EVIDENCE ON FIRE (original) (raw)

Contextual Bias in Fire Investigations: Scientific vs. Investigative Data

The Brief, American Bar Association, Tort Trial and Insurance Practice Section, Vol. 44, No. 3, Spring 2015., 2015

Contextual bias is an issue that has come to the forefront of forensic science in the last few years, and nowhere is contextual bias more likely to influence scientific determinations than in fire investigation. This is largely because many fire investigators also serve simultaneously as law enforcement officers. This article will explore the different duties, responsibilities, and ethical requirements of the scientist and the law enforcement officer. What data constitutes scientific evidence and what constitutes investigative information? Can the two be separated? Should they be separated? How does the science suffer when the scientist is influenced by contextual bias? How does law enforcement suffer when a fire investigator is unable to classify a fire based on the physical evidence? There are no easy answers to these questions. In one case, the ethical and valid response may be obvious, while in the next case, a fire investigator attempting to assist the jury to understand the physical evidence can easily cross the line and conflate valid, but domain irrelevant, investigative data with scientific proof. It is up to counsel to help the expert witnesses delineate between information that can potentially bias the interpretation of the physical evidence, and information that is necessary for its objective evaluation.

Have We Learned the Lessons of the Willingham Case? A National Survey of Fire Investigators

The research sought to quantify the extent to which six forensically faulty fire investigation methods, which were discredited by scientists more than 20 years ago, have continued to be used in the field as well as how the professional qualifications of fire investigators are related to their likelihood of using discredited fire investigation methods to infer that a given fire was intentionally set. The researcher analyzed data gathered in the National Survey of Fire Investigators, which collected 12 demographic data items from 217 public-sector fire investigators in 36 US states and asked participants seven questions to identify the causes of six fire scene observations that were once universally accepted by arson investigators as compelling signs of arson. The research showed that some of the arson investigation myths are still commonly believed to be legitimate indicators of arson, while others are no longer widely believed, and that attributes usually associated with professional competence do not reliably predict whether or not a fire investigator will recognize all six arson investigation myths.

TOWARD A MORE SCIENTIFIC DETERMINATION: MINIMIZING EXPECTATION BIAS IN FIRE INVESTIGATIONS

This paper discusses the concepts of expectation bias and confirmation bias in science in general and in fire investigation in particular. Self examination, location by the discovery of errors in many fields of inquiry has led to a focus on the sources and influence of bias. This is one of the leading topics in forensic science today, and will likely be the focus of a National Academy of Sciences report on the status and needs of forensic sciences in the United States.

Failed forensics: How forensic science lost its way and how it might yet find it

Annual Review of Law and Social …, 2008

A group of nonscience forensic sciences has developed over the past century. These are fields within the broader forensic sciences that have little or no basis in actual science. They are not applications of established basic sciences, they have not systematically tested their own hypotheses, and they make unsupported assumptions and exaggerated claims. This review explains the nature and origins of those nonscience forensic fields, which include the forensic individualization sciences and certain other areas, such as fire and arson investigation. We explore the role of the courts in maintaining the underdeveloped state of these fields and consider suggestions for improving this state of affairs (addressing the potential role that could be played by these fields themselves, by the courts, and by normal sciences).

Arson Investigation: Misconceptions and Mythology

Wiley Encyclopedia of Forensic Science, 2009

Unlike in many other fields of scientific inquiry, progress in fire investigation is held back by the burden of an entrenched mythology. Despite the fact that it has been fifteen years since NFPA 921 was first published, some fire investigators still rely on "misconceptions" about the meaning of various fire effects and fire patterns. This paper will explore the development and promulgation of the mythology of arson investigation. Certainly, there is no reason to believe that anyone ever set out to promulgate something that was not true. It is likely that many myths came about as a result of unwarranted generalizations. For example, an investigator might observe a pattern of spalling around the remains of a gasoline container and make an association of gasoline with spalling. The next time that spalling is observed, gasoline is inferred.

Fire Investigation: Historical Perspective and Recent Developments

Forensic Science Reviews, 2019

ABSTRACT: As a forensic science, fire investigation involves a wide variety of disciplines and thus attracts an equally wide variety of practitioner s. These range from fire protection engineers who may only occasionally engage in forensic work to law enforcement officers, laboratory chemists, metallurgists, and materials engineers. This breadth of practice has resulted in a checkered history, which only relatively recently has given science a full-throated embrace . Because of the stakes involved , fires provide a rich source of material for litigation , both civil and criminal. This conceptual review provides a brief history from the standpoint of a practitioner who has witnessed and sometimes precipitated the changes that have taken place since 1974. Highlights include the debunking of many misconceptions about fire behavior and a general (though not always uninterrupted) movement toward making fire investigation more scientifically accurate through the development of best practices. KEYWORDS: Arson , Cameron Todd Willingham , fire investigation , ignitable liquid residues (ILR), Lime Street fire, NFPA, Oakland fire, standard s.