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Analysis Of Brandon Mayfield In The Madrid Bomber Case

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Scientific experts have been considered to provide impartial scientific evidence in contrast to most other types of evidence. But as illustrated by several examples like the misidentification of Brandon Mayfield in the Madrid Bomber case, it has been demonstrated that the forensic experts can be influenced by contextual bias. (Kassin, Dror & Kukucka, 2013) In Goodwin’s case there are several sources of error that due to a confirmation bias. The examiners were pre-armed with contextual information, they were aware that the target fingerprint belonged to an individual on the MI5 watch list, leading them to be suspicious of their target. Moreover, the examiners did not analyse the fingerprint in isolation, they examined it against this pre-existing …show more content…

One example of this bias is a study of Slovic performed in 1982 related to horse-race handicappers. The participants were asked to prognosticate the winner horse and declare their confidence in their prediction. As they were given more and more information about the horse and rider, their confidence in their prediction kept increasing, but their accuracy remained the same. (Saks, Risinger, Rosenthal,& Thompson, 2003). Cambiar mas In relation to the fingerprint analysis, examiners should analyse the fingerprint in isolation, examining in the first place the evidence from the crime scene and documenting their conclusions before making comparisons against a target, as happened in Goodwin’s case. This will erase the potential influence that the contextual information about the suspect could have on examiners (Dror, 2009). Regarding the pressure to close the case in Goodwin’s case, it’s relevant the study of Charlton performed in 2010, who performed 13 semi-structured interviews with experienced fingerprint examiners. He noticed that examiners reveal a personal interest in catching criminals and solving crimes, with could lead them not to be objective. They also express a desire to give definitive conclusions as a result of their work, a strong need for closure and the aspiration of the detection of a fingerprint match (Kassin, Dror & Kukucka,

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