
Sept. 14, 2008
Evidence Of Injustice
FBI's Bullet Lead Analysis Used Flawed Science To Convict Hundreds Of Defendants
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Evidence Of Injustice
In a joint investigation, 60 Minutes' Steve Kroft and The Washington Post's John Solomon report on a flawed science used in the convictions of hundreds of defendants, dozens of whom may be innocent.
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Steve Kroft, speaking with Lee Wayne Hunt. (CBS)
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Aside from eyewitness testimony, some of the most believable evidence presented in criminal cases in the United States comes from the FBI crime laboratory in Quantico, Va. Part of its job is to test and analyze everything from ballistics to DNA for state and local prosecutors around the country, introducing scientific credibility to often murky cases.
But a six-month investigation by 60 Minutes and The Washington Post last November showed that there are hundreds of defendants imprisoned around the country who were convicted with the help of a now discredited forensic tool, and that the FBI never notified them, their lawyers, or the courts, that the their cases may have been affected by faulty testimony.
The science, called bullet lead analysis, was used by the FBI for 40 years in thousands of cases, and some of the people it helped put in jail may be innocent.
As correspondent Steve Kroft reports, one of them is Lee Wayne Hunt, who is now serving a life sentence for murder in North Carolina.
Lee Wayne Hunt tells Kroft he's been behind bars for over 22 years and 6 months, and maintains he's an innocent man. "What I've said from the word get go that I ain't -- never killed nobody. I didn't have nothing to do with this," he says.
Hunt was convicted in 1986 of murdering two people in Fayetteville, N.C., based on the testimony of two questionable witnesses and what turned out to be erroneous ballistics testimony from the FBI lab.
For years, the FBI believed that lead in bullets had unique chemical signatures, and that by breaking them down and analyzing them, it was possible to match bullets, not only to a single batch of ammunition coming out of a factory, but to a single box of bullets. And that is what the FBI did in the case of Lee Wayne Hunt, tying a bullet fragment found where the murders took place to a box of bullets the prosecutors linked to Hunt.
"I put it exactly the way it sounded to me, and the way that I believe it to be," Hunt says. "He said that this box of bullets is the same box of bullets that was used to kill these people, made on, about the same time."
"I think everybody in the courtroom assumed that this was valid evidence," says Hunt's attorney, Richard Rosen.
Asked how important he thinks this was to his client's conviction, Rosen says, "I thought it was very important to our client's conviction. It was the single piece of physical evidence corroborating their story. And it came from, you know, it came from the mountaintop."
The FBI first used bullet lead analysis while investigating the assassination of John F. Kennedy, trying to match pieces of bullets discovered at Dealey Plaza with bullets found in Lee Harvey Oswald's rifle.
By the 1980's, the FBI was routinely using this analysis to link bullet fragments found at a crime scene with bullets found in the possession of a suspect, almost always in cases where more reliable ballistics tests were impossible.
"And could you run like a standard ballistics test on this?" Kroft asks William Tobin, a former chief metallurgist for the FBI.
"No," Tobin says. "They're too deformed for the conventional ballistics examinations."
Tobin says the Quantico lab was the only place in the country that did bullet lead analysis, and the assertion that you could actually match a bullet fragment to a specific batch or box of bullets went unchallenged for 40 years -- until Tobin retired in 1998 and decided to do his own study, discovering that the basic premise had never actually been scientifically tested.
"FBI lab personnel testified that you could match these fragments to this bullet," Kroft remarks.
"Yes, that's correct," Tobin says.
Asked what he found out, Tobin tells Kroft, "It hadn't been based on science at all, but rather had been based on subjective belief for over four decades."
"So what you're saying is that this is junk science?" Kroft asks.
"That's correct," Tobin says. "It's worthless as a forensic tool."
Produced By Ira Rosen
© MMVIII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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See all 118 CommentsThe second time, while working on a sensitive project as a government contractor, I discussed a particular information collections problem with them. To one question the agent replied that they "didn''t need a warrant (for wiretapping) if they were''nt going to court." So much for the Constitution, as this was well before the Patriot Act.
After seeing your report, only God has a clue as to their current injustices. Way to go CBS and WP!
