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Crime lab workers suffer from "team spirit" mentality

It's one thing to change procedures in an institution, but quite another to change its culture, which is a challenge still facing the troubled Houston crime lab and other government-run forensic labs in Texas.The publication Government Technology has an extensive feature focusing on the Houston lab as an example of virtually everything that can go wrong with forensic analysis, declaring that "Some problems with the HPD Crime Lab - such as underfunding, poor staff training and close ties to police and prosecutors - also may be inherent in crime labs across the country."While many mistakes at the Houston crime lab resulted from sloppiness and understaffing, but nearly all errors tended to favor the prosecution over the defense:In late 2002, television station KHOU in Houston looked into deficiencies of the HPD Crime Lab and asked William Thompson, University of California, Irvine professor and forensic expert, to investigate...continue to full post

Full post as published by Grits for Breakfast on July 10, 2008 (boomark / email).