Just by way of an explanation, Doctor Di Maio was unable to make it to this meeting. So in accordance with the policies and procedures, I will be filling in for him as vice chair for this meeting. The first item on our agenda is to review and adopt the minutes from the April 4 meeting. Has everyone had an opportunity to review the minutes? Yes. Yes. Is there a motion to accept the minutes? I so move. Second. Any discussion? Clarifications? OK. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed. OK. Motion carries. The second item is the office admin update from Lynn Garcia and Leigh Heidenreich. OK. So the first thing I wanted to do was to introduce you to your intern, who is sitting right here. This is Esteban Serrano, and he's been with us since the beginning of the summer and has been really invaluable to us, especially on the hair microscopy work. Because there are a lot of case files and a lot of Excel spreadsheet management. And so he's attended all of the meetings and helped do a lot of the drudge work around getting that material organized. So Esteban's here. He'll be available at the break, if you'd like to quiz him about his future plans which include attending Rice University in the fall. Oh, good school. So we're really happy to have him. [COUGH] Excuse me. And I'm sorry if I'm coughing. I'm struggling with some allergies, so I might be coughing a little bit. I apologize for that. Moving on to the budget, we've included two different items for you on the budget in your materials, as well as the LAR document that the university uses to submit the legislative request on the commission's behalf. So it basically just goes over accomplishments, past accomplishments, future accomplishments. It's a little bit more focused on a narrative than on the financial piece of it. The university is still working on that piece of it. So we'll be asking, I believe, for the same amount this time around. Because we have a million dollar budget per biennium, which is quite a healthy budget right now. So we're going to see how that goes, and what we can get accomplished with that. With the budget forecast, Leigh and I have really tried to-- it's hard to forecast two years out, so what we tried to do was include the salary and overhead, which we know. Those are fixed. The salary and overhead includes the standard 3% salary increase for Leigh and me that all university employees receive. Is that accurate? All that are performing satisfactorily. Depends on the university. Pardon? Depends on the university. Well at Sam Houston that's what everybody gets, so we're moved along with the group. Which we're very grateful for obviously, because lots of folks don't get increases. And then the future predictions reflect what we see as increased activity in the area of forensic development. We do a lot of collaboration with Judge Hervey, who's here with us today. And those programs sometimes cost money. So between that and the certification initiatives that we have, we think there will be expenditures in that category. We think just based on the self disclosures and complaints that we have in front of us just for today's meeting, that the commission is starting to get complaints in areas for which we don't have subject matter experts sitting on the commission. So that means, in order to do a good job-- and our statute allows us to consult outside experts. And they charge money. They typically don't do it pro bono. A number of them did in the Willingham case, but that was a special situation. Discipline specific reviews-- that covers hair microscopy. And in that area we think we're going to have probably less in billings from laboratories-- and I'll talk about that later-- and more costs that go towards getting transcripts. Because we're going to do our best in collaboration with Judge Hervey, with the prosecutors, to get transcripts for free. But if we have to buy them, we'll buy them. And I think this is a general forecast, and we'll get more details as we go into the next fiscal year. Does anyone have questions about it? Now the next document, "Budget Status Report FY 2014." What this reflects is a new set up for the way that we present data, that is responsive to Doctor Peerwani's request at the last meeting, that we include percentage of total budget, percentage projected use, and percentage remaining as columns for you to analyze. Now when this particular budget status report was created 7/16, we had only spent $425,664 of the budget, but we predict that with the various items that have come in to be charged from now until the end of the fiscal year, we will indeed spend the full budget amount. Right now, if you account for everything that we have set aside or every bill that has been paid, we have $13,000 remaining through August 31. Which Leigh and I-- and we'll talk a little bit more about how that money may be spent-- we may need your approval on a couple of items. But we think that we will indeed exhaust the budget. Which is a good thing, because typically the legislature does not like to refresh budgets that have not been spent. Because they don't understand why, if you need it, you wouldn't have used it last time. So this is where we stand on that. Does anyone have questions? Lynn. Yes. 85% expenditure through what date? 7/16. 7/16. OK. That's pretty good. We're on the mark. Yeah. It's pretty good. And just keep in mind that there may have been some items through 7/16 that have been set aside but haven't been charged out yet. One example of that is-- Jefferson County did their hair microscopy work. They just finished it, just are billing it. So that will come out. There are a number of other items like that. But we still have $75,000 left as of 7/16. Well, of that $75,000 we really only have 13, because-- It's encumbered. The other money is encumbered. Right, Leigh? Yes. I will say that our budget-- as it gets higher, it gets more complex. So we really spend a lot more time than we used to tracking the numbers, getting back and forth with the university. It's very extensive I would say. There may be a future point, when Leigh graduates from law school-- if she stays on with us-- where we might consider hiring someone who has that type of administrative expertise, and who maybe even has interacted with the university before. Because as she takes on more investigative responsibilities, then that will leave a gap in our administrative side. And I think she does a great job trying to manage the university's policies and procedures, which aren't really tailored to the commission. They're tailored to an academic institution. So a lot of things that we bring to them are like, whoa. You can't do that. And so then I have to say, well, we're going to do it. So the question is how are we going to do it? So we have a great relationship with them, but there's a lot of times where they have to think outside the box a little bit for us. And I'm sure you've experienced that. I do know that. And I should mention as well that we have a new director of budget and finance, Matthew Olmstead, who is just a remarkable individual. So I think the process will run really smoothly. And we're due to have a conference call with him soon, just an introductory one. He just took over. So we'll get to know him. Any other questions? Budgetary questions? And if you ever have a question about budget expenditures, anything like that, feel free to call us too. Because we can look it up and track things down. Development and data management. Super exciting actually. We contracted with a company that is going to create a database for us in FileMaker Pro, so that we can track our cases. If you might imagine the way the commission's files look-- what it is is we have a shared file system with a thing that says "Complaints." And every complaint we've ever had has a folder, and all the documents are in there, which is fantastic sort of. What is far, far more preferable-- I mean, considering there are only two of us, I think we have good organization-- it's far more preferable to have a database that has numbers, tracking numbers, attached to every single case that we get in that has fields where you can enter, complaint screening committee reviewed this on x date. Here's the vote. Here's the letter that went out. Where you can attach the correspondence with the complainant. The person who's creating it for us has been absolutely phenomenal. I think she's going to do a great job. She's starting with the hair microscopy casework, because it's a discrete project. And we really, really need a database for it. So we're hopeful that that's going to help bring the commission forward even a step more. And we'll be able to access that database remotely and so forth. So it's a far better way of tracking information than in individual file folders. And then the Spanish website we looked into-- it would be cost prohibitive to translate the entire website. In part because our web developer can't really-- they would charge us a few thousand dollars just to count the words on the website, never mind the whole translation. So what we decided to do was go with a translation of the forms. And the ones that you see here in your packet are in final form, in the sense that the words are all there. It doesn't look like this in the online version. The printed version is not as nice as it looks in the online PDF. But we did get those translated. Are they uploaded yet? We had to approve them today. If you all are OK with going with these forms for now and uploading them, then we will put them up on the website. Is there a motion to approve the Spanish translations of the complaints? I make a motion to approve the Spanish translation of the complaint forms. A second? Second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? So carried. And those will also go into the booklets that are available to prisoners. So let me ask you this question. When we get the forms back, obviously the Spanish forms people are going to put in Spanish. So do we have the support in our administrative staff to then be able to translate that into English? I can do it. You can do that. And if I need help, I can get help to do it. I mean, without asking my husband. We have a translation company that can help us. Esteban is fluent, so we can call him up at Rice, and ask him if he wants to do it. But I can do it. I'm thinking the type of responses we're going to get, I will be able to do it. And if I don't, I'll get help. Depends on how many you get. Right. Yeah. If I get a flood of them, then we're going to have to go get it translated. OK. Anything else administratively? The next item on the agenda is discussion and consideration of recommendations from the Complaint Screening Committee concerning pending complaints and lab self-disclosures. And the Complaint Screening Committee met yesterday and had a lengthy meeting that ended a little after 7:30PM. So the chair of that committee is Doctor Eisenberg. OK. Well thank you. We had five new complaints actually. There was one complaint that we carried over from the April 3 meeting, and that's the complaint involving Mr. Powell, George Powell III. And there were four new complaints, and I think there were seven self-disclosures