FrozenInMinn
10-14-2004, 08:48 PM
Thursday, October 14, 2004
Boston police to shut down troubled unit
The Associated Press
BOSTON- The Boston Police Department is shutting down its troubled
fingerprinting unit, which has been blamed for a wrongful conviction
and harshly criticized by an outside consultant.
The unit, which tries to identify suspects by matching prints at crime
scenes with prints on file, is "inadequate," police Commissioner
Kathleen O'Toole told The Boston Globe.
Officers will need two years of training to fix the problems, and in
the near term the State Police will do the unit's work, O'Toole said.
She said her administration has spoken with the police union about
hiring previously trained civilian specialists to run the unit. If that
doesn't work, she said she'll hire an outside consultant.
The shutdown is a major blow the department, which holds itself up as a
national model.
"It's not typical at all," said Dr. Michael Baden, a former chief
medical examiner in New York state and a prominent forensic
pathologist. "Normally things have to be pretty bad before a lab is
shut down."
Problems in the unit surfaced publicly in February, around the time
O'Toole began her tenure and reviewed the wrongful conviction of
Stephen Cowans, who was freed in January.
Cowans spent six years in prison after the unit wrongly matched his
print with a fingerprint from a glass mug found at the Egleston Square
crime scene where Officer Gregory Gallagher was shot and wounded in
1997.
O'Toole asked Attorney General Thomas Reilly to investigate the role of
two police fingerprint analysts, Rosemary McLaughlin and Dennis
LeBlanc, in Cowans' wrongful conviction.
Reilly concluded there wasn't enough evidence to support perjury
charges against the two officers. But O'Toole placed both on
administrative leave and lambasted the unit for its "low standards and
a lack of professionalism."
O'Toole also hired fingerprint specialist Ron Smith to review the unit
and prepare it for a major overhaul needed to win accreditation from
the American Society of Crime Laboratory Directors.
The commissioner said Smith's analysis, included in a report last week,
was alarming enough that she decided to suspend all activity in the
fingerprinting unit. She would not be specific about the report, except
to say that the unit had inadequate training.
"It's important that I say there are some people working in latent
prints - put McLaughlin and LeBlanc aside - who have really tried
hard," O'Toole said. "I understand some have gone and paid on their own
for training. There are some people who, the department failed them.
They didn't receive appropriate training."
James Starrs, a fingerprinting analyst and teacher of forensic science
and law at George Washington University, said the problems in the unit
are entrenched.
"I have never seen anything but problems with the Boston fingerprint
lab," said Starrs, who worked for Cowans' defense team. "I've never
seen quality work from them. ... They're police sergeants, not
scientists, doing the work. That's a serious problem, because they
don't have the scientific standards to abide by."
Boston police to shut down troubled unit
The Associated Press
BOSTON- The Boston Police Department is shutting down its troubled
fingerprinting unit, which has been blamed for a wrongful conviction
and harshly criticized by an outside consultant.
The unit, which tries to identify suspects by matching prints at crime
scenes with prints on file, is "inadequate," police Commissioner
Kathleen O'Toole told The Boston Globe.
Officers will need two years of training to fix the problems, and in
the near term the State Police will do the unit's work, O'Toole said.
She said her administration has spoken with the police union about
hiring previously trained civilian specialists to run the unit. If that
doesn't work, she said she'll hire an outside consultant.
The shutdown is a major blow the department, which holds itself up as a
national model.
"It's not typical at all," said Dr. Michael Baden, a former chief
medical examiner in New York state and a prominent forensic
pathologist. "Normally things have to be pretty bad before a lab is
shut down."
Problems in the unit surfaced publicly in February, around the time
O'Toole began her tenure and reviewed the wrongful conviction of
Stephen Cowans, who was freed in January.
Cowans spent six years in prison after the unit wrongly matched his
print with a fingerprint from a glass mug found at the Egleston Square
crime scene where Officer Gregory Gallagher was shot and wounded in
1997.
O'Toole asked Attorney General Thomas Reilly to investigate the role of
two police fingerprint analysts, Rosemary McLaughlin and Dennis
LeBlanc, in Cowans' wrongful conviction.
Reilly concluded there wasn't enough evidence to support perjury
charges against the two officers. But O'Toole placed both on
administrative leave and lambasted the unit for its "low standards and
a lack of professionalism."
O'Toole also hired fingerprint specialist Ron Smith to review the unit
and prepare it for a major overhaul needed to win accreditation from
the American Society of Crime Laboratory Directors.
The commissioner said Smith's analysis, included in a report last week,
was alarming enough that she decided to suspend all activity in the
fingerprinting unit. She would not be specific about the report, except
to say that the unit had inadequate training.
"It's important that I say there are some people working in latent
prints - put McLaughlin and LeBlanc aside - who have really tried
hard," O'Toole said. "I understand some have gone and paid on their own
for training. There are some people who, the department failed them.
They didn't receive appropriate training."
James Starrs, a fingerprinting analyst and teacher of forensic science
and law at George Washington University, said the problems in the unit
are entrenched.
"I have never seen anything but problems with the Boston fingerprint
lab," said Starrs, who worked for Cowans' defense team. "I've never
seen quality work from them. ... They're police sergeants, not
scientists, doing the work. That's a serious problem, because they
don't have the scientific standards to abide by."