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Reports and Publications

Guilty Until Proven Innocent: Field Drug Tests and Wrongful Convictions

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This report by the Penn Carey Law Quattrone Center provides the first-ever comprehensive analysis of presumptive drug field test usage across law enforcement agencies in the United States. Inexpensive and fast, these tests have become a tool of choice for law enforcement agencies. Unfortunately, they are notoriously imprecise and are known to produce “false positives,” …

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Bitemark Analysis: A NIST Scientific Foundation Review

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The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has reviewed the scientific foundations of bitemark analysis, a forensic technique in which marks on the skin of a biting victim are compared with the teeth of a suspected biter and found that the field is not supported by sufficient data. NIST has published its findings in …

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A Forensic Without the Science: Face Recognition in U.S. Criminal Investigations

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NACDL Training and Resource Counsel Clare Garvie has authored a new report titled A Forensic Without the Science: Facial Recognition in U.S. Criminal Investigations. Designed as a resource for defense attorneys, advocates, and the public, it outlines how police face recognition searches are prone to error from under-performing algorithms, the lack of training and cognitive …

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A Review of Legislation Associated with Lawfully-Owed DNA Samples

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Convicted offender DNA sample collection laws vary in each state in terms of what type of offense obligates an offender to provide a sample, whether a conviction should be the trigger for sample collection, and which agency is responsible for collecting the sample. Because of this interstate variability, the effectiveness of DNA sample collection laws …

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Toolmark-Comparison Testimony: A Report to the Texas Forensic Science Commission

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To assist the Texas Forensic Science Commission in a pending review of traditional toolmark-comparison testimony, the Yale Law School Forensic Science Standards Practicum submitted this report on the range of approaches that courts, legal commentators, and scientists have proposed for presenting toolmark-comparison evidence in trial settings. The report addresses four major topics: (1) the case …

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Statement of the TX Forensic Science Commission Regarding “Alternate Firearms Opinion Terminology”

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Dec. 2021 statement Addressing a USDOJ document that instructs firearms examiners to avoid using terminology such as the weapon “could have fired” the bullets or cartridge cases, “consistent with” or “could not be excluded” as having fired the bullets or cartridge cases.

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