by laboratories. So there's a considerable amount of discussion relative to these. So what I'll try to do is summarize the complaints with some basic background information, and then tell you about the recommendations of the Complaint Screening Committee to the full board. Can I just ask has everyone had an opportunity to review the memo and the original documents that were made available? And just as a point of clarification, as we go through, we anticipate that there will be some complaints or disclosures for which we will have to establish investigative panels. And rather than appoint chairs to those panels as we go through, we'll wait until the end of the report from the committee. And then we'll go through the ones that will need to move through to a panel, and appoint chairs, and solicit some volunteers for membership. Is that OK for everybody? Do you feel as though, since all the members of the committee have the documentation, it's necessary to describe the complaints? I do. OK. OK. So the first complaint was the one that was carried over from the April 3 meeting. And that was, again, George Powell, and it involved what appears to be the presence of digital evidence. So on November 20, 2009, a jury convicted the appellant, George Robert Powell III, of aggravated robbery of the 7-Eleven convenience store and sentenced him to 20 years in prison. At the trial, the state called the clerk and the manager of the 7-Eleven store as witnesses. Both identified Powell as the man who robbed their store. The state then called two clerks from Mickey's, another convenience store that was robbed the day before the 7-Eleven. The Mickey's clerk also identified Powell as the man who robbed their store. They also testified that they had watched the videotape of the 7-Eleven robbery and believed that it depicted the same person who robbed Mickey's. After the state rested its case, the defense called the clerk and manager of a third area convenience store, Valero, that was robbed 12 days before the 7-Eleven. The Valero employees who testified were Sherry Rose and Victoria Milleola. Rose testified that she knew Powell personally. He had come into the Valero store several times. She also testified that she believed Powell was not the man who robbed the Valero store. Because Powell was much taller and spoke differently from the robber. Milleola then testified they had seen the videotape of the 7-Eleven robbery, and believed that showed the same man who robbed the Valero store. But she did not believe that the man was Powell. Milleola echoed Rose's belief that Mr. Powell was taller than the robber. Mr. Powell maintained he is innocent of all three robberies. After trial, the state presented a report from Knox and Associates, a forensic consulting firm, by the prosecution. The consultant concluded that the suspect shown in the surveillance video is at least 6 foot 1 tall. After Mr. Powell was convicted and sentenced, Powell's girlfriend, Tamara Parsons hired expert, Doctor L. Janovitz, to conduct both a height determination of the suspect pictured in the Valero video and the 7-Eleven video and a voice recognition comparison and analysis. Doctor Janovitz issued his report on January 14, 2014. He concluded that the suspect shown in the surveillance videos was probably 5 foot 7 and 1/2 inches, with approximately half an inch margin of error. Two experts came to very different conclusions and used very different methods for reaching their conclusions. Because the forensic discipline is not subject to accreditation under Texas law, there does not appear to be a consistent quality standard governing the work of the practitioners in the discipline of the analysis in Texas. In terms of the jurisdictional analysis, neither expert in the case is from the DPS accredited crime laboratory and are specifically exempt from DPS accreditation. We heard discussion that when the legislature was reviewing it, they were contemplating putting digital evidence into the law. But at the time it was so new, they decided not to do it. Thus the commission cannot make a negligence or misconduct finding for this complaint. What we're interested in is really the two experts reported vastly different size determinations. One basically said that the individual in the video was 5' 7" to 5' 8". And the other one said he was over 6 foot 1. So that was clearly a great discrepancy. And this individual was ultimately convicted, and I think he was given 28 years. And it is the recommendation of the Screening Committee that we should present to the full commission our recommendation to actually do an investigation to try and determine why there's such a vast difference between the two reports. They both appear to have very good credentials, and they use different methods of getting at it. So we'd like to first find out if there is a recommended method. And if we can get a consultant to really help us sort out this difference. Because that was a key piece of evidence. And he was convicted. And in fact he was 5' 7" to 5' 8", then perhaps there was a misjustice done. And I just want to add quickly, I spoke with the chair of SWGIT, which is the SWG that's responsible for this area. And she's at the FBI. She mentioned that the SWGs-- because I had called asking, well, can you give me an experts name? And they generally don't do that. But she did say that there are reputable people out there in and outside of Texas, who could help the commission sort through these issues. They do have a standards document that she pointed me to, which is schedule 12 on their website, that governs this particular area of digital evidence. Because it's quite a broad discipline, as you might imagine. And so there does seem to be-- at the ASCLD meeting in addition, there has been discussion on and off. Why is digital evidence not accredited? Why is digital evidence not accredited? Because ASCLD lab does accredit the discipline. I talked to Brady, who's here today, Brady Mills, who is the current sitting president of ASCLD as well as the director of the crime laboratory in Austin for DPS. Did I get that right? Yes, ma'am. That's correct. And we had a bit of a discussion, because he was around when the original decision was made about digital evidence as an exclusion from accreditation. And I think it was very early in the discipline's development. I'm not even sure ASCLD lab was accrediting the discipline at that time. So it didn't make a lot of sense for DPS to put it on the list. I think they would be willing, though obviously they're not going to give a pre-determination about how they would come out on it. They'd have to look at it. But they'd be willing to give it fresh eyes, I think was a fair assessment. I went back and looked at the list of disciplines that are included in DPS accreditations, and this one actually is statutory. So this would be part of our discussion. But you are correct. ASCLD lab was very new to it at the time that the DPS accreditation was made. So there would have to be a lot of collaboration with DPS, if the commission were to look at the accreditation issue. Because what I didn't even think about at the time was if the commission were to make a recommendation that this discipline be accredited along with the other disciplines-- number one, the legislature would have to take action. That might be easier than we think. Who knows? But number two, if a bunch of people currently performing this discipline are no longer allowed to perform the discipline, who gets the cases? DPS probably. And so would there be an impact there? There would have to be a real thoughtful analysis of what types of recommendations the commission would make, since this would not be a negligence or misconduct review. It would be more of a policy type, best practices review. I hope that makes sense. I just had a question. I thought that our mandate was to evaluate labs for alleged negligence or misconduct only if the labs are accredited. How do we overcome this hurdle? This particular issue-- the lab is not accredited, and I don't think we have any standards to compare. We might get experts, I agree, but is there an allegation of negligence or misconduct that is being alleged? Or they're two reports that don't coincide as far as height is concerned. So I'm a bit confused. What are we trying to investigate? So the inmate who was convicted does allege negligence or misconduct by the state's expert. We have expanded jurisdiction now since the last legislative session. So there are three categories that the commission can investigate. One is the traditional negligence or misconduct in an accredited laboratory involving an accredited discipline. The second is the commission is allowed to investigate disciplines that are not subject to DPS accreditation, but only for the limited purposes of making observations regarding the integrity of the analysis, issuing best practices, and other recommendations that the commission feels are appropriate. And then the third category is when the commission sort sua sponte, for lack of a better word, decides that of its own initiative it's going to review cases. That would be hair microscopy as the example. So this would be that second group of cases. So we cannot render an opinion about negligence or misconduct. Am I correct? Exactly. So I think the committee felt that because of the significant difference in the two opinions, that really we should potentially reach out to an expert to give some direction, some advice to the committee as to is one absolutely wrong or absolutely right? Or it's still inconclusive. But because of the sentencing, we felt we had to do something. And at least, if not an expert, than certainly ask the commission, the innocence group, to take a look at this. So by the end of day, we are not going to render an opinion of whether this was a misconduct or negligence. Am I correct? That's correct. All that we're going to say is that we got an expert, and this expert is saying something different. We might have a third opinion. Right. I think that's right. I think our position was we could have no impact on this. We could have an expert that points out that there are standards that weren't followed by one side or the other. And the best that could come out of it would be to have some recognizable objective standards that could be followed that would enhance this. My interest in this, and the reason I thought it was worth further investigation, is use of video cameras of various qualities is a tremendously common tool in the prosecution of cases. And the quality is such that sometimes it isn't clear who is on them. And if there are standards there that could help the parties on either side differentiate between good science, and bad science, and whether those are followed. I think it would be an advance. And I think from what's been said, there's some possibility as our jurisdiction continues to expand, that we might at some point have this under our jurisdiction. So I'm sorry I'm ignorant about all this video thing. But do we have a national standard on that at all? It's through SWG. Is that a working standard or is it an accepted standard? It's a working standard, I think. I haven't looked at 12, the