On Thursday, the Detroit Police Department's firearms laboratory was shut down after a state police audit prompted by tainted firearms evidence called into question all forensic evidence handled in the lab over several years. Of 200 cases reviewed in the audit, 10 percent were found to have errors, a rate that experts called "10 times higher" than an average lab.
Clifford, the police spokesman, defended Baltimore's embattled lab, explaining that the decision not to pursue DNA database hits did not come from technicians.
Rowe, chairman of the nation's oldest forensic science department, said that given the scrutiny, detectives may be more likely to discard evidence that they determine to be irrelevant rather than have it tested. Detectives need to be careful not to create the perception of having a "confirmation bias," he said.