Mike Nifong is the posterboy of justice in America today.
How else do you develop an interest in crime fighting without first being victim to it? How does someone want to be a cop, not being a criminal? Its fear driven.. Its a way to satisfy the angst. Most cops nowadays are naturally corrupt, and political.. Very political. To find any cops out there nowadays of the old ways? Of the old virtues.. is hard to find.
Any evidence from a police or FBI crime "lab." should be regarded very skeptically by jurors and judges..
'' .. listen, you little rich sick girl, attract business by paying me & 3 other to hob nob at your sick bed for 22.04 each per night ($0.92 each hour) & sleep in ur guest beds at your 1700 square foot, 1/4 plus acre subsistence farm pretending to be your inept competition as we play song dance skit kit you are here why why why first aid on the trail & dance get well feed world get sick tax world hike naked dance dressed porn songs (or 11.08 per night / $0.46 per hour if you expect your crops eaten) .. ''
'' .. the bed & breakfast / lunch / dinner that pays you to sleep with them .. ''
'' .. school teachets paid by sick little kids to rally round their sick beds & cure their own school teachet cancers & other diseases .. ''
'' .. money formality is sure to disappear .. ''
'' .. space aliens said they''d feed the world but first to invest trillions dollars / votes in decades of baby raping war .. ''
'' .. have you hugged a lazy naked ignorant profane blemished promiscuous kid today? .. ''
'' .. she builds prisons, not paradises; but, she swears wishes don''t come true .. ''
'' .. at $.20 per gift, 330 shared @ $.30 each / 3300 @ $.21 each .. ''
'' .. if avg 90,000 countys 90,000 folk, each is visited in 60 years at 1 sick bed at each of 33 villages across 4.5 countys per day .. ''
'' ...
which came first eternity or the earth?
easy to see the earth came first
or we wouldn''t be wondering which came first,
except that, even if earth first,
eternity must swell to infinitely beyond and before and after the earth,
and so must have come first anyway,
such that two folk can one say the earth is flat and one can hike to pluto,
while the other says the earth is round, and there is no hiking trail to pluto,
and they each can be absolutely correct, and each absolutely incorrect at the same time,
and each go their seperate ways,
still the earth is both round and flat at the same time, unless one chooses to believe otherwise;
but, then you''d have to be crazy
... ''
'' ... what''s the difference in ruling forever because one wants to, and because one will be damned not to? whatever difference one chooses ... my soul spans forever, and i get a bad dream here or there now or then and chaos seems to rumble round till i calm inside and out and remember it was all my fault and i never truly cut anyone but myself ... i only glance at you cruelly because you are not the one i wish that i could be; though, i''m sure to be again ... ''
of "FAILURES BECAUSE of INCOMPETENCE"?
Without help from John Q. Public that bunch of no
accounts couldn''t catch a cold if they stayed out in
the cold for a week.
That bunch of incompetents shoulb be disbanded and
a group should replace them similar to the German
Secret Police of World War II era.
The FBI is what it says "FAILURES BECAUSE of
Incompetence.
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Posted by barbaraf4 at 12:08 AM : Nov 19, 2007
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An Innocent man has spent over 20 years behind bars and THIS is all you care about? God where do you creatures come from. IF States like this one had a GOOD justice system there would be no questions here. When it was shown in Illinois that there were problems with convictions, the state IMMEDIATELY stopped the process dead in its tracks. To the citizens of that state NO person should serve ONE MINUTE of time that was not just. To the citizens of the South? Who knows what makes those losers of history operate. I know there are good people there but they somehow never are able to get a grip on the Fascist who rule. Sieg Heil Y''all.
Posted by barbaraf4 at 12:08 AM : Nov 19, 2007
An Innocent man has spent over 20 years behind bars and THIS is all you care about? God where do you creatures come from. IF States like this one had a GOOD justice system there would be no questions here. When it was shown in Illinois that there were problems with convictions, the state IMMEDIATELY stopped the process dead in its tracks. To the citizens of that state NO person should serve ONE MINUTE of time that was not just. To the citizens of the South? Who knows what makes those losers of history operate. I know there are good people there but they somehow never are able to get a grip on the Fascist who rule. Sieg Heil Y''''all."
