012. The Washington Post reported that the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have launched the largest post-conviction case review in American history. The review was sparked by the work of Dr. Frederic Whitehurst, a top FBI crime lab expert who initially blew the whistle on the laboratory’s misconduct twenty years ago, between 1992 and 1998. Dr. Whitehurst is represented by Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto, LLP.
In response to Dr. Whitehurst’s original whistleblower disclosures, the DOJ formed a Task Force in the mid-1990s to review thousands of cases impacted by Dr. Whitehurst’s allegations and to determine if any individuals were wrongly convicted. At the time, the DOJ and FBI pledged to correct their mistakes. However, the DOJ Task Force review was conducted in secret and resulted in very few defendants being notified of problems with forensic evidence.
Results from the Task Force were not publicly released until Dr. Whitehurst succeeded in obtaining Task Force documents in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the DOJ. As head of the National Whistleblowers Center’s (NWC) Forensic Justice Project, Dr. Whitehurst and the NWC worked extensively with the Washington Post to analyze and publish the Task Force findings in April 2012.
The results of the NWC/Post analysis were shocking and documented the poor job that the DOJ did to review the FBI Lab problems that had been reported by Dr. Whitehurst. Rather than fix the problems at the FBI Lab, the DOJ relied on prosecutors and kept most of the problems secret.
Links:
- Washington Post, “Justice Dept., FBI to review use of forensic evidence in thousands of cases.” July 10, 2012.
