Virtual Event: Brandon L. Garrett

Harvard Book Store's virtual event series welcomes BRANDON L. GARRETT—the L. Neil Williams Professor of Law at Duke University School of Law and author of End of Its Rope: How Killing the Death Penalty Can Revive Criminal Justice—for a discussion of his latest book, Autopsy of a Crime Lab: Exposing the Flaws in Forensics. He will be joined in conversation by DANIEL MEDWED—professor of Law and Criminal Justice at Northeastern University—and RADHA NATARAJAN, Executive Director for the New England Innocence Project.

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About Autopsy of a Crime Lab

"That's not my fingerprint, your honor," said the defendant, after FBI experts reported a "100-percent identification." They were wrong. It is shocking how often they are. Autopsy of a Crime Lab is the first book to catalog the sources of error and the faulty science behind a range of well-known forensic evidence, from fingerprints and firearms to forensic algorithms. In this devastating forensic takedown, noted legal expert Brandon L. Garrett poses the questions that should be asked in courtrooms every day: Where are the studies that validate the basic premises of widely accepted techniques such as fingerprinting? How can experts testify with 100 percent certainty about a fingerprint, when there is no such thing as a 100 percent match? Where is the quality control in the laboratories and at the crime scenes? Should we so readily adopt powerful new technologies like facial recognition software and rapid DNA machines? And why have judges been so reluctant to consider the weaknesses of so many long-accepted methods?

Taking us into the lives of the wrongfully convicted or nearly convicted, into crime labs rocked by scandal, and onto the front lines of promising reform efforts driven by professionals and researchers alike, Autopsy of a Crime Lab illustrates the persistence and perniciousness of shaky science and its well-meaning practitioners.

Praise for Autopsy of a Crime Lab

"An indispensable book for understanding how the misuse of forensics has contributed to almost half of all wrongful convictions. Brandon Garrett brilliantly busts the myth of the 'infallible' expert witness laboring in a completely 'objective and flawless' crime lab, applying only the 'most reliable' scientific methods. With unique insight and specificity, he explains the ways forensics can go wrong and shows how to make it right. If you believe that when life and liberty are at stake, accuracy and candor are essential, this book is a must-read." —Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld, founders of the Innocence Project

"The greatest source of contamination in the lab is the human mind. Garrett breaks the illusions that a white lab coat shields a person from bias and that a sterile environment necessarily produces cold, incorruptible conclusions. Necessary reading for those who implement the criminal justice system and for those who find ourselves thrust into it, either as a suspect or juror." —Amanda Knox, author of Waiting to Be Heard

"One of the hardest things we 'innocence lawyers' face is unraveling the damage of bad forensics in a case years or decades later. Garrett's book is the best book yet to unravel the pervasive problem of bad forensics leading to wrongful convictions." —Mark Godsey, author of Blind Injustice: A Former Prosecutor Exposes the Psychology and Politics of Wrongful Convictions