Brandon Mayfield Award $2 Million
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Steve Everist
- Site Admin
- Posts: 551
- Joined: Sun Jul 03, 2005 4:27 pm
- Location: Bellevue, WA
Brandon Mayfield Award $2 Million
Steve E.
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Iain McKie
- Posts: 192
- Joined: Mon Jul 04, 2005 1:23 am
- Location: Ayr, Scotland
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Brandon Mayfield
‘The United States of America apologizes to Mr. Brandon Mayfield and his family’
While many issues remain to be resolved in the Brandon Mayfield case the sheer power and importance of the above apology cannot be denied.
The most powerful country in the world openly admits its culpability in the injustice that surrounded the mistaken identification of Mr. Mayfield’s fingerprint 2 ½ years ago.
Over that period the mistake has been admitted, an international panel has examined the related issues and reported, the FBI has implemented far-reaching recommendations and Mr. Mayfield has been compensated and publicly apologised to on behalf of the people by the American Government.
Although as always politics has played a major part in the problem and the solution the United States should be justly proud of the manner and the relative speed of the move towards resolving the injustice perpetrated on Brandon Mayfield and his family.
Meanwhile in Scotland the SCRO, aided and abetted by the government of Scotland, after a decade of avoidance and delay, has still to admit to not one but two serious errors. This continues to threaten anyone brought before our courts on fingerprint evidence and allows critics of fingerprinting to challenge one of the most important crime prevention and detection tools in the forensic sciences.
Scotland has been described by its First Minister Jack McConnell as, “the best small country in the world". Like Jack McConnell I am proud to be a Scot but before we can make any claims to greatness known injustices must be admitted to instead of being allowed to fester without apology.
While many issues remain to be resolved in the Brandon Mayfield case the sheer power and importance of the above apology cannot be denied.
The most powerful country in the world openly admits its culpability in the injustice that surrounded the mistaken identification of Mr. Mayfield’s fingerprint 2 ½ years ago.
Over that period the mistake has been admitted, an international panel has examined the related issues and reported, the FBI has implemented far-reaching recommendations and Mr. Mayfield has been compensated and publicly apologised to on behalf of the people by the American Government.
Although as always politics has played a major part in the problem and the solution the United States should be justly proud of the manner and the relative speed of the move towards resolving the injustice perpetrated on Brandon Mayfield and his family.
Meanwhile in Scotland the SCRO, aided and abetted by the government of Scotland, after a decade of avoidance and delay, has still to admit to not one but two serious errors. This continues to threaten anyone brought before our courts on fingerprint evidence and allows critics of fingerprinting to challenge one of the most important crime prevention and detection tools in the forensic sciences.
Scotland has been described by its First Minister Jack McConnell as, “the best small country in the world". Like Jack McConnell I am proud to be a Scot but before we can make any claims to greatness known injustices must be admitted to instead of being allowed to fester without apology.
As always my thanks to all experts who have supported Shirley over the years.