On July 29, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott ruled that the state’s Forensic Science Commission (FSC) does not have author­i­ty to review evi­dence regard­ing the pos­si­ble inno­cence of Cameron Todd Willingham (pic­tured), who was exe­cut­ed in 2004. Willingham was con­vict­ed of set­ting the fire that killed his three chil­dren, but inves­tig­tions by promi­nent foren­sic sci­en­tists have dis­cred­it­ed the evi­dence of arson pre­sent­ed at tri­al. Abbott said evi­dence that was test­ed or offered into evi­dence pri­or to September 1, 2005 is beyond the scope of the FSC’s legal juris­dic­tion. In 2008, the Innocence Project filed a com­plaint with the FSC alleg­ing pro­fes­sion­al neg­li­gence by arson inves­ti­ga­tors in the case. The Commission pre­vi­ous­ly issued a report find­ing that the orig­i­nal arson inves­ti­ga­tors relied on now-out­dat­ed sci­ence in con­clud­ing that the fire was inten­tion­al­ly set. In a state­ment released by the Innocence Project, Co-Director Barry Scheck said, ​“We are dis­ap­point­ed in the Attorney General’s rul­ing.… We believe the rea­son­ing of the opin­ion is wrong and con­trary to the clear inten­tion of the leg­is­la­ture when it formed the Commission. We urge the leg­is­la­ture to cor­rect this injus­tice and ful­ly empow­er the Commission to inves­ti­gate all mat­ters that could help pre­vent wrongful convictions.”

(T. Eaton, ​“AG says Forensic Science Commission can’t con­sid­er Willingham case, oth­ers before 2005,” Austin-American Statesman, July 29, 2011; Innocence Project Press Release, July 29, 2011). See Innocence and Studies.

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