specific document that addresses this sub-discipline of IT. But it's probably a recommendation like most of the SWGs at the moment are actually recommendations or guidelines, rather than standards. And that's something that will be changing I expect. But I don't think any of us are familiar with that recommendation at the moment. We don't know whether or not they've followed it. It's in the back of this complaint file. And what Doctor Mozayani has open are those photos that show you how it should be. Oh, you can see from there what I opened? Yes. So that's the document. As you see here, it's got the figures and so forth. So this is out there. How widely it's used-- I think it varies. Brady, would you agree that there's a lot of variation? The SWG's are able to do [INAUDIBLE] in labs. And certain disciplines they were able to describe in these guidelines, but it's not an actual set of standards. But usually when they put the guidelines the laboratory must follow it. It's kind of unwritten. Well again, this case-- 2009. Yeah. So it's not that old. Well, I think the value of having someone else look at this, is you have parties that have been employed by two opposing sides. And they came out with vastly different results. And having someone that is uninvolved with it-- if it turns out they have a third result, it kind of shows that that field has such variance. And I think that itself is worthwhile to know. But also if it turns out that there is a standard not followed, then I think that's important as well. Even though we're not going to render an opinion otherwise, we may one day have to. I think it's important also for us to recognize that a third party would be able to look at the strengths and the weaknesses of each method that was used. Because they were very different methods that were used in analysis here. And I think that might help establish some guidelines for future practice. The answers that they came out with are very different, but that's almost less important than the method they used to reach it, which are so different. I mean, they couldn't be more different. Whereas in other disciplines that wouldn't happen. I mean that much of a variance, I don't think. Like in toxicology, you shouldn't see that wide of a difference in approach lab to lab. I think there's many disciplines where they do, without the mandate from the accrediting body, follow the SWIG recommendation, DNA and drug chemistry being the main ones. But for disciplines like IT, I'm not sure that we have a feel for how common it is for them to follow. Rudy, do you have a sense of that? Do you follow the SWIG IT guidelines at DPS? We do. We feel as a laboratory that those are best practices for the community. And so we do follow the SWIG guidelines. So maybe something the panel-- when we establish the panel-- might consider, actually, is using some expertise at DPS, since they're following the recommendations already, before they actually go ahead, and move ahead, and hire an expert. It's just a thought if you're open to that. If we're asked [INAUDIBLE]. They always say that at DPS-- So I guess the question is we're throwing it open to the commission to ultimately make a final decision in that case. We recommended that we should approach an expert and try to get some help in making some determination as to the way that each had done it. Is there one way preferable? Is there one way better than any other? So is there a motion to establish an investigative panel for complaint number 14-01? I would rule that, yes. I second it. Will those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? OK, so the second case is a case involving Mr. Kenny Robinson. His complaint is essentially against the autopsy performed by the pathologist Ralph Erdman who was contracted by Lovett County DA's office. This is an older case just by the fact it's not covered-- autopsies are not covered by our compelling legislation. It occurred in 1988. It's beyond the jurisdiction of this group. So all those facts said that we believe we do not have jurisdictional analysis. However, we feel that the results is such that we would suggest that we recommend that the Innocence Project of Texas take a look at this case, and see if there's any help they can provide to Mr. Robinson. I should say that we were provided documentation which supports allegations of wrongdoing by Doctor Erdman in a number of cases, suggesting that he had previously fabricated his autopsy results, and there may be some basis for the complaint. So we're recommending that we refer this to the Innocence Project of Texas. Can I make one slight amendment to that? Sure. So we, for a long time, we've been dumping everything at Nick's feet. And I think what we try to do now is we have a letter that has all of the Innocence Clinics that are funded on there. So that if someone is, let's say their family member's in closer physical proximity to the clinic at Texas Southern, or for whatever reason, feels more comfortable going there, then they have that option. So yes, typically it's Nick and company that take the case on, but we want to include the others as well. So amended. Thank you. So is there a motion to dismiss complaint number 14-06? I'll make a motion. Second? Second. Will those in favor say aye? Aye. Those opposed. I had a question, though, about this. Do we have some mechanism for vetting contract pathologists that are performing autopsies? No. The commission-- I mean, we don't. Right, I'm saying, but is there a standard that we-- [LAUGHING] Certainly the standard is that if you're supposed to be doing an autopsy, and say you do one, that you actually do it. [LAUGHTER] I mean, that's a pretty simple standard there. That's the minimum standard. I understand that entirely. The question is, not everybody has necessarily direct access, and this was a contractor, I believe. Yes. OK. So how does the Department of Public Services decide who they're going to allow to do this? Do they have a way to analyze and find out if they're competent? No, and that's not our jurisdiction, I assume. No. Well, there is an oversight body in Texas, the State Board. And the autopsy is considered a medical practice, and so if there is a complaint, it should go to the State Board and they will investigate that. OK. And obviously, a dry autopsy is totally unacceptable. It's not that Doctor Erdman's have been all dry. He's done some autopsies, but his conclusions are frequently very wrong. And that's not the only-- And he kept some bodies in his fridge at home or something? I mean, we heard a lot of crazy stuff yesterday, but, I mean, this is beyond the pale type behavior. I just wanted to volunteer to Nick that if you do pick this case up, and if you wanted a forensic pathologist to evaluate, I'll be more than happy to help you out. Yes. I've done some court cases. I'll keep on adding to my portfolio. [LAUGHTER] Dry autopsy-- the first time I heard that term was yesterday. I have a deposition right now from a forensic pathologist which-- he says that autopsy is art. He's doing it as like art. Art? Yes. And that's-- the result was wrong, because just that day, the art was-- didn't draw it. Art's very subjective, so it's an art. OK, we can move on to the third complaint. This is Case 14-08. It involved Blazick. It's a case involving firearms and tool marks. The background and facts are defendant Joshua Rankston is a client of a criminal defense attorney, complainant Frank Blazick. Franks, who was charged with capital murder in Rains County, Texas. The victim in the murder was known to carry a 410/405 caliber pistol, the same type of weapon with which the victim was shot several times. Investigators found no weapon at the crime scene. The state theorized that the perpetrator took the victim's pistol, shot him with it, then left with the weapon. In his complaint, Blazick complains that a few months after the crime, a 410 pistol similar to that owned by the deceased and was recovered on a roadside in a nearby county. The weapon was provided to the final examiner at Southwestern Institute of Forensic Science, SWIFS, along with the wadding taken from the victim. The SWIFS examiner identified the weapon as having fired the bullets from the deceased. Further police investigation determined that the recovered weapon did not, in fact, belong to the deceased, as the state had theorized, but rather to a party unrelated to the investigation. The complaint explained that if the initial laboratory report from SWIFS in 2010 had been correct, then both defendants would have not been guilty, because neither had access to the recovered weapon. In September, 2012, the DA resubmitted the same weapon and bullets to SWIFS along with three exemplar weapons of the same make and model. On this occasion, the analysts concluded that she could only confirm that the weapon was the murder weapon. The analyst indicated that the first report was scientifically valid, but she did not know that the weapon actually fired the fatal rounds. So SWIFS is DPS accredited, and the firearm and tool mark analysis is a forensic science discipline to pass accreditation. Thus the complaint could be accepted by the investigation and a negligence and/or misconduct finding may be issued by the condition for this complaint. Doctor Bernard recused himself in this case coming from SWIFS, and the complaint was left for discussion between the remaining members of the committee. The overall recommendation was that we essentially allow the full commission to review this case because of the initial discrepancy between the first report, which clearly said that it was fired from that weapon, and then the subsequent report basically said that they could not make any determination as to the origin of the bullets or the cartridges that killed the individual. Can I just interject here that Doctor Bernard is recusing himself from discussion and deliberation on this case for obvious reasons. Yes. That you do have-- there are some representatives from SWIFS to-- Yes, the laboratory. Answer any questions that the commission has. And the commission felt as though-- the complaints committee felt as though there's enough ambiguity, perhaps, in the way that things are done and handled, that that is probably something that may be looked at-- to have two differing reports giving the same weapon. I'm presuming the second report was generated by another examiner, correct? No, the same examiner. Same examiner, and both reports were verified, so-- and there's some discussion to the witnesses about the fact that, as far as an explanation that is possible for the mechanisms in the weapon that makes the markings to change over time, is, if I understood it correctly, by use of it, by firing, depending on the burr or something else can account for that. That's the next question I was going to ask, was the weapon being used since-- We don't really know. I think the weapon was found a few months after the original murder, and it was probably not a significant amount of time for the weapon to be used to the level which it may take to change the markings. But that's something that I think we-- Right, but it wasn't moved between the first testing and the second testing. My