ASCLD-LAB accreditation for crime labs raises serious questions.
The only outsiders invited to review the work of the State Bureau of Investigation's lab for the past 20 years missed all the problems revealed this month by two former FBI agents and newspaper reporters.
No one at the accreditation agency, or others familiar with its work, seems to be surprised.
ASCLD-LAB, a group led by former SBI agents and based in Johnston County, is the leading accreditation agency for crime labs nationwide. But it reviews cases selected by supervisors in the agency being audited, and it does that only every five years.
"Am I surprised we didn't see a problem? Not really," said Michael Grubb, chairman of ASCLD-LAB and director of the San Diego Police Crime Lab. "Every case they work is not examined. It's a relatively small number."
The SBI's certification through ASCLD-LAB is a signal to the world that the crime lab's work is sound. Leaders wear it as a badge of honor, often citing ASCLD-LAB's seal of approval as proof of good work.
The significance of that accreditation is now in question.
ASCLD-LAB was formed in the 1980s as forensic crime lab directors tried to organize and adopt basic standards "before someone else set them for us," Keaton said earlier this summer. Keaton was North Carolina's point person in those talks.
The first wave of forensic labs was accredited in the late 1980s; today, 364 forensic crime labs in the U.S. are accredited through ASCLD-LAB, making it by far the largest accrediting agency in forensic science.
Through five separate accreditation reviews, auditors sent to North Carolina by ASCLD-LAB found nothing like the picture revealed in recent independent audits and news reports.
Earlier this summer, Keaton spoke with confidence about the SBI's quality of work, dismissing questions about problems illuminated in February when SBI analyst Duane Deaver was criticized for withholding critical blood evidence. In that case, Greg Taylor, a Wake County man, spent 17 years in prison for a crime he did not commit, in part because Deaver withheld results of blood tests that were favorable to Taylor.
"I don't think there are a large number of cases in which there's been a miscarriage of justice," Keaton said. "Absence of evidence is not evidence of innocence."
Every five years, a team of forensic scientists from crime labs in other states come to the SBI lab to inspect its work. They study policy manuals, double check first-aid kits and review the layout of the lab. They check each criterion they meet and note shortcomings they expect to be fixed.
For each unit, inspectors examine five cases for each analyst. They allow lab supervisors to select the cases.
"They can cherry pick," said Randall Robbins, a retired lab official from the Illinois Police crime lab who performed audits for ASCLD-LAB. "They also can sanitize the files. Any lab across the country can dress it up and make it look as pretty as it wants."
Link:
http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/08/26/648075/inspectors-missed-all-sbi-faults.html