What if our courts were this interested in getting it right?
The Amanda Knox case appears to be a never ending. She was convicted in 2009 in an Italian court of murdering her roommate. At the trial the prosecution used DNA evidence, which showed that both Knoxs and the victim's DNA was on the knife that was believed to be the murder weapon. There was also DNA from the victim and a co-defendant found on a bra clasp. That evidence was subsequently called into question.
A court ordered review of the evidence questioned the validity and reliability of the evidence, as well as raised questions of contamination. Did you get that? Yes, the court appointed an independent expert to review the evidence after the conviction. Something that is virtually unheard of in the United States.
Predictably, the prosecution questioned the independent expert, and wanted to have their own expert re-examine the evidence. That request was denied. Again, something unusual for this country.
I have no idea how the Italian justice system operates, or how the case got to this point. My interest has been in the forensics, which was always a critical part of the government's case. As I have suggested before, there are always problems when the justice system turns to science to decide guilt or innocence. In the United States, we have yet to come up with a solution for the situation present here – namely, the subsequent discovery that the forensics was faulty. It appears they take that far more seriously in their places.
I wonder what would happen in the United States if trial judges showed the same concern for the integrity of the conviction. Far too often, once a defendant is convicted that is the end of it and everyone moves on to the next case. It takes a monumental development to undo a conviction, even when everyone recognizes there are problems with it. A good first step would be for the court to appoint its own expert, and not rely on dueling experts presented by the prosecution and the defense.
I don't know how it will all turn out. The fact that the evidence is being re-examined is significant though and something we can learn from.
It's very interesting that this case is, I think, the first one in which the Italians have incorporated the Anglo-American adversarial process into their own. And right off the bat, there are problems with the science and process. While I can't prove it, I think part of the reasoning for modifying the existing Italian system was they though this process would better incorporate scientific evidence.