understanding was the weapon was secure, so the only use of the weapon would've been to do the firings that would have resulted of that. And I think the expectation, again, in the discussion of this, was that it wasn't like, "We think this is the weapon confirmed." That it was quite the opposite. We've just, in the abundance of caution, since this weapon was found, go ahead and test it. And I think the second test result was more consistent with what they expected to find, because there was multiple tests that came out of this. So was there any biological evidence found on the weapon? No. None recovered, so did SWIFS try to get another opinion outside their own lab? Not that we know. I believe-- and I think there are individuals from SWIFS here that probably could provide that information, but based on the complaint screening yesterday, wasn't there an attempt on the part of the law enforcement agency to have the firearm examined at DPS? Hi, I'm Tim Slater. I am from SWIFS. I am Section Chief in Physical Evidence Section, so I have administrative responsibilities and management responsibilities over the Firearms Unit in that section. My expertise is not firearms. It's DNA and genetics. And April Stowe is the firearms supervisor at this time, although she was not the supervisor at the time this examination took place. The question to clarify this? Whether DPS was asked to look at that? There was a question about retesting, and my recollection was that there was a request made for that, that the reexamination took place at SWIFS. Yes, that is the case. Our understanding of this is through communications with the Rains County District Attorney's Office. And we understand that their investigation indicated a conflict between our results and what they were getting in their investigation. They made a request to the Department of Public Safety to reexamine the evidence. And DPS declined to do that. It was not, we understand-- and based upon the communication of the DA's office, that DPS's policy is not do reexamination of firearms evidence when the examination was already done by another [INAUDIBLE]. So as a result of that, the Rains County DA contacted us and requested if we would do a reexamination, which we agreed to do. The question about biological evidence-- there was never any request to do biological analysis at the time. The swabs were taken when DNA was requested. I see. And our understanding is the original gun was recovered along the roadside after some period of time, so there's probably very little expectation after being in an environment for an extended period that you would get biological elements of significance [INAUDIBLE]. I just wanted to say that it is commendable that SWIFS, when they examined the weapon the second time, they came out and said they were not sure about the first report, which is very good, so I'm very happy about that. But I think if everybody has any thoughts, my thought would be to resolve this issue. Only way we can do it is to get another agency to look at it. I know that most firearm examiners don't like to do that. Especially since SWIFS has an excellent reputation. So, but it can be resolved. I agree with you, too, because that's-- probably we need to have another lab or another expert to look at that, and just let's at least review the result. Especially because sometimes we have situations where on the re-review, they realize that things maybe weren't done correctly. It's my understanding there's no flaw in the way the analysis was done between review one and review two, both of them-- at least from what I heard from the testimony. And so that's more troubling to me than we recognize something that maybe should have been done differently, or wasn't done in the case. And again, it's an area that can be very critical in cases, so I think it would be a good idea to have an independent lab look at it and see what the answer is. I think there's also a broader question in the discipline, just from recent conversations about how a conclusion is expressed in a laboratory report. And I think the way that it's expressed in these reports is very common among the discipline. But it's entirely possible-- we'll see what the expert that we talk with says, but it's entirely possible that this person's subjective judgment-- she went through the appropriate steps. She reached a subjective judgment. Calling it just was the wrong opinion, but the question, I think, then becomes, OK, how do we express to the community that's going to receive that conclusion that this is an opinion of the examiner? Because the way it's currently worded, and I think the way the vast majority of firearms examiners conclude things is quite definitive. Is that a fair statement? Because I think you all are looking at ways to revise the laboratory report internally? Is that right? We are. I mean, we are doing a corrective action review of this at the moment. I would say that one of the issues for us is that our understanding of what the correct answer is, is a bit unsatisfactory, because it's based completely upon what the District Attorney is telling us the defendant stated as part of the plea bargain, which is not the best sort of information to make evaluations of scientific processes on. I would be absolutely supportive of having not just one firearms examiner, but multiple firearms examiners look at these materials to come to a conclusion. I don't know that one person would be [INAUDIBLE]. I think anybody working in a scientific area understands that there are some results which are clearly far above your threshold for detection or threshold for making an opinion. And there are other ones which are fairly close to that threshold. And that when you're close to that threshold, different examiners may come to different opinions, even in DNA. But there's no way in firearms to express how far you are away from that threshold. Right, and that's a big issue generally. I think that's a fundamental problem. But I think that's true for all pattern recognition. I think that there are expectation biases. And they are inadvertent, I would say. I remember the famous Madrid bombing, where the FBI implicated a person from Portland, Oregon. And they were totally wrong on that. And they then recanted that, and they went back and said yes, we were incorrect. And I think this happens in all pattern recognition. So we have to be cognizant of that. I'm sorry I interrupted you. No, no. I thought from yesterday, if I understood Lynn's question, the point was that-- the concern was that as is going on currently in our microscopy examination, that the way it's expressed, the way it's reported, is an issue-- that I think we've learned-- I've certainly seen over the years, especially with the introduction of adding a certainty of measurements, that there's a value to reporting this is our answer. But you can't give it 100% weight, because these are the factors. And I think that's what we're wondering about-- whether that's something else that can be gained from this? Is there a better way to report it so that everybody knows we don't mean absolutely this is the weapon. We mean it with these qualifications. If that's a fair-- there's two elements here. There's the opinion of the examiner. And then there's the qualifications in terms of the limitation of the analysis. And the opinion of the examiner is simply that. If there is uncertainty in an opinion, then it needs to be a different opinion. So it's getting that element of the limitations of the analysis in the reports that I think will be an opportunity for improvement. I guess the way I'm hearing most of the labs now are dealing with that, it's the second reviewer is doing it-- their testing themselves without knowing what the result is from the first examiner. And they try to get with each other in the same-- you know, if it is the result same, then that's it. If it's not, then they go with the other one. And that's the labs, the FBI is doing right now with the fingerprints. Most of the labs that they work with, the second reviewer completely does it-- It's a blind examination. It's a blind examination, yes. So is it a blind examination currently, or is that going to be part of the recommendation from the root cause analysis? That's the point where we believe that we can improve the process. We don't know that that's the problem in this particular case, but that can be an improvement of the process regardless of what the root cause is. But I think somebody mentioned that, and I think that's important-- DNA NAS report talked about how do we express error rates? And should those error rates be included in our reports? I don't think that we're really doing that right now. And how do you measure an error rate? But there is not any requirement for DNA. There's no way to do that for a subjective pattern. I just went to a conference on this exact issue. There's a lot of discussion right now in this particular discipline about whether there's any way to express it statistically. And there's been some movement around that. Whether it comes to anything I don't know, but it's definitely an area of conversation. I mean, it seems to me this is a best practices investigation more than anything else. And I don't know that we have a sense of how many firearm sections within the state do blind reexaminations as opposed to the alternatives. but clearly that places a significant burden on the labs, and so we need to consider all of that. So do we need a motion to [INAUDIBLE]? I have just one question, probably better for April as the subject matter expert, but in terms of the characteristics changing sufficiently between 2010 and 2012, given the fact that the weapon had only been used for test firing, how many times would it have had to have been fired in order for those characteristics of changed, from being able to make what appears in the first report to be fairly definitive identification-- it says test shots were labeled-- oh, sorry, it says all were identified as having been fired from Item 69 Taurus revolver to not being able to make the identification. How many times would you have to fire the weapon to change it to that extent? I think that it would have had to have been fired significantly more than what it was actually fired for the test fires that were actually done. I think in this case, part of the change in opinion was that originally, the material That was compared-- the wads from autopsy were plastic material. The test-fired material, based on what we had in our reference collection was actually lead. So that was what the original identifications were made on, was a lead test fire compared to a plastic wad-- which can be done. And we've had proficiency tests where you can compare different materials to one another and make identifications. Upon the second re-examination, we actually had evidence ammunition that was submitted, so we had plastic wads to test fire. So the second examination included comparisons of the plastic wads from autopsy compared to plastic test fires. And then in addition to that, there was a comparison back to that original lead slug that was fired. So I think with the additional information and the additional test