The mayor in Spring Hill, TN threatens city employees with possible termination if drug results are leaked to the media.

(Tennessee) Spring Hill’s mayor wanted the results of a drug test the town’s police chief failed kept “highly confidential” and threatened to terminate any employee who “leaked” the information to the media, according to an e-mail obtained by The Daily Herald.
Earlier this month, Police Chief John Smith tested positive for codeine during a random drug screening of city employees. The chief said he took the last two pills of an 8-year-old Tylenol 3 prescription to alleviate a sore back a day before taking the random test Nov. 9.
Smith said he threw away the pill bottle and was unable to find a record of the prescription from a doctor’s office or pharmacy.
On Nov. 19, Mayor Mike Dinwiddie responded to an e-mail about the incident from the city administrator with a stern warning for city employees with loose lips.
“It goes without saying that this should be kept highly confidential,” Dinwiddie wrote. “Any city employee leaking this info publicly will be considered for immediate termination. IF the media does get wind of this, please forward their inquiries to me.”
The e-mail was addressed to City Administrator Victor Lay and the town’s aldermen. It was carbon-copied to the city attorney, the finance director and the police chief.



Link: http://www.c-dh.net/articles/2009/11/27/top_stories/01drug.txt

MA state police crime lab facing backlogs on cases.

Two years ago, the State Police Crime Lab came under scrutiny after a state-ordered investigation revealed that more than 16,000 DNA samples, some dating back to the 1980s, were stacked in cold storage and had not been analyzed. That backlog, characterized by the state to be of “crisis proportions,’’ led to the firing or resignation of three lab employees, including the administrator and director.

In a shift, the lab, located in Maynard, no longer is focused on reducing that backlog to zero, officials said.

Since 2007, only 500 samples have been tested from the 16,000. Those samples - many of them connected to homicides and other deaths, sexual assaults, and property crimes - were tested only because district attorneys requested that they be analyzed. If no requests are made, the samples remain in cold storage.

If the statute of limitations is encroaching on a case, the lab will unilaterally analyze certain samples, said John Grossman, the Department of Public Safety’s undersecretary of forensic science and technology.


link:
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/11/27/demand_for_dna_testing_outstrips_crime_lab_capacity/

Google Scholar a new law search engine.

Users can go to the Google Scholar online search engine and type in case names, topics or key words to find the relevant cases. “We think this addition to Google Scholar will empower the average citizen by helping everyone learn more about the laws that govern us all,” Google says in an announcement posted at TaxProf Blog.

Researchers can try an “advanced scholar” search link that narrows searches to opinions in specific states, according to the Supreme Court of Texas Blog. Users can also specify whether they want to search for “all of the words,” an exact phrase, or at least one of the words. They can also add date and author restrictions.

The opinions will have “cited by” and “related articles” links that take readers to other opinions and articles that will help them understand the information.

Google Scholar provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories, universities and other web sites. Google Scholar helps you find relevant work across the world of scholarly research.

Features of Google Scholar

Search diverse sources from one convenient place
Find articles, theses, books, abstracts or court opinions
Locate the complete document through your library or on the web
Learn about key scholarly literature in any area of research

Link: http://scholar.google.com/

Virtual cop to run police lineups in the future?

A major cause of miscarriages of justice could be avoided if computers, rather than detectives, guided witnesses through the identification of suspects. That's according to Brent Daugherty at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte and colleagues, who say that too often officers influence witnesses' choices.

The problem was highlighted in 2003 when the Innocence Project in New York analysed the case histories of 130 wrongly imprisoned people later freed by DNA evidence. Mistaken eyewitness identification was a factor in 77 per cent of the cases examined.


Link: http://pqx.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/12/3/289

The 2007 National Institute of Justice survey of law enforcement forensic evidence processing.

The "Crime Report" made the following observation:

Only four in 10 law enforcement agencies have computerized tracking systems for forensic evidence, according to the results of a survey by the National Institute of Justice. The NIJ received responses from more than 2,000 state and local agencies which revealed, among other things, that in fourteen percent of unsolved homicides police had not submitted forensic evidence (including DNA, fingerprints and toolmarks) to the crime lab.

Links: http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/228415.pdf
http://thecrimereport.org/2009/11/16/unanalyzed-forensic-evidence/

National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers Releases Preliminary Recommendations on Strengthening Forensic Science.

"Contrary to media portrayals of forensic science in popular TV shows, forensic science evidence presented in court is often based on speculative research, subjective interpretations and inadequate quality control procedures. Ensuring the scientific integrity of forensic science evidence is essential to preventing wrongful convictions and exonerating the innocent. In support of reform efforts of the forensic science community, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers has released a 12-page preliminary report advocating a “culture of science” in the forensic science community and supporting the establishment of a national resource center for forensic science."

Link:
http://www.nacdl.org/public.nsf/NewsReleases/2009mn29/$FILE/Forensic_Science_Report_Final.pdf

More people are seeking to have their criminal records sealed or expunged.

