Scientists who are skep­ti­cal of Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney’s claim that DNA is ​“infal­li­ble” evi­dence in a death penal­ty case have voiced con­cern about the assump­tion, not­ing that there is no way to avoid all pos­si­ble instances of human error and that the evi­dence does not always prove a person’s guilt or inno­cence. Theodore D. Kessis is the founder of Applied DNA Resources, based in Columbus, Ohio, and a fac­ul­ty mem­ber at the John Hopkins School of Public Health in Baltimore. He pro­vides expert tes­ti­mo­ny and analy­sis to the legal com­mu­ni­ty, includ­ing reviews of pro­to­cols used by labs that ana­lyze DNA evi­dence, and notes, “[L]ike any­thing that involves humans, there is always the pos­si­bil­i­ty of error in DNA test­ing. I would not go so far as to say that DNA is fool­proof. The spec­trum of a DNA test may range from fool­proof to something’s wrong here. DNA test­ing is a tool, and how that tool is used in a crim­i­nal tri­al may depend upon what you are try­ing to prove. Don’t mis­un­der­stand me, DNA is an invalu­able tool. But in and of itself, DNA can­not tell you who com­mit­ted a crime.” Dean Wideman, a foren­sic sci­en­tist from Texas, echoed Kessis’s con­cerns and not­ed that DNA evi­dence has its lim­i­ta­tions. ​“DNA evi­dence has been used to acquit as often as con­vict… What it doesn’t tell us is the stuff that lawyers are good at using – it doesn’t tell us whether semen left is the result of rape or con­sen­su­al sex. It doesn’t tell us what time a per­son was at a scene. It does not tell us why a per­son was at a scene… For all we hear about DNA evi­dence, often­times it is not going to move a case in one direc­tion or anoth­er,” he said. (Cape Cod Times, May 6, 2004) See New Voices. See also, Innocence.

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