fires, that's what supported a change in opinion. Thank you, that's helpful. Can I add to that? You can correct me if [INAUDIBLE]. On the second round of testing in 2012, there were actually [INAUDIBLE] multiple lead test fires. Yes, there were. But those were not identified back to the original test fire that was done in 2010 and was used as a basis for comparison. So the microscopic characteristics were not sufficiently similar to say that those test fires which were known to have come from the same gun matched up with that original test fire. And that's a very odd thing to, first off have happen. And I think that it's, for me, in analyzing it from a root cause analysis, it's something that kind of confirms the independence of that second round of testing, because that's not the sort of result you would expect if people were simply trying to confirm their original observation. Is there any other discussion? I just had one more question. We recognize that if a weapon has been fired multiple times, there are some changes that take place. But what about if the weapon is left in disuse for many, many months or years? Do we expect any changes to occur also? I wouldn't expect any changes unless it had been exposed to moisture and there may be rusting of the barrel, but I don't think that that would be a common thing to observe if it's being retained in an evidence warehouse. Are you saying that you don't expect based on what you feel, or do we have scientific evidence for that? I don't have any scientific basis for that expectation. Is there a motion to establish an investigative panel for Number 14-08, Blazick? I'll make the motion. I'll second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All those opposed? OK. And one commissioner abstains. And abstention from Doctor Bernard. OK. The next complainant was Richard Earl Gambles. And he was convicted of two counts of aggravated sexual assault and received two life sentences. Mister Gamble's complaint alleges that Mister David Young, a DNA analyst at the DPS Regional Laboratory in Lubbock gave falsified testimony about hair, blood, and slide test results that we used to convict him at trial. He requests copies of the original DNA reports in this case, alleging that the test results presented at trial were fabricated. He also alleges numerous flaws in the police line-up used to identify him. He further alleges a conspiracy between Judge Bradley Underwood and Assistant DA Kenneth Hawke and claims that his attorney did not provide sufficient representation. On face value, this case should be dismissed because it precedes the legislative creating the commission. It originally occurred at least in 1997, if not earlier, and therefore predates the minimum, the time at which this commission was actually enacted. Any further, any allegation against the Judge and Assistant DA are beyond the scope of this committee, and therefore, it's recommended that this be essentially dismissed-- this complaint be dismissed. Is there any discussion? Can I raise one issue that's come up? And we're struggling with it a little bit, which is often when we have these complaints, we ask DPS, can you send us a lab report? And then they send us the lab report. And so we'll forward that with a dismissal letter to the inmate. But what occurred to me recently is that the reason DPS and the other laboratories don't provide them when requested through a PIA request is because there's an exception in the PIA that state agencies don't have to provide information to current inmates. So it might be better to try to route these through the innocence clinic so that the correspondence is between the clinic and the inmate. Because otherwise, it's basically we become a PIA vehicle to get around the exemption that's in the PIA. Does that make sense? We become sort of a go-around. And we don't have the staff to be able to manage that. Does that make sense, what I'm saying? If the clinics get involved, then that exemption goes away because they're able to get whatever they need through the PIA. Is that fair, Nick? I just don't want to be the end run around the rule. So when we issue are findings and send a copy of that, we send the materials we considered with that to the inmate currently? If they ask for a DNA report-- like in here, the brother of this inmate says that in the past, I've attempted to obtain copies of DNA results from Lovett County, but was unsuccessful. Basically, he says he doesn't have the financial means to do it and he can't get it. Right. So typically, if I have it, I just send it because, why wouldn't we? But I think what could happen is if the word gets out that all you've got to do is ask the Forensic Science Commission, you can get your reports. Right. I'd rather have, if Nick or one of the other clinics is interacting with the inmate, I'm happy to give it to him and he can turn it over, and then see if there's anything there. But I just get-- we're starting to get more and more of these, I want my DNA report. I want it. And after giving out the last few, I was thinking, oh god, what have I gotten myself into? I mean, it seems silly not to give it to them. But you're right, it is going to be-- it could be a default way of them getting documents that they don't have, especially concerning when they're complaints that clearly fall outside our jurisdiction. And if they get hooked up with one of the clinics, then they can get it. So we need to-- do you need us to-- No, I just want to-- --to approve that change? No, you don't need to do anything. I just wanted to raise it as an issue. So in this case, as an example, we would turn it over to the clinics for further interaction with the inmate in addition to dismissal. OK. One of the things that I wasn't even sure about, I don't know if these are the original reports or copies. The reports were dated June 26, 2014. The offense date was 1995. And apparently his conviction was 1997. So the dates on there are just an issue in the lens that Pat Swanson has pointed out. They get dated the day that he generates them for reasons that I'm not sure he's even clear about. But it's just a quirk in the lens. The other thing, there are apparently three different reports. There were apparently three victims. Multiple sexual assaults. He was convicted of two counts of aggravated-- I'm not sure which of the reports are directly applicable to this case. That's everything they have on him, on this particular inmate. So in the future, you will send the dismissal letter to the inmate, but also a letter to tell them to cut in touch with the innocence clinic. Will you be providing the innocence clinics with the reports? Yes. So isn't that just adding one additional layer to getting around the non-disclosure? Well, if they are represented by an attorney, they're entitled to the information. So it's basically just helping the lawyer not have to go through a PIA request to DPS. OK, I understand. Or any other laboratory. I'm just using DPS in this example. Is there a motion to dismiss investigation 14-09 Gambles? Mm-hmm. Second. I would also amend-- what Lynn said is that we provide the innocence team, whichever one elects to take this case, with the report. OK. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed. OK. The fifth complaint was that of Scharmen. A complainant was George Scharmen, who is a defense attorney representing defendant Tracy Blanket, who was charged with a DWI. "Scharmen alleges that the Office of Scientific Director at DPS failed to disclose important electronic data regarding the operation and performance of breath-testing machines located at the [INAUDIBLE] Office in San Antonio, Texas. The complainant alleges that the machines have been registering multiple errors, such as false interference, in the referenced sample device used to calibrate the machines. Mr. Scharmen alleges that the interference include acetone, which is used in the machines during monthly maintenance procedures. DPS refers to the errors as false, but cannot explain why the machines are reporting this error. According to [? Scharmen, ?] DPS claims that no other false interference have been registered by San Antonio machines since November of 2013. However, the electronic data is no longer available beginning November of 2013. [? Scharmen ?] requested the electronic data may be made available to-- for his client. Some of the things which we also found out is that the DPS, although the Office of Scientific Director has issued standard guidelines which provides guidance to not only the Department of Public Safety's Breath Alcohol Laboratory, but also the laboratories providing breath alcohol service which fall under the department's regulartory authority. The OSD, the Office of Scientific Director, does not have the authority to govern the disclosure of governmental records, Section 7A of the SOD detail record keeping for laboratory providing breath alcohol services. There is no requirement these records must be maintained in electronic form. And the DPS does not provide breath alcohol laboratory services to Bear County. Instead, the Bear County Commissioner's Court has a contractual agreement with the private forensic laboratory, Alamo Forensic Services. Under the regulatory authority given the [INAUDIBLE] by the Texas legislature and the resulting administrative code set forth in [INAUDIBLE] 37 Chapter 19, the Office of Scientific Director certifies two employees of Alamo Forensic Services as technical supervisors. These two individuals provide alcohol laboratory services to Bear County, including [INAUDIBLE] operator supervision, testing facility oversight, and record compilation and retention. Since DPS is not directly involved in the day-to-day activities at Alamo Forensic Services, DPS has made no claims concerning the [INAUDIBLE] interference in Bear County. All records concerning the instance mentioned in the complaint are in the custody and control of Alamo Forensic Services. DPS recently received a portion of the electronic information generated by the [INAUDIBLE] instrument. They don't receive the complete records. This data is used by the OSD for program management. The individual test records and other information related to instrument maintenance is always maintained by technical supervisors who are employees of Alamo Forensic Services, who are responsible for the instrument oversight. In this case, Alamo Forensic Services maintains the evidential test records and instrument maintenance files. DPS regularly provides the collected program management data and responds to public information requests." "So late in calendar year 2013, the data acquisition software become corrupted and the programs became inoperable. Therefore, DPS did not get any results signing in November 2013. Prior efforts to repair the data had been unsuccessful. However, DPS believes recent attempts to patch the software will prove effective and will provide this program management data in accordance with established DPS policy related to public information requests." So it is the recommendation of the Complaint Screening Committee that this complainant be informed of the fact that it's not the responsibility of the DPS to provide this data. And that