Expert Panel to Discuss Controversial Familial DNA Searching at 21st International Symposium on Human Identification

Business Wire
MADISON, Wis.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–The controversial use of familial searching is among the timely issues in DNA analysis that will be debated at this year’s International Symposium on Human Identification (ISHI). The symposium, held October 11-14 in San Antonio, is the only conference to focus exclusively on DNA analysis and attracts forensic scientists from around the world.

Message from Mariska Hargitay: The Shame of Rape-Kit Backlogs

Good Housekeeping.com
National studies have shown that cases in which rape-kit evidence was tested were much more likely to advance through the criminal justice system and lead to arrests. New York City’s arrest rate for rape rose from 40 percent to 70 percent once it adopted the policy to test every booked rape kit. In Los Angeles, a recent decision to test every booked rape kit uncovered DNA evidence from suspects in additional rape cases. Testing every kit, and giving law enforcement the resources they need to investigate sexual assaults fully, makes a dramatic difference in victims’ lives — and public safety.

Three-way Crime Focus At Justice Meeting

4NI.co.UK
There was a both a cross-border and a cross-channel focus on crime as David Ford, the Stormont Justice Minister, attended the first trilateral meeting with the Irish Republic’s Dermot Ahern and Kenny MacAskill from Scotland.

DeWine promises to improve crime lab, fight Obama plan

Ohio.com
DeWine said his biggest challenge will be to fix what’s wrong with the state crime lab, where he said slow processing times for DNA tests, rape kits, fingerprints and other forensic evidence are inhibiting law enforcement around the state.

”The efficiency level there is abysmal, and has very real, very serious consequences for victims of crime and for public safety,” he said. ” . . . We need an attorney general that thinks like a prosecutor, and who understands the pain and anguish of crime victims.”

Police to trial while-you-wait DNA tests

Thinq.co.uk
Police will soon have the means to grab someone’s genetic sample and run it through the national DNA database while waiting in the street, if early trials by military industrial giant Lockheed Martin are successful.

Bode Technology Expands Its Cutting Edge RFID Technology To Law Enforcement Units For First Time

Business Wire
GlobalOptions Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: GLOI), a leading provider of domestic and international risk management services, today announced that Bode Technology, one of the world’s largest forensic DNA analysis firms, has begun offering its new state-of-the-art Bode-RFID™ tracking system to law enforcement agencies and crime laboratories nationwide in an effort to streamline work flows and help control costs in the ever-growing field of evidence tracking and analysis. The new system will enable field investigators and laboratory analysts to cut costs and effectively automate and manage a process which has been traditionally slow.

Backlogs linger at Houston crime lab

Associated Press
A growing backlog at the Houston police crime lab has a prosecutor lobbying to have all new blood and DNA evidence sent to the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences for testing.

Leahy To Introduce Reauthorization Of Landmark Justice For All Act

Patricky Leahy Website
The Justice for All Act made modest but rare reforms in the way the death penalty is used in the criminal justice system. It also improved support services for crime victims, and provided important tools and assistance to help state and local governments use DNA evidence to convict guilty offenders and exonerate the innocent. The Justice for All Reauthorization Act will extend, strengthen and improve many of the 2004 reforms.

Amateur search group claims grave of Russia’s ‘man in iron mask’ found

Rianovosti Russia
The remains of Ivan VI of Russia, an ousted Russian 18th century infant tsar who spent most of his life in solitary confinement, have probably been found in northern Russia, the head of an amateur search group said on Monday.

Remains of More than ten fallen Finnish wartime MIAs found this year in Russia

HELSINGIN SANOMAT Finland
”I phoned my children and told them that my father was coming home”, says Maija Kivipelto, 74, recalling the moment some years ago when she heard that the body of her father Juho Niemi had been found – almost 70 years after he had died.