Posted by MCVet at 06:24 AM : Nov 19, 2007"
I think Barbara has a fair point, but you cant stop being such a ******* drama queen for 2 seconds.
Did she say, "to he11 with the guy wrongfully convicted for over 22 years!"? No. She just made a statement to the overall impact, sorry if it didn''t suit your bed-wetting.
"The gov''t should have to give you at least $1,000,000 for pain and suffering if you are wrongly put in jail/prison. Posted by jh6379
jh6379 - It is indeed sad. NO Argument there.
Where would the million come from ? Are you passing along your bank account number ? The ''government'' is us jh6379.
I expect to hear some lame argument like, bush writes checks he can''t cover, so if this is your response, let me say in advance: do two wrongs make a right ?
The public''s drooling admiration for the "G-men" that was carefully nurtured by J. Edna Hoover''s PR flaks will not be swayed by these latest revelations...after all, the fact that for the first WTC attack, the FBI cooked the bomb, provided the fuse, trained the driver and refused it''s informer and provocateur''s request that the bomb be replaced with harmeless material--and even tried to charge their informer!...unfortunately for these keystone nitwits, the informer had recorded his conversations with his handlers.
The public blithely ignored Hoover''s sabotage of the JFK investigation...they ignored the refusal of FBI bosses to investigate the Arabs at the flight schools and quietly accepted Bush''s order to lay off the bin Ladens prior to 9-11.
They ignored the outright lies and framing of a jounalist and his wife over their discoveries regarding the FBI''s cover-up of TWA 800 evidence so as to sell the official lie of its downing.
Let''s not forget how it aided an abetted a mob assassin in Boston...
www.poconocommunitynews.com
I''m sorry for your loss and what you and your loved ones have had to endure. I''m glad that you raised the point that you did, I think it''s important.
Since I wasn''t in the courtroom to hear all the evidence I don''t have an opinion on this man''s guilt or innocence, but for the sake of discussion let''s say that the other evidence would''ve been enough to convict him without this tainted evidence. That means the negligence of the FBI is harming victims and defendants alike.
I have no doubt that some of the people who will be released now in response to this are innocent and that some guilty parties will walk on the basis of this. All the more reason to fix the problem before more people are victimized.
I hope that you, your cousin, and family can find piece knowing that your loved ones are in a better place.
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Posted by JOgle1106 at 10:17 AM : Nov 19, 2007
+ report abuse
Did YOU listen to the whole story? I believe the Attorney for another man involved admitted to that attorney that HE killed all of them, the the accused man was NOT involved. He went to the Nazi Judge in that wacked out Red Neck he11 hole and told him so. What did the Klan Man do? He turned in the Attorney, who''s cliant killed himself in prison, into the Bar Association and refused to even hear him out. If it''s not this it''s giving a black kid 10 years for oral *** or having ropes hung from trees. It just seems these people and I do believe there are good ones amoung them, will NEVER get the message. NEVER. Sieg Heil Y''all.
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Posted by mitchoncbs at 10:45 AM : Nov 19, 2007
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Even for a Nazi you are a very sick human... you make the Klan look good!!
I saw in the History Channel recently that the FBI gots its start under false pretences back in the early 1900s. It was created to chase prostitutes after some religious sensationaltist lied to Congress by convincing them that white women were being enslaved in brothels. Congress knew it was inaccurate, but it was all willfully generated and willfully accepted lies. It was all about forcing a religious agenda. Turns out, they shutdown brothels all over New York and could not find any slaves. The effort forced the willing women out of brothel work and into 12 hour-a-day jobs in textile mills for pennies a day. And if you notice, prostitution today is being called "modern day slavery"....and the FBI has it as a high priority. Hey, if the lie worked before....do it again.
Learn more:
www.JPFO.org
Learn more:
www.JPFO.org
Prosecutors generally use any means possible for convictions, including faulty evidence.
There are many innocent persons who have been exonerated by DNA, so it occurs...a lot. "Justice" is a joke, and not getting the science correct is an inexcusable fundamental flaw. A big price to pay for prosecutor egos.
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