if they need the data, they should certainly contact Alamo Forensic Services. I think in our materials, they've already been notified of that. Matt Allen, who's the scientific director and oversees the breath alcohol program in Texas for DPS, already has made that communication letting them know that the records are available directly from Alamo Forensic Services and not through DPS. So this is not really any-- it's not a complaint alleging negligence or misconduct. It's a question of accessibility to the information. And they've already been instructed where to get the information. So I'm not quite sure why it was submitted. Neither am I. My question what be, [INAUDIBLE] do about all this? Maybe we can direct them and tell them that this has been already related to you. I think that's essentially what we're suggesting, is they just get reminded another time that DPS is not the right party. That Alamo Forensic Services is. And they apparently had contacted them before. And it's them that needs to provide any further information. I would agree. Any discussion, additional discussion? OK, is there a motion to dismiss this complaint? So move. Second? Second. Second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? OK, now we can begin with the self disclosures of a number of laboratories concerning different incidents that occurred. The first is case 14-07. It's a self-complaint by IFL Laboratories, Integrated Forensic Laboratories, here in the Metroplex. And this involves two marks. "On April 10, 2014, Integrated Forensic Labs-- we'll refer to them as IFL-- disclosed a non-conformance in the laboratory's firearms tool mark section. IFL firearms examiner, Paul Slocum, issued a report that excluded a group of cartridge cases as being fired from a group of five firearms provided by examination by Nassau County Police Department to IFL for testing. After initially defending his work against questions raised by law enforcement, Mr. Paul Slocum re-examined his work and discovered that he had mistakenly eliminated the cartridge cases by cartridge manufacturing characteristics. Upon re-examination, Slocum confirmed a match to one of the five firearms he originally excluded. In the course of his analysis, Mr. Slocum used a manufacturing anomaly considered a classic characteristic found on the head stamp of cartridge cases to separate cartridge cases into five groups. He then compared the cartridge cases to each group to test cartridge cases fired from any of the the five firearms. He matched four groups to a firearm, but he reported the fifth as not being fired from any of the five firearms. His subsequent reexamination determined that the fifth group of cartridges had indeed been fired from one of the five firearms. At the time, Ron Fazio was general manager of IFL, and he was the one who technically reviewed this case and confirmed that the original report that he did not catch the mistake made by Mr. Slocum. Since then, Mr. Fazio has been promoted to vice president of NMS Labs, the IFL's parent company. Since the cartridges were originally reported to Nassau County Department as exclusions, no verification was made. They had a number of suggested corrective actions. IFL issued the original report to Nassau County Police Department and a detective had called to express his concern that something had been missed in Slocum's analysis. So the contracting agency called to find out about the exclusion. And Mr. Slocum originally had said, no, no mistakes were made. IFL then essentially went through a series of corrective actions, including analysis of all the firearms casework conducted in the last 12 months. General Manager Fazio ordered all the firearms case work conducted in the last 12 months. At the time, there appeared to be only two firearms analysts, Mr. Slocum and Mr. Fazio. And as I had said, Mr. Fazio had tech reviewed the original report from Mr. Slocum and missed the error. The order was designed to determine if a similar error could have occurred in other cases. They ha a number of other suggested things that they needed to do." They developed a spreadsheet which ensured that every item would be checked against every item. That was put into effect after this event. I guess one of the things that the Complaints Committee was not clear about and was not perhaps satisfied with was the fact that in the review of all cases in the last 12 months, Mr. Fazio was the one who had done the tech review and then re-reviewed, essentially, these cases himself. Since this occurrence-- in fact, within the last week, there appears to be another analyst capable of doing further reviews. They've qualified a technician to an analyst position. And now there's a woman who could actually do tech reviews. So the question that we have before us is, do we feel that the actions of IFL satisfied the commission? Or, if there's more that could be done in this particular case? So we leave it up to the commission for their determination. So just for clarification, did Complaint Screening Committee yesterday decided to defer-- We're deferring to the full commission on this particular case. There was this irregularity of a person who originally did the tech reviews who missed the problem. Should he be the one that is to review those cases again? He's already seen them once and he made a mistake in this particular case. Whether he's made any other states, we're not sure. But from what they've provided us, they've found no other-- Mr. Fazio found no other cases done in the last 12 months where there are any other errors. For the first question that you ask, that's not acceptable in the audit, the person that is reviewer or examiner to audit the cases-- That's true. --if the corrective action happens. Right. So I think that's probably-- you notice it all of you. And the second thing, I look at them differently. There is no non-experience examiner that you have and you want that to review that. I think that's too much putting in shoulder of the examiner that is just promoted from technician to examiner. So the second one, proposing-- or they are proposing is not the right person for this too. That's the way I feel. Well, I think they've already completed that corrective action and the review. And this person who was a technician and had not yet completed her training to do independent case work participated in the review. As far as I know, she's not participated in any review. It was just that they now have another analyst available. I thought she had? My understanding-- Elise Watts is here, so she can clarify. She was part of the review. She was not the only person that did the review. She did more of a logistical type of investigation rather than actually confirming one case against another or one item of evidence against another. I thought you had indicated that she just got promoted this past week? Correct. So at the time, whenever these reviews took place, she was not an examiner or analyst? Right. And the cases that she reviewed, it was not a complete review. She did part of the review, like the paperwork-type part. So I guess what we felt as though it should be left up to the commission to determine if we felt that what they've done in this particular case was sufficient, or we may make other recommendations to put this to rest. If I could say one more thing? Sure. The error that occurred was not that he d identify a particular cartridge case to a weapon. It was that he just didn't look at it. He had eliminated it on [INAUDIBLE] mark impressions, which is a manufacturing process. Because we do not verify eliminations, there was no way that Mr. Fazio, the reviewer, could have caught this particular error. As soon as Mr. Slocum looked at i t, he said, yes, this is an error that I made. And then I made it because I excluded it on class characteristics that were not related to that particular weapon. We have done a corrective action on that to make sure it doesn't happen again. So any complex case-- this case had six guns and like 46 cartridge cases. Any complex case has to have a permutation worksheet to where not just the analyst can make sure that he has compared everything that can be compared, but also the tech reviewer now can make sure that everything that can be compared has been compared. So we feel like we have addressed the issue that occurred. It wasn't a technical issue. It was just a logistical type of issue. And I think I asked this and you explained it in part, but I'm still confused why the exclusions don't have a verification process? Because I mean, inclusion and exclusion to me are equally important. I mean, one party or the other is going to be very interested in that happening. Is there something that I don't understand about the process that keeps you from making sure that-- from what you're saying if I understood it, the error made was in excluding it. It wasn't an inclusive. But there is no mechanism in place at the time-- you don't verify the exclusions. And I'm not hearing you say that even with the corrective plan, you're now verifying the exclusions. That's correct. Why not? It's I guess a logistical problem, a logistical issue to where doing the exclusions would add significant time and manpower requirements to the particular cases. And it's not required by [INAUDIBLE]. Will the corrective action you've put in place, if that corrective action had been in place originally, would that paperwork you've discussed have made clear to Fazio when he looked at the work that that exclusion was not properly done? Yes. And also, to Slocum. It would have clued him to, oh, wait, I need to go and check this group against the guns. So it would have caught the problem. So for clarification, the error in this case, where there was some sort of non-conforming work event related to the fact that there wasn't an attempt-- it was an oversight not to make a comparison between one of the weapons and some of the items that were recovered? That's correct. It was an oversight. Right. And so the examiner was able to identify that he had not performed some of the comparisons that were necessary in the case. And then when the case was tech reviewed, that process was also missed, but you now have a worksheet that will prevent that from happening in the future? Correct. How can that be missed during the tech review? Can you explain that? When the case is being tech reviewed by the second independent examiner, how is it possible for them to miss that there was an attempt to do a comparison? Because surely, there must be some documentation in the case folder that an attempt on the comparison was made. Right. And when he separated out the groups of cartridge cases, he had like five different groups of cartridge cases. He compared all of the cartridges that were in that particular group. And the individual characteristics of each of those in the group matched each other. There were five compared within each group. When he compared it to the test fires, he matched one set with one gun, second set with second gun, and so on. And then he had this one group leftover that didn't match any of the other piles or groups that he had already matched with the guns. So he erroneously concluded that this did not have a