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Prime Time CrimeDNA
VANCOUVER - A new tool that wipes dirt and contaminants out of DNA samples could revolutionize the way police investigate serious crime and terrorism, and help researchers find the root of disease.(CanWest) MORE: Nanopore Research
Long considered the most solid proof in any criminal court case, the biological goods can easily be planted at a crime scene, according to Dan Frumkin, lead author of a paper published in the online journal Forensic Science International: Genetics. "You can just engineer a crime scene," Frumkin contends. "Any biology undergraduate could perform this." (INN)
SEATTLE - The improbable linking of an unsolved Auburn burglary, unidentified DNA from two crime scenes, and the work of cops and prosecutors in two counties led to the arrest Friday of the man authorities say is responsible for the attack that left one woman dead and her partner wounded in South Park last Sunday. (Seattle Times)
OTTAWA - Every year, construction workers or farmers churning up the soil of Western Europe unearth the bodies of a handful of Canadian troops killed in the two world wars. Even after their skeletal remains are found, though, the service-men's identities often stay a mystery. But now the National Defence Department is planning to keep a team of experts on retainer who can routinely use genetic testing and other advanced forensic tools to try to attach a name to the long-dead soldiers, airmen or sailors. (National Post)
SASKATOON - Saskatoon Police Service have released several sketches, along with a 3-D facial reconstruction, in the hope of solving the case of a woman murdered roughly 100 years ago. (Saskatoon Star Phoenix)
Ottawa urged to establish forensics watchdog
OTTAWA - With a US report throwing doubt on the validity of nearly every type of forensic evidence used in courtrooms, an expert on wrongful convictions is urging Canada to consider setting up a watchdog agency to regulate what is currently touted as "science." (Toronto Star)
CALGARY - Bylaw officials will begin using a new $1-million DNA analyzer to track down pet owners who fail to scoop their dog's poop. (Sun Media)
STUTTGART - German investigators' search for a mysterious suspected killer has ended with an embarrassing discovery: identical DNA traces common to dozens of crime scenes stemmed from contaminated cotton swabs.. (AP)
Danger of DNA: it isn't perfect
In 2004, a New Jersey prosecutor announced that DNA had solved the mystery of who killed Jane Durrua, an eighth-grader who was raped, beaten and strangled 36 years earlier. "Through DNA, we put a face to the killer of Jane Durrua, and that face belongs to Jerry Bellamy," prosecutor John Kaye said. The killer, however, turned out to be someone else. (Los Angeles Times)
CANBERRA - A blood-swollen leech found at a crime scene eight years ago has led Australian police to an armed robber in an unusual twist of DNA technology, officials say. (AP)
The editor-in-chief of an academic journal has resigned after his publication accepted a hoax article. The Open Information Science Journal failed to spot that the incomprehensible computer-generated paper was a fake. This was despite heavy hints from its authors, who claimed they were from the Centre for Research in Applied Phrenology – which forms the acronym Crap. Philip Davis, a graduate student at the University of Ithaca in New York, who was behind the hoax, said he wanted to test the editorial standards of the journal's publisher, Bentham Science Publishers. If their papers are accepted, academics pay a fee in return for Bentham publishing the papers online. (Guardian UK)
MILWAUKEE - A person known only by DNA has killed five prostitutes over two decades in Milwaukee police said Monday. More than 20 DNA samples from other unsolved homicides of prostitutes are being re-sent to the state crime laboratory to check for possible links to the killer. (AP)
LOS ANGELES - DNA leads detectives to John Thomas Jr., 72. He is held in two slayings, but police suspect he may have killed up to 30 elderly Westside and Claremont women a decade apart. (LA Times) MORE: Unraveling the life DNA reveals serial killer
MADRID - A new generation of cleaning products could help criminals get away with murder by making bloodstains invisible to forensic tests, researchers said. (Reuters) MORE: Why hair bleach is a murderer’s best friend
