The Texas Forensic Science Commission will review the case of Cameron Todd Willingham (pic­tured) as its first case in its inves­ti­ga­tion of foren­sic mis­con­duct alle­ga­tions. Willingham was exe­cut­ed in 2004 in Texas for three deaths that occurred in 1991 from a fire in his home. The State Fire Marshal’s office had orig­i­nal­ly ruled that the blaze was an arson start­ed by an accel­er­ant. But the Innocence Project of Cardozo Law School in New York sub­mit­ted a 2006 report by five nation­al­ly known fire inves­ti­ga­tors that con­clud­ed the fire was not inten­tion­al­ly set. The report stat­ed that the fire was not start­ed by arson and that the indi­ca­tors used by inves­ti­ga­tors to con­clude that the fire was arson have since been proven to be sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly invalid. Barry Sheck, co-direc­tor of the Innocence Project, said, ​“All the assump­tions they were mak­ing were with­out any sci­en­tif­ic mer­it.” Willingham had long claimed his inno­cence, even in the last moments before his exe­cu­tion. The pan­el will review if inves­ti­ga­tors’ tes­ti­mo­ny was con­sis­tent with sci­ence at the time and whether advances in sci­ence should have prompt­ed them to ques­tion their original testimony.


(J. Lozano, ​“Texas to review arson case that end­ed in exe­cu­tion,” Associated Press, August 16, 2008). See Innocence.

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