gun in this group that it came from. But how did reviewer missed it again? So both of them missed it the way-- the reviewer didn't notice that needs to be included. There was not a mechanism for the reviewer to know it because at that time, it was labeled as an inclusion. And being labeled as an exclusion, it's not visually compared on the microscope by a second analyst. We're relying on the expertise of the firearms examiner to be able to recognize an exclusion very easily as opposed to a confirmation, which is definitely more difficult. So the reviewer is not reviewing-- I'm not firearm examiner. But just in general, the second reviewer is not reviewing from the initial that the case comes to the lab by the time [INAUDIBLE]? So they are missing one part of it? No. They don't review that part to see what has to be tested or not. That part is missing. No. It's all documented. And all of the matches are confirmed by a second analyst. So the second analyst went to the scope and he confirmed the one to one, and two to two, and three to three. He confirmed all of those. But when he got to the last group, they were eliminated by the first examiner. And he did not do some of that because it was an elimination. That was the point she was making though, is that he didn't go back and agree with the exclusion because once the exclusion was made, he didn't go back and look. Correct. But that's part of your process now? Correct. Only for complex cases, though? Not for all cases? Right. I'd still think this addresses the question with the discipline that is something that is going to be addressed at some point anyway. So I think it brings up another question about-- of the discipline of firearms and tool mark examination. I think it also addresses this issue of whether or not if you are the technical reviewer and the tech reviewer of record on a case, whether or not you are the correct individual to re-review cases as part of a corrective action. Because in my mind that wouldn't be acceptable in any of the other disciplines. But in this situation, there was no other person to rely on, is that not the case? But you have to. You can get them from another lab. That's very c practice. You'd have to go out. That's very common practice. If you have one examiner in your lab, you send them for review to another laboratory. And Elise, while you're here, when this notification was made to the accrediting body, ASCLD/LAB, what was the response from them? That it was a non-reportable event. And what do you understand by a non-reportable event? That it fell below the criteria that ASCLD/LAB has in order to qualify it as a deviation policy-- I'm not sure-- A disclosure. Yeah, a disclosure. Yes. They had copies of the corrective action, the same ones we have? Exact same ones. Is Mr. Slocum still employed by IFL? Yes. I'm sorry? Is Mr. Slocum still working for the IFL? Yes. And how long has he been employed there? Four years. Four years. And is Mr. Fazio doing a firearm work anymore or has he moved on? He is in Pennsylvania now and he has moved on. We have promoted a technician as an analyst. And we've hired another experienced analyst who will be joining us shortly. So you'll have three-- Yes. --firearm [INAUDIBLE]? And was it clear to ASCLD/LAB that the reexamination or the re-review as part of the corrective action was done by the same person who tech reviewed the original cases. They got the exact same documents that you did. Yes. So it's your understanding that they clearly understood that the re-review was done by the same technical reviewer. The original. Yes. And they deemed that to be acceptable. Yes. Well, that raises some interesting questions. So really because of those same -- We looked at it the same way. And we were not comfortable with that. And we felt as though it really should be the judgment of the full commission, if the commission felt that everything in terms of corrective actions were sufficient and allowing technical review to reexamine and review the same cases he once saw before, we felt was not necessarily appropriate and leave it up to the commission to make any final recommendations. So does someone want to entertain a motion? If I could say one more thing. The cases from Nassau County, all of them are not just being reviewed, they're being retested. By, By whom? By my laboratory. Where-- Which examiner? Lorelei Peterson. The new-- Yes. So you're willing to retest now. But to come up with a mechanism to retest exclusions that something that's not part of the current SOP. Correct. Except for complex cases. Correct. And there's a definition of what that is. That is. Yes. We do have a definition. So is there a motion regarding this complaint or to self disclosure, rather? Does someone want to entertain a motion? I guess what we felt as though we are not satisfied with having an individual who had been part of the technical review to re-review cases and we'd like to suggest that the IFL come up with another mechanism to deal with these situations where a second analyst who's reviewing is not the original reviewer. So are you proposing a motion to establish an investigative panel on the basis of establishing best practices? I would say that is a correct-- [CHUCKLING] --statement, yes. Is there a second? I'll second that. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. All those opposed. Same sign. OK. The next self-disclosure, unfortunately, is also from IFL. This is a case involving blood alcohol. So on May 20, 2014, IFL disclosed to Commission via email that the laboratory was investigating an incident where a blood alcohol analyst either misplaced, lost or destroyed another analyst's worksheet that recorded the data of analysis, evidence packaging information and other analysis notes. IFL followed this up with a formal written disclosure on June 27, 2014 So the actual things of the case were, an analyst, E. Fellow, was in the process of reanalyzing drug chemistry case. Fellows' result was slightly different from the initial IFL report, so she requested that analyst Lemon also test the samples for confirmation. One of the questions that we have, Elise was, were they really different or were they within acceptable limits. And I believe your response is that Ms. Fellow, when she tested it, they were in acceptable limits of the original report done by another analyst. So they weren't really wrong. They were within acceptable range. In the course of her examination, Lemon recreated Fellows' original worksheet and asked Fellow to initial the new worksheet via Post It note. Fellow observed that her original worksheet was not in the case folder and she notified supervisor Nathaniel Stevenson that she thought that the document was missing. Lemon never notified the supervisor about the missing document. The original worksheet had seemingly disappeared and Lemon presented the new worksheet with no explanation or documentation as to why the original worksheet was removed from the original case file. Supervisor Stevenson Watts interviewed Lemon on May 8, 2014 about the missing worksheet. During the interview, Lemon stated she had recreated the worksheet because it was messy, with numerous crossouts. She was later asked again on another date, subsequent date, what had happened to the original worksheet. Lemon stated that she did not know why the worksheet was missing and she actually thought it was in the case folder. Lemon was dismissed from IFL on May 16, 2014. They conduct an internal audit as part of their corrective action. IFL conducted an internal audit of all the analysts, caseworkers in the lab. The room 1539 cases from November 2013 to April, 2014. There were no other instances of missing documents found. In response to the incident, IFL created an internal policy that will control Staples and notified in a timely manner, any potential issues that might involve their cases. It was further-- there was some further discussions that this individual essentially left IFL on her own accord or was dismissed. But she had been cautioned previously about similar types of events that had occurred. And the reason for her dismissal was that apparently she violated common laboratory practices in terms of notification and essentially policies involving handling of documents. It was more of an honesty issue. That she knew that she had asked Ms. Fellow to resign something that Ms Lemon had created. She did notify a supervisor and this was something that I felt was a violation of trust in her So the question is, in terms of the actions taken by IFL, were they acceptable? Is this a case that we feel should be closed and that there's no further of work recommended in terms of this particular case? So, again,-- I think that one thing that we discussed in this was that there are times when a significant amount of work has been done. And that the work is acceptable and that we needed an avenue to communicate that to the laboratories. That dismissal may not be correct term but a letter describing that the Commission has evaluated it and felt that their actions were appropriate and nothing else, no other actions were needed. Right. So again, I'm sorry, I left out that the complaints screening committee felt that, I felt sufficient steps to prevent any further occurrence of this event And as Dr Bernard eloquently said that we feel as though the Commission, in general I think that there was some discussion about this yesterday. The question here is not related to the analytical results. Right. Rather the missing documentation. But it does state in the complaint that the reason for the retest was because the results were slightly different. And I think the screening committee had questions yesterday on what slightly, what the definition of slightly different was. And I think we were anticipating some response from IFL or National Medical Services today on what slightly different meant. That's your cue. Back when the original analysis was done, our quality protocols and criteria were different than what they are now. So when we were doing it previously, we would run and get four points of data on that one sample. And we would report out the lowest of those four points. The two points or the four points had to be within plus or minus 10% of one another. OK. So in the first analysis the results were 0.138, 0.139, 0.168, and 0.169. So those were within plus or minus 10% of one another. And in the second analysis it was 0.177, 0.179, 0.177, and 0.179. so in looking at the report, which was reported out in the first one as 0.13, and the second analysis was 0.17. That was what caused the concern of Ms. Fellows. When we went back and we looked at the criteria, first of all, our criteria is now that the four points have to be within plus or minus 5%. So we've tightened up our quality range on that. And also, if we analyze the data from the first run with our criteria on the second run, it is, and take the average, we do get where the values are overlapping. So it's not significantly different. Those two values do overlap. But the first run sounded like the data was more than the acceptable criteria. No. It was within-- 0.1 0.138, the first one and 0.169 was the last. So that's the differences. 