An ongoing review of DNA tests conducted by the Houston Police Department has revealed “severe and pervasive problems” with the lab’s findings in more than two dozen cases, including three death penalty cases. The new report released by independent investigator Michael Bromwich, who is reviewing more than 1,100 Houston Police Department DNA cases analyzed between 1987 and 2002, also linked the DNA lab’s troubles to “very disturbing problems” within the Houston Police Department’s serology division during the late 1980s and early 1990s. The serology division, which analyzes blood typing, was the precursor of the police department’s DNA division.
“Not surprisingly, almost all of (the) problems the independent investigation found in the Lab’s DNA cases — including inadequate training of analysts, lack of supervisory reviews, failure to report the statistical significance of test results, and the failure to use necessary controls — had their origin in the Lab’s serology work,” stated the report.
The death penalty cases of Franklin Dewayne Alix, Juan Carlos Alvarez, and Gilmar Alex Guerva are among the report’s list of 27 problematic DNA cases. The investigators found that in one of the cases, the DNA lab “failed to report reliable and potentially exculpatory DNA typing results” and instead reported that the suspect was guilty.
Questions regarding the quality and accuracy of testing from Houston’s DNA lab led to its closure in December 2002 and prompted a joint review of almost 400 criminal convictions. After problems were discovered in other areas of the lab, Bromwich’s team was hired to conduct an independent investigation. To date, two men have been released from prison after discovery of flawed crime lab work in their cases. This most recent report has prompted the police department to expand its crime lab review to include serology lab testing conducted between 1982 and 2002.
(Houston Chronicle, January 4, 2006). See Innocence.
Innocence
Oct 15, 2024