U.S. job seekers are crashing into the worst employment market in years and background checks that reach deeper than ever into their pasts.
The result: a surge of people seeking to legally clear their criminal records.
In Michigan, state police estimate they'll set aside 46% more convictions this year than last. Oregon is on track to set aside 33% more. Florida sealed and expunged nearly 15,000 criminal records in the fiscal year ended June 30, up 43% from the previous year. The courts of Cook County, which includes Chicago and nearby suburbs, received about 7,600 expungement requests in the year's first three quarters, nearly double the pace from the year before. Civil-rights organizations have long complained that young black men are disproportionately hindered when prospective employers ask about applicants' arrests or convictions. But attorneys say past offenses are increasingly catching up with blue-collar and middle-class applicants with solid work histories. The increase comes as unemployment has risen above 10%, allowing potential employers to be choosier than they have been in decades. More Americans have criminal records now, criminologists say, in part because a generation has come of age since the start of the war on drugs. These convictions are increasingly coming to employers' attention. Background checks have become more commonplace in the years after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and cheaper. More than 80% of companies performed such checks in 2006, compared with fewer than 50% in 1998, according to the Society for Human Resource Management, an association of HR professionals.

Link:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125789494126242343.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLETopStories

A Chicago private investigator is under investigation for supposedly paying a witness.

Cook County prosecutors contended today that a private investigator working with students at Northwestern University's Innocence Project paid a witness in their investigation of a man they believed was wrongly convicted of murder in 1982.

"This evidence shows that Tony Drakes gave his video statement upon the understanding that he would receive cash if he gave the answers that inculpated himself and that Drakes promptly used the money to purchase crack cocaine," according to a filing made by prosecutors today.

The filing argues the students acted as investigators, not reporters, and as such aren't protected by press rights.


Prosecutors allege that after conducting a 2004 interview with Drakes, an investigator with the team paid a cab driver $60 to take Drakes from the interview site, a park in downstate Swansea, to a gas station two miles away. That amount was more than the fare and tip, and leftover cash -- $40 -- was given to Drakes; he used it to buy crack at a nearby crackhouse, the filing states.

David Protess, director of the Innocence Project, acknowledged Drakes' cab fare was paid but denied it was in exchange for a statement by Drakes implicating himself in the killing.

The filing "is so filled with factual errors that if my students had done this kind of reporting or investigating, I would have given them an F," he said.

Evan Benn, the student who says he handed the cab fare to the driver, said he was given an estimate of $50 for the trip Drakes said he was taking, back to his home.

"We gave the money directly to the cab driver, told him not to give any of the money to Tony Drakes and we got a receipt for that," Benn said. "It was all well documented."


The Innocence Project in 2003 took on the case of Anthony McKinney, convicted of killing a guard, and helped him win a new day incourt. But as they prepare for the hearing on McKinney's fate, prosecutors have focused on the students and teacher who led the investigation.

Lastmonth, the state's attorney subpoenaed the students' grades, notes andrecordings of witness interviews, the class syllabus and even e-mailsthey sent to each other and to professor David Protess of theuniversity's Medill School of Journalism.



Link:
http://mobile.chicagotribune.com/inf/infomo;jsessionid=B3799F952DA9F74F109D.4246?view=breakingnews_article&feed:a=chi_trib_1min&feed:c=latest_breaking_news&feed:i=0BE5001A9591F7EC44E69B9F4EEB5D00&nopaging=1

The Supreme Court to decide on prosecutorial immunity involving false testimony.

The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday on whether prosecutors who use false testimony should be liable for a wrongful conviction. "This case sits near the intersection of a pair of well-settled issues," federal defenders from Georgia wrote in a case analysis distributed by the Supreme Court. They said prosecutors who unwittingly use false testimony during a trial are absolutely immune, though such testimony should never knowingly be used.
"In the middle are cases in which an individual commits pre-arrest investigatory misconduct, and then that same individual employs the fruit of that misconduct in a judicial proceeding," Cynthia Roseberry and Morad Fakhimi wrote.
Paul Clement, with King & Spalding, argued on behalf of two men, Curtis McGhee and Terry Harrington, who were convicted and then cleared of murder. He said the prosecutors don't have absolute immunity, referencing past cases where immunity for pretrial investigatory conduct was rejected.
Stephen Sanders, with Mayer Brown, represented investigators and prosecutors, and Pottawattamie County, Iowa. He argued that the false testimony does not cause injury by itself, and only its use in court can cause injury. Because the injury can only be inflicted during the trial, while the prosecutor is immune, there should be no liability for the pre-trial fabrication, he said.
"Your case here is a polite way of telling us we wasted our time in Buckley v. Fitzsimmons," Justice Anthony Kennedy said. "I mean, we were just spinning our wheels in that case?"
In Buckley, the court denied absolute immunity to a prosecutor who played a role in fabricating evidence against a suspect during an investigation, and who made false statements about a suspect during a news conference.


