The Texas panel panel fault chemistry in the Bryan case for "exaggerated findings" and inadequate...

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The Texas panel panel fault chemistry in the Bryan case for "exaggerated findings" and inadequate DNA analysis











This story was co-published with The New York Times Magazine.







An influential state commission issued a very critical assessment on Friday of a second key actor in the conviction for the murder of Joe Bryan, and said a chemist in the Texas Department of Public Safety's crime laboratory had "overstated the findings, exceeded his experience and participated in speculation "when he stated. in 1989.

In a report issued at its quarterly meeting, the Texas Forensic Science Commission also found that the now retired pharmacist, Patricia Retzlaff, did not conduct a thorough analysis of the key DNA tests in 2012, after a judge allowed such tests.

The report marks the second time in just three months that the commission, a national leader in the reform of forensic science, has highlighted serious flaws in the prosecution of Bryan, a former high school principal who has now spent more than 30 years in prison for the murder. of his wife, Mickey, a fourth grade teacher in Clifton, Texas. In July, the commission found that the blood spatter analysis used to condemn Bryan was wrong.





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Among the items that were not fully analyzed was a cigarette butt that was discovered at the crime scene. The defense has long maintained that the cigarette butt is proof that another person, apart from the brigans, who did not smoke, entered his home the night of the crime. (The principal investigator of the case claimed that he accidentally tracked him to the house on the heel of his boot). The commission noted that there was a "large remaining DNA extract" that could be analyzed.

Concerned about these findings, the commission urged Texas DPS, the state's leading law enforcement agency, to review a broader sample of Retzlaff's work "to assess whether similar observations regarding the testimony and thoroughness of the analysis are present. in other cases".

Brady Mills, who runs the state's crime lab, declined to comment, but the lab routinely follows the commission's recommendations.

Retzlaff worked at the state's regional crime laboratory in Waco for more than three decades, from 1981 to 2012. The lab analyzes forensic evidence from law enforcement agencies throughout the 18-county Dallas area. and Austin. The Texas DPS refused to comment on how many cases Retzlaff had worked or witnessed during that time.

Retzlaff, who performed serology and analysis of trace evidence in Bryan's case in the mid-1980s, as well as post-conviction DNA analysis in 2012, did not return calls for comments.

Bryan was the subject of a two-part investigation by ProPublica and The New York Times in May, that questioned the accuracy of the analysis of the bloodstain pattern used to convict him, as well as the training of the experts who testify in such cases. In July, the commission discovered that the blood spatter analysis used to condemn Bryan "was not accurate or did not have scientific support" and the expert who declared that he was "totally wrong".

The bloodstain analyst in the case, Robert Thorman, granted in an affidavit last month That some of his conclusions in the case were wrong.

The commission's report, which reiterated its findings on the flawed testimony of blood spatter, revealed that the deficiencies in the forensic case against Bryan are more extensive than initially known.

The commission found that Retzlaff, then known as Patricia Almanza, made numerous speculative or unscientific claims at Bryan's trial in 1989, some of which reinforced the prosecution's case. Among them:





Retzlaff testified that the hairs at the crime scene in Bryan's house belonged solely to Joe and Mickey, although the method employed by Retzlaff (microscopic comparison of hair) can not make those definitive determinations. His testimony, which the commission called "not scientifically sustainable" and "deceptive," helped undermine the defense's argument that an intruder killed Mickey.

  





Retzlaff credited the prosecution theory that the killer, after firing at Mickey, took the time to change clothes and shoes before fleeing from the crime scene. This theory helped explain one of the biggest holes in the state's case: blood was never found inside Bryan's Mercury, although prosecutors alleged that Bryan fled the crime scene in his car. When questioned by a prosecutor, Retzlaff agreed that the lack of blood outside the master bedroom, where Mickey was shot, suggested that the killer had cleaned and changed before leaving the house.

  

Commission member Jarvis Parsons, the group's only prosecutor, characterized this as "totally outside the scope of his experience."





