M’charek, Amade, et al. “The Trouble with Race in Forensic Identification.” Science, Technology, & Human Values, vol. 45, no. 5, 21 Jan. 2020, pp. 804–828, journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0162243919899467, https://doi.org/10.1177/0162243919899467.
This paper focused on how race came back in forensic investigation, legislation, and in our society, while the case they talked on evolved. On May 1st, 1999 a 16 year old girl, Marianne Vaastra was found raped and murdered north of the Netherlands near the Frisian Village. It took 13 years to solve this case, but it became a turning point in how forensic DNA technologies solved case . It changed forensic DNA from an identification tool into an investigative tool that was aimed at identifying traits of an unknown suspect. Forensic DNA profiling was introduced to various jurisdictions in Europe and the United States in the late 19802 and early 1990s. It became a “truth machine” and advanced even further with the introduction of the Polymerase Chain reaction. With PCR it’s possible to compile a DNA profile with very little biological traces. DNA profiles involved comparing DNA found at the crime scene with the DNA already in DNA databases. Now, with how forensics is changing, the goal has shifted into finding clues about the identity of an unknown individual or i.e. the suspect. This article talks about how this difference is intertwined with race and how the case talked about helped with that change. The authors said that race is, in quotes, “not solid nor will it melt into air. It does not wander about as a pregiven entity because it is, as M’charek (2013) has said, a material semiotic relatio .”
“Assessing the Quality of Forensic Evidence: Racial Biases.” Forensics Colleges, http://www.forensicscolleges.com/blog/forensic-evidence-racial-biases.
Jeff Kukucka, an Associate Professor of psychology at Towson University, talks about how racial bias during examinations of forensic evidence is problematic in itself, as well as the person the evidence is pointed towards. While forensic is typically used to exonerate individuals, unfortunately, if used for harm, it can put people in jail wrongfully. There has been proven evidence that the quality of forensic evidence decreases and is used incorrectly when it comes to a person of color. Dr. Kukucka explains how, until 15 years ago, psychologists started to research why forensic errors such as those happen. And it pointed to the concept of unconscious bias versus overt racism. He talks about how work done in forensics is by humans, and as humans, we make mistakes, and also sometimes don’t even realize the hidden bias we carry with us every day. Some examples he gave to combat this would be to limit the information scientists get, examiners follow a standardized process, and have them be transparent about how they got to their conclusions about the evidence.
Yim, An-Di, et al. “Diversity in Forensic Sciences: Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) Representation in Different Medicolegal Fields in the United States.” Forensic Science International: Synergy, vol. 5, Sept. 2022, p. 100280, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fsisyn.2022.100280.
This article talks about Diversity in forensic fields. Written by the National Library of Medicine, they research how diverse the field of forensics really is. Unfortunately, they found that no forensic-specific professional organizations, such as the American Academy of Forensic Science, the American Board of Forensic Odontology, and the National Association of Medical Examiners, had reports on the diversity and race of their members. They were able to find other racial statistics from broader scientific disciplines, and it shows that compared to the U.S. population, Asians are overrepresented in medicine, such as pathology and dentistry, but underrepresented in the social sciences, such as anthropology and psychology. Black and Hispanic people are underrepresented in all fields that they researched. Indigenous people are underrepresented in pathology and psychology. From the organizations looked at in this research, Black, Hispanic, and indigenous individuals were found to be underrepresented in almost every field.
Shipman, Matt. “Forensic Researchers Call for Proactive Efforts to Address Racism.” NC State News, 2024, news.ncsu.edu/2022/01/forensic-research-blm-racism/.
This news article, written by Ann Ross and Matt Shipman, talks about how Forensic researchers are calling for a change in addressing the systematic racism in forensics. Especially to do with anthropology and the way human bones of black descent are treated primarily in museum collections and by society. They point out how important skeletal remains and collections are in terms of training and for biological anthropologists. They show how human societies used to be, human biological changes over time, and they are generally just important uses of data for anthropological research. Unfortunately, the collections that are researched or gathered include remains that were collected without consent or for ethically questionable reasons, and were collected to continue racist anthropological theories. The authors say that the anthropology community has a bigger role to play in combating such issues.
Innocence Project. “Innocence Project: Race and Wrongful Conviction.” Innocence Project, 2023, innocenceproject.org/race-and-wrongful-conviction/.
The Innocence Project is a wonderful organization that helps wrongfully incarcerated individuals get freed. On their website, they talk about the statistics of individuals whom they’ve helped free since their start. Out of the 60% of the people they successfully helped free or exonerate since 1992 are black. The national registry of exonerations showed that more than half of the 3300 people who were freed from 1989 to 2022 were black. Though only 13.6% of the U.S. population is black. A report from 2022 from the registry said that black people who are innocent are 7 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of murder than their white counterparts. Other than faulty and biased forensic evidence, threats to witnesses and accused, deception in the interrogations, and wrong witness identification are reseasons why this number is so high. The website talks about how people are more likely to not recognize and mix up a person of race or of different race than them. White individuals are also poor at recognizing people who are not white. Jury diversity plays a role in it as well.
Cleaver, Kathleen. Back to Africa: The Evolution of the International Section of the Black Panther Party, excerpted from the Black Panther Party Reconsidered. Black Classic Press, 1998. Alexander Street, https://search.alexanderstreet.com/view/work/bibliographic_entity%7Cbibliographic_details%7C4392 246. – Black Radical Tradition.
Black Radical Tradition Excerpt on the Black Panther Party. The Black Panther Party advocated a full-fledged American Revolution to replace domination by “pig power” with the freedom gained through “people’s power.” Recognizing that the revolution could not be accomplished by Blacks alone, the Panthers sought to unify all disaffected and oppressed peoples in America to combat the imperialist monopoly of power and transfer control over the country’s resources into the hands of the people.’Domestically, the Black Panther Party analysis insisted that racism could not be fought with racism, but with solidarity. Unlike most Black nationalist organizations during the 1960s, the Black Panther Party encouraged close cooperation across racial and cultural barriers and engaged in numerous coalitions.’