2016/06/02

Houston Chronicle May 31, 2016: Who should control Houston's crime lab?

Houston residents should be proud of the progress the city has made in the field of forensic science. In 2003, investigative journalists at the Chronicle exposed the Houston Police Department Crime Laboratory as a national disgrace. Under police department management, the lab had hired incompetent analysts who used slipshod procedures that were biased against the accused. The lab sent at least two innocent people to prison and overstated the strength of the evidence against hundreds of others. Shocked by the stories appearing in the news, the Houston City Council hired a team of outside experts, led by lawyer Michael Bromwich, to conduct an independent review of the lab. That review, known as the Bromwich Report, confirmed the worst fears about the depth of the lab's problems.

Recognizing the massive failure that occurred under police department management, the city reorganized the lab as the Houston Forensic Science Center, a local government corporation with an independent board of directors. In setting up an independent lab, the city was following a 2009 recommendation of the National Academy of Science, our nation's highest scientific body, that crime laboratories be separated from law enforcement agencies. The Academy suggested that the mission and priorities of police departments are not always compatible with maintaining high scientific standards and concluded that crime labs should be run by scientists rather than police officers. The transition of the Houston crime lab to full independence from the police department was completed in April 2014. more