Retzlaff stated that the fibers in a key piece of evidence, a blood-stained flashlight that Mickey's brother said he found in the trunk of Bryan's car, were consistent with the fibers of the trunk of Bryan's car, however, there is no notes in the case file that indicate that you have ever made a fiber comparison.





Retzlaff's testimony contrasted with that of two other employees of the crime laboratory who testified in the case and who, according to the commission, "remained within the limits of their experience and offered no speculative observations or conclusions."

The report also noted that while Bryan's attorneys at the trial were able to correct some of Retzlaff's statements during the interrogation, "the defense should not be required to" clean up "the misleading testimony after the fact."

Created by the Texas Legislature in 2005, the commission, composed of seven scientists, a prosecutor and a defense attorney, does not investigate the guilt or innocence of the defendants, but the reliability and integrity of the forensic science used to obtain their convictions. This year, his investigation into Bryan's case was extended to a reexamination of the bloodstain pattern analysis, a forensic discipline whose practitioners consider the drops, splashes and traces of blood at the crime scene as clues that can sometimes be use to reverse engineer. the crime itself



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The blood will tell, Part I

The murder of Mickey Bryan, a quiet fourth grade teacher, surprised her small city of Texas. Then her husband, a beloved school principal, was accused of killing her. Did he do it, or was there a terrible mistake?









                                        


                                    





The blood will tell, Part II

Joe Bryan has spent the last three decades in prison for the murder of his wife, a crime he claims he did not commit. His conviction was based largely on the "analysis of the bloodstain pattern," a technique still in use throughout the criminal justice system, despite concerns about its reliability.







Bryan was tried twice, first in 1986 and then again in 1989. Although Retzlaff testified in both trials, the commission only reviewed his 1989 testimony, since Bryan's retrial was the basis of his appeal.

The commission's findings further reinforce the defense's argument that Bryan, now 78 and in poor health, deserves a new trial. Bryan had been attending a director's convention in Austin, 120 miles from where the murder occurred, in the days surrounding the murder. He has always maintained that he was in Austin, asleep in his hotel room, at the time of the crime.

Friday's meeting was attended by key figures in Bryan's ongoing legal search for a new trial: Forest County District Attorney Adam Sibley and attorneys for Bryan, Walter Reaves and Jessica Freud of Waco.

After the meeting, Reaves and Freud said they were encouraged by the commission's findings, which came a few weeks after the conclusion of an evidentiary hearing in Comanche, Texas, during which they dismantled numerous aspects of the state's case. On the last day of the hearing, in a dramatic setback, the bloodstained analyst whose testimony had proved critical in condemning Bryan to relinquish some of his earlier testimony.

"My conclusions were wrong," Thorman, a retired police detective, wrote in an affidavit. "Some of the techniques and methodology were incorrect. Therefore, part of my testimony was not correct. "

The state and the defense will submit their written summaries of the testimony presented at the hearing to Judge Doug Shaver on November 9. Next, the judge will recommend to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals if Bryan should receive a new trial. The judges of that court will be the final arbitrators.

The participants in the case seemed surprised to learn on Friday that more DNA analysis could still be done on the cigarette butt. It remains uncertain whether this analysis can continue now.




Additional unproven evidence, such as Mickey's sexual assault kit, "could have potential probative value," the commission said in its report. The Forest County prosecutor's office has blocked the defense efforts for these items to be tested. Judge James Morgan, who presided over Bryan's two trials, ordered the tests to be conducted last year. Prosecutors appealed their decision to the 11th Texas Court of Appeals, which has not yet issued an opinion.

The report of the commission is not admissible in a criminal proceeding, and will not be considered by Shaver. But Freud said the report was just further evidence that the district attorney, who has so far refused to comment, no longer had a case.

"The Texas Forensic Science Commission has told the Texas Forensic prosecutor for the first time that there is a committed scientific testimony that supports Joe's conviction," said Freud. "And still, let another day of this injustice of 32 years persist."

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