Writing in the journal PNAS, researchers say the broken bones of these stone age people show they were killed in a struggle. Comparisons of DNA from one grave confirm it contained a mother, father, and their two children. (BBC)
EDMONTON - A jury convicted Neil Lester Johnson of grabbing a little girl from her bed, taking her to a dark alley, raping her in the dirt and leaving her naked and alone on a summer night 13 years ago. (Edmonton Journal) PREVIOUS: Girl's video describes 1995 rape
CHARLOTTETOWN - High-tech analysis of evidence in Charlottetown's only unsolved homicide has given police a new lead - DNA from a woman they believe might know the killer well. An item of clothing found at the scene of Byron Carr's killing in 1988 contained both male and female DNA, police say. (CBC) PREVIOUS: Police release sketch in 1988 homicide
TORONTO - Twenty four years ago Elizabeth Hoffschneider was raped and strangled in her Southern California apartment. Ontario Superior Court Justice Todd Archibald found there was "more than ample evidence" to order Gerald Su Go, 52, committed for extradition. (Toronto Star) MORE: 3 hairs lead to arrest
STRASBOURG - Hundreds of thousands of DNA samples face being removed from the national database after a court ruling that holding samples of people with no criminal convictions breaches human rights laws. (Times online) MORE: DNA database innocents win landmark ruling
COCHRANE - Seventeen years after a Stoney First Nation man drowned in the Bow River west of Calgary, Cochrane RCMP have finally been able to identify his remains. (Calgary Herald) PREVIOUS: New DNA tests proving a boon for cold cases Alberta missing persons and unidentified human remains
CALGARY - Advances in forensic DNA testing and old evidence steered investigators to James Alexander Parent, 50, who was arrested in Calgary on charges that stemmed from an attack on a woman in her southwest home on April 6, 1987. (Calgary Herald)
CANBERRA - Australian police will re-examine 7,000 crimes solved through DNA evidence after a mistake forced detectives to free a suspect wrongly accused of murder. (Reuters) PREVIOUS: DNA fiasco Victoria Police Forensic Services Centre
DALLAS - Charles Chatman said throughout his 26 years in prison that he never raped the woman who lived five houses down from him. Now 47, Chatman is expected to win his freedom Thursday on the basis of new DNA testing that lawyers say proves his innocence and adds to Dallas County's nationally unmatched number of wrongfully convicted inmates. (AP)
DNA acquittals shaking up forensic science
Courts believe DNA evidence because it is scientifically proven. It originated in the worlds of science, with molecular biology and clinical medicine. But in criminology different rules apply. With the number of DNA acquittals rising, many defense attorneys and prosecutors say it's time to take a hard look at current forensic techniques. (NBC)
Thief got under victim's nails
VANCOUVER - For a feisty Kerrisdale grandmother, it was a case of scratch-and-win. Thanks to an astute police constable and the wonders of modern science, police have made an arrest in the granny's purse-snatching, for a belated birthday present and an early Christmas gift. (Vancouver Province)
Man free 21 years after wrongful rape conviction
NEW YORK - A man who spent more than two decades in prison after being wrongfully convicted of a brutal rape was freed Thursday because DNA evidence has cleared him. Relatives of Alan Newton, 44, whooped loudly as he entered the crowded courtroom. (AP) MORE: Innocent Project
EUGENE - The bodies of a slain woman and her daughter, exhumed from an unmarked grave in Kelso, Wash. for DNA testing last April, have been returned to their native Fiji, where they were cremated three weeks ago in a Hindu ceremony before their ashes were scattered to the sea. Two decades ago, Raj Narain, 24, and 14-month-old Kamnee Koushal Narain, were found in separate southwest Washington rivers. (Asian Pacific Post) PREVIOUS: Hunt goes to Vancouver Can you help 20-year-old cold case
4,000 more 'cold cases' reviewed
LONDON - Forensic scientists are to begin reviewing around 4,000 more unsolved sex crimes, the government has said. The latest DNA techniques will be used to re-analyse evidence from rape and other serious sexual assault "cold cases", some dating back to 1991. So far the Forensic Science Service has re-examined over 11,000 cold cases leading to the conviction of 30 sex offenders. (BBC) PREVIOUS: Forensic lab errors in hundred of crime cases Police to review DNA criminal cases