0.31. My question is how long was it did before these two tests to be done. How did the first ones pass? 0.138 and 0.169 is-- Variance is 0.31 which is better than 10%. We're going to have to defer to Dr. Stevens on that. I will ask him and get back with you as soon as possible. But my understanding is, and I could be wrong, is that the average of the 0.138 and 0.139 is compared to the 0.168 and 0.169 and both of those is the difference plus and minus is 0.152, which is the same data. So these are separate data points. Correct. So number one and number four aren't related to one another. Is that correct? Correct. OK. Aren't you measuring the same thing though? But what do you mean, they are not related to each other? They are one sample. Two separate samples. They are two separate samples? Right. Two separate samples. So one sample gets two data points. And the second sample gets-- They're separate examples that are tested. OK. So it's not [INAUDIBLE]. When you say sample, you say one tube of blood? One tube of blood, yes. So you receive one tube of blood from the officer. Or two tubes of blood from the officer? Or from the case. Whether we received one or two, we always just sample out of one. So it is one sample. So it is one. All of them coming from one source. That variance between 0.13 and 0.16. And so, from that one blood draw, you sub sample twice so you have a duplicate measurement, you have two internal standards, is that how you have four results? Correct. Are you doing all of the testing in one day or two different days? Same day. Same day, same person, same calibrated. All right. Right. The results for the first test would not pass our quality control today. It would have been rerun. So that's why the samples-- Ultimately what caused Ms. Fellow to rerun the samples? Was it a report issue based upon the first set of results? Or was she just retesting because someone didn't like first results? No, the first analyst left. And it was going to court so they asked us to retest it and we usually do that in order to prevent them from having to subpoena the analyst that's no longer there. How do you keep the samples in the first place when you store it? Like that blood. Was it in a refrigerator? Yes, ma'am. And how long was it between the first test which was the result 0.138 and the second test that was the result 0.177. How long was it like that? I believe it was a year and a half. Year and a half. OK. And it's the same vial. Same vial. Now. if you let me reiterate, the values were 0.138 and 0.139 and then 0.168 and 0.169. So not as a blood alcohol analyst but it looks like there might have been a little pippetting error on the first vial, the 0.138. But the difference between them was still within our criteria and it was passed. In that particular instance. Or that particular situation, we report out the lowest of the four values, which had truncated off so we reported it out as 0.13. The toxicology, I mean, Dr. Kerrigan knows it probably very well too But just it the stability of the drugs and they produce more and less. That's a concern, too. When you've been retesting the quantitation after someone. So you cannot really check the second one with the first one that much. That always gets some changes in the concentration happens and sometimes goes higher or lower. So this blood was in the fluoride tube, gray top tube, But 1/2 year is a long time. I think the pathologists and toxicologists that are used to seeing blood alcohol results would probably all be in agreement that the first test results should have been repeated right away, that they're not really in agreement. But that's beyond the scope of what we're here to discuss today. And as I understood, this is not the current procedure that you're using now that IFL is part of National Medical Services It's a different procedure or you just amended your acceptance criteria for quantitative alcohol measurements? We updated our quality standards for these measurements. We did data analysis and we found that our criteria for the differences between the first sample and the duplicate sample were typically within plus or minus 5% rather than plus or minus 10% and we elected to use that value and I don't know the date that we started that but it's been at least six months, maybe a year. And I think this came up yesterday, but just as a matter of record for the Commission, the reason for the dismissal was unrelated to the analytical result. And it was unrelated to the loss of worksheet, which can happen. Worksheets may get destroyed on occasion. but it was because she was evasive or inconsistent in her ability to describe where the worksheet had gone. Is that right? Well, questions regarding personnel issues, we had to refer to our HR department. But the examiner was dismissed by IFL or NMS as a result of this? Yes. A combination of things. Again, it was not her technical ability. She did get the appropriate answer on her retest. It was other acts. And all of her previous work is going to be reviewed. Correct. And I assume that you've made it known to your client agencies that since she won't be available to testify that all that will be retested at no cost. It is being retested, right. Were notifications made to the clients that the work was being re reviewed? Reviewed? It says that 1,539 cases between November, 2013 and April, 2014 were audited or reviewed. I didn't understand your question, sorry. Yes, we audited those 1539 cases. Did we report that to the agency? OK. Because it wasn't a retest. It was just an audit. Audit, yes. But all of the cases that are still pending and not adjudicated, we are retesting at the request of the client. And you did report the agencies that she's no longer there. She was dismissed. Because we got that report. How long are you planning to keep those samples? Because if comes the case five years after that-- We don't store samples. You don't. We sent it back to the agency shortly after it's analyzed. So the agencies have to store the evidence. Is there any other discussion? Is there a motion regarding this self-disclosure? I feel that they did what they needed to do we should dismiss it at this moment. So there's a motion to dismiss this complaint. Is there a second? I think that, again, as we discussed yesterday, the word dismiss may not fit in this said letter of no further action needed would be many more appropriate. Yes. Is that your motion? No further action? No further action is needed. I'll second that. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. All those opposed, same sign. OK. So, we're up to the next self-disclosure. And this is involving the DPS Austin Toxicology Lab. On May 20, 2014, DPS Deputy Assistant Director Pat Johnson notified the Commission of nonperformance in the Austin Laboratory Toxicology section. Johnson disclosed that a number of toxicology staff testified, or that a member of the toxicology staff testified, in a case in which he later realized that an amended report was pending but had not yet been issued. The case was a part of a group of 123 DUI cases involving drugs that had been issued with results that were unsupportable due to a problem with a particular Clonazepam working solution. The working solution was used to determine the amount of one to three drug compounds, Clonazepam in one of them in the blood samples. There was no problem with the qualitative measurement, i.e., the identification of the drug as Clonazepam. But rather with the quantitative measurement of the amount of the drug and the sample using the particular working solution. At some point between October, 2013 and January, 2014, laboratory management decided to issue new management reports to the group of 123 DUI cases with unsupportable quantitative results. On May 12, 2014, after the examiner referenced above had testified, the lab discovered that the new reports had never been issued. After discovering this, the lab amended the reports on all 123 of the cases and reissued the reports on May 16, 2014. At that time, the laboratory notified every affected prosecutor by providing each with a list of the cases from their respective counties. The laboratory also disclosed the error and oversight to ASCLD/LAB and reported amended results to all law enforcement customers. The lab recognized it clearly took too long to issue the amended lab reports and is in the process revising its standard operating procedures to ensure the problem does not occur again. So we actually have some recommendations for the full Commission, but we had some additional questions that we could not answer at the time. One of the questions, I guess, if Brady is still here, we were curious as to where did the review process break down? That is, there was a significant amount of time between when cases were done and then actually amended reports didn't go out until many months later, at least six or more months. So we don't understand the process. Where did the problems occur? That was not really addressed in the information we were provided. The issue was a handoff between the quality group and the claims group. We came up with a good action plan and action items through our corrective action process which included issuing many reports. Our LIMS system did not have the ability for us to issue amended toxicology reports at that time. There was one crystal report, which was the mechanism we used to report on our LIMS that was not available. So the tool was not available to our tox groups to be able to issue a recommended report. The decision was made to not do those by hand, but to do those through our process through LIMS, because that crystal report really allows them to poll the data that was reported out the first time and then amend, ao both the new data and the old data is contained in the same report which is very clear to our client what was changed. The crystal report for our toxicology test, or our toxicology report, is complex. Our internal resource and crystal report writing were not able to complete that work. There was a ticket that was issued to our IT department to get that report generated. And it did take time for us to accomplish that. When we realized that there were clients taking action on the reports, this was around a May time frame we did realize that those reports had not gone out. We pulled that project back and used internal resources [INAUDIBLE]. In May, they were released to the client. So then a copy was also issued to, directly to the District Attorney's offices. I've got a question. It may just be because that I don't quite understand. The point, someone, an analyst was testifying. And they had a result in the qualitative screen, there's not a question with that. Was there a quantity on there and then you realized there was an error in the quantitation? Or was it just qualitative only they were testifying to? I believe they testified to all the information on the report, which include qualitative and the quantitative result. OK. As a point of clarification though, and this was discussed at the screening committee yesterday, although there clearly was a quality error, a quality control issue in the quantitation of this particular drug, that wouldn't have influenced the outcome of