Links:
http://www.courthousenews.com/2009/11/04/Prosecutorial_Immunity_Debated_in_High_Court.htm

http://www.courthousenews.com/2009/11/04/NickW%20Prosecutor%20Testimony.pdf

Scent lineups called into question how accurate are police or drug dogs?

A dog’s sniff helped put Curvis Bickham in jail for eight months. Now that the case against him has been dropped, he wants to tell the world that the investigative technique that justified his arrest smells to high heaven.

The police told Mr. Bickham they had tied him to a triple homicide through a dog-scent lineup, in which dogs choose a suspect’s smell out of a group. The dogs are exposed to the scent from items found at crime scene, and are then walked by a series of containers with samples swabbed from a suspect and from others not involved in the crime. If the dog finds a can with a matching scent, it signals — stiffening, barking or giving some other alert its handler recognizes.

Dogs’ noses have long proved useful to track people, and the police rely on them to detect drugs and explosives, and to find the bodies of victims of crime and disaster. A 2004 report by the F.B.I. states that use of scent dogs, properly conducted, “has become a proven tool that can establish a connection to the crime.”

Scent lineups, however, are different. Critics say that the possibilities of cross-contamination of scent are great, and that the procedures are rarely well controlled. Nonetheless, although some courts have rejected evidence from them, the technique has been used in many states, including Alaska, Florida, New York and Texas, said Lawrence J. Myers, an associate professor of animal behavior at the Auburn University College of Veterinary Medicine.

In particular, the methods of the dog handler in Mr. Bickham’s case, and in a half-dozen others that are the basis of lawsuits, have come under fierce attack.

The handler, Deputy Keith A. Pikett of the Fort Bend County, Tex., Sheriff’s Department, is “a charlatan,” said Rex Easley, a lawyer in Victoria, Tex., who represents a man falsely accused by the police of murdering a neighbor. Deputy Pikett, the lawyer said, “devised an unreliable dog trick to justify local police agencies’ suspicions” for producing search warrants and arrests.


Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/04/us/04scent.html?_r=2&hp

Crime mapping is a new website that tracks crime in your neighborhood.

As of 11/3/09 they only cover a few areas across the U.S.

CrimeMapping.com has been developed by The Omega Group to help law enforcement agencies throughout North America provide the public with valuable information about recent crime activity by neighborhood. Our goal is to assist police departments in reducing crime through a better informed citizenry. Creating more self reliance among community members is a great benefit to community oriented policing efforts everywhere.

This application represents a new hybrid in mapping technology which utilizes both Google Maps and ESRI’s advanced geographic engine. These two solutions are combined to serve the public accurate and timely data in the form of maps and reports. Crime data is extracted on a regular basis from each department’s records system so that the information being viewed through a Web browser is the most current available.

The Omega Group has over sixteen-years of experience in building crime analysis and mapping applications. Throughout the United States, hundreds of agencies currently use one of our desktop or web-based CrimeView solutions. We are the premier provider of innovative solutions for crime analysis and reporting.

The Omega Group is dedicated to our long standing relationships with law enforcement agencies. We never post any data without the expressed permission of each department and we will never scrape information from other sites!

Link: http://www.crimemapping.com/

Are the police in San Jose, CA. using "Resisting Arrest" too often when dealing with suspects?

Scott Wright was fixing the emergency brake on an old Cadillac in a parking lot near Willow Glen last year when the San Jose police rolled up. Within minutes, he had been shot with a Taser and beaten with batons, breaking his arm.
The cause of the trouble? Wright reached into his van to wash his greasy hands.
Police said they feared he was going for a weapon, but no weapon was found. Wright was charged with resisting arrest, but the district attorney dismissed the case before it got to trial.
What happened to Wright is no isolated event. Hundreds of times a year interactions between San Jose police and residents where no serious crime has occurred escalate into violence.
Many times the reason for the encounter is as innocuous as jaywalking, missing bike head lamps, or failing to signal a turn. But often, as the incidents develop, police determine the suspect is uncooperative and potentially violent and strike the first blow.
While many of those incidents raise questions about whether the police response was excessive, the department almost always dismisses such complaints about its behavior and limits public scrutiny of the cases, moves that tend to heighten distrust of the department, particularly in minority communities.
Last week, the Mercury News disclosed the existence of a cell phone video documenting one such confrontation between police wielding batons and a Taser and college student Phuong Ho, who police said was
resisting their instructions. It is rare for such a video to come to light, but allegations of excessive force are far from uncommon.
In recent months the Mercury News has reviewed 206 court cases in which the most serious charge against the defendant was a violation of California Penal Code section 148, the misdemeanor crime of resisting arrest or delaying or obstructing a police officer. Of those, 145 — 70 percent of the cases — involved the use of force by officers.
The review was launched following the April disclosure by the newspaper that San Jose charges far more people with resisting arrest, compared with its population, than any other major California city, and that a disproportionate number of those charged are Latino residents. State and county statistics show San Jose police charge people with resisting arrest, as the primary charge, three times a day on average.

Link:
http://www.mercurynews.com/top-stories/ci_13686438?nclick_check=1