Americans have a complex relationship with the death penalty, which is rooted in their national identity and yet which is becoming increasingly difficult to support. (National Post) PREVIOUS: Part 1 Part 2
Forensic expert fired over test
LANSING, Mich. - A state forensics scientist who said she tested her husband's underwear for DNA to determine if he was cheating on her has been fired. (AP) MORE: Briefs expose ex-CFLer's affair
Bees join hunt for serial killers
LONDON - The way bumblebees search for food could help detectives hunt down serial killers, scientists believe. (BBC)
In real life, Alexandre Beaudoin usually works alone and some lab tests can take days or weeks. (Montreal Gazette)
OTTAWA - Call it CSI Vimy. In 2003, construction workers in northern France uncovered the remains of two Canadian soldiers from World War I, killed in a trench assault soon after the famed victory at Vimy Ridge. (Toronto Star)
BOULDER - New DNA tests have definitively cleared the parents of child beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey of her unsolved murder almost 12 years ago, prosecutors said yesterday. (Reuters) MORE: Lacy clears family
In 1988, 20-year-old Lynette White was fatally stabbed in South Wales. The murder went unsolved for 15 years, until a fresh DNA sweep of her apartment in 2000 turned up spots of blood on a skirting board that had been missed the first time around. (Fox)
DNA clears man of 1981 rape conviction
DALLAS - A decorated Vietnam veteran convicted of rape 25 years ago became a free man Tuesday after a judge ruled he probably wouldn't have been found guilty if DNA testing had been available. (AP)
MANCHESTER, UK - A serial burglar was jailed for four years yesterday after being trapped by a bead of sweat he left at the scene of one of his crimes. (Telegraph)
VANCOUVER - Lillian Jean O'Dare is the oldest case on Vancouver's list of 65 missing women. (Vancouver Sun) MORE: Skeleton of Canadian woman identified after 30 years
LONDON - Law enforcement agencies are eyeing a new forensic technique that can isolate individual DNA in cases where more than one person's samples are found. (CTV)
WINDSOR - Judy Sawchuk was 25 years old when her battered body was found lying in a dried pool of blood on the floor of her downtown Windsor apartment. (Windsor Star)
RELATED: Sex attack solved 11 years later
Man serving time for '97 killing faces new charge
TACOMA - Pierce County prosecutors say new DNA testing of blood found on Cecil Davis' boots back in 1997 revealed it was almost certainly from Jane Hungerford-Trapp, who was found dead on the landing of a Hilltop-area apartment-complex stairway April 14, 1996. (Post-Intelligencer)
Police make arrest in cold case
WINNIPEG - A man serving time in an Ontario prison for bank robbery is now charged with first-degree murder, thanks to DNA testing in a 21-year-old homicide case. Winnipeg police say Robert Joseph Kociuk, 64, of Joyceville, Ont., has been charged with the 1984 stabbing death of 48-year-old Beverly Dyke. (CTV)
VANCOUVER - A right foot found recently found on a Richmond beach belonged to a dead man from the Lower Mainland who had been reported missing nearly two years ago, the RCMP said Thursday. (Vancouver Sun) DNA links foot to missing man
Clallam to meet with Canadian cops
Police identify one 'mystery foot' owner
No reason to believe the feet were severed
Foot belongs to missing BC man
'No foul play' as first foot identified
Police news conference on feet
Found 2007-08-20 Jedidiah Island
Foot found May 22, 2008
DNA evidence in M25 rape trial
MAIDSTONE, UK - A railway worker went on a "campaign of rape" against women and girls aged between 10 and 52, a jury at Maidstone crown court heard yesterday. "I'm not going to hurt you physically. This will just leave you emotionally scarred," he allegedly told one victim. (The Guardian)
OPP website seeks help to identify cold cases
TORONTO - The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) and the chief coroner's office have launched a new website, The Resolve Initiative, to help identify dead and missing people in cases that date back as far as 1975. (CTV)
Accused killer left his DNA at scene
TORONTO - The trial of the man charged with killing Yorkville commercial real estate broker Lisa Posluns three years ago began yesterday with the prosecutor describing the Crown's scientific case against the accused as "very powerful evidence of his presence" at the crime scene. (National Post)
Almost half of all criminals convicted of serious offences in Canada could be getting away with murder with the help of judges who are ignoring the law of the land. (Toronto Sun)
CSI students get training house
The work is more laborious, the clothes less glamorous and it takes a much larger team to solve a crime. Those are the main differences between Hollywood's version of forensic science as portrayed in the hit television series CSI and real life, according to those studying the discipline at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT). (Toronto Star)
DNA testing is finally done in 1993 murder
FREDERICTON - George Pitt always said the only thing he was guilty of was having bad friends, and that the only thing prosecutors put on trial was his lifestyle. (CanWest) PREVIOUS: Injusticebusters: George Pitt
Lindsey's Law aims to link DNA with missing persons
VANCOUVER - Lindsey Jill Nicholls' remains may be among about 300 unidentified sets sitting in Canada's morgues. Her family has no way of knowing, but her mom is determined to change that with ''Lindsey's Law.'' (CanWest)
DNA tests confirm parentage of 'Baby 81'
KALMUNAI, SRI LANKA - DNA tests have confirmed that "Baby 81" – an infant who survived the Dec. 26 tsunami – belongs to a couple who fought for custody of the child. (CBC) PREVIOUS: Couple arrested over tsunami baby
Man confessed to sex crimes he didn't commit
Quebec City police say a man they arrested in 1995 spent five years in jail for crimes he did not commit. Simon Marshall confessed to a series of sexual assaults but police now say DNA evidence proves he was innocent. (CBC)
Inmate charged in 1990 stabbing of Seattle woman
SEATTLE - King County prosecutors brought a first-degree murder charge yesterday against a prison inmate whom they accuse of the brutal stabbing death of Betty Minnis in her home 14 years ago. DNA evidence from the Minnis case matched DNA analysis on file in a state databank as belonging to Trenino Rollins. (Seattle Post-Intelligencer)
Killer gets life for 1968 slaying
SEATTLE - With the help of DNA technology and a newly installed team dedicated to unraveling unsolved "cold cases," police charged John Dwight Canaday, who has been serving a life sentence for killing two other women, with the slaying of Sandra Bowman, a 16-year-old pregnant newlywed. (Seattle Post-Intelligencer) PREVIOUS: Suspect named in 1968 killing
Bill C-13: The DNA identification act and the National defence act
DNA links inmate to deaths of 12 women
LOS ANGELES - Two Los Angeles cold case homicide detectives used DNA test results to link an imprisoned rapist to the deaths of 12 women and an unborn girl between 1987 and 1998. The suspect in the killings, 37-year-old Chester Dwayne Turner, was convicted of rape in March 2002 and is serving an eight-year term at California State Prison. (CNN)
Oversight of crime lab staff has been lax
SPOKANE - A close look at the Washington State Patrol crime labs reveals a stressed system in which officials have been slow to deal with misconduct by long-time employees -- dating back to one of the first scientists hired more than 30 years ago. (Seattle Post-Intelligencer) PREVIOUS: Seattle Post-Intelligencer Special: Shadow of doubt
Killer caught by relative's DNA
SURREY, UK - A relative of Craig Harman, jailed for killing lorry driver Michael Little, inadvertently led police to their man after officers used pioneering DNA techniques. (BBC) RELATED: Global DNA test narrows hunt for serial rapist Serial rapist's DNA is traced to West Indies
DNA tests clear two men convicted of rape
RICHMOND, Va. - Gov. Mark R. Warner on Thursday pardoned two men wrongly convicted of sexual assault and recently cleared after a review of DNA evidence saved years ago by a meticulous forensic scientist. (AP)
Jail term for fake DNA tests boss
BOURNEMOUTH, UK - Simon Mullane, 39, charged up to £600 for tests as managing director of an internet firm based in Poole, Dorset. But Bournemouth Crown Court heard that Mullane was inundated with work and made up results for some 150 swabs which should have been sent abroad. (BBC)
DNA helps police close in on killer in '68 death
SEATTLE - Seattle police detectives are on the verge of solving the killing of 16-year-old Sandra Bowman in 1968 that sickened the community and have found their suspect sitting in a state prison cell, where he is serving time for killing two other women. (Seattle PI) RELATED: State of Washington v. John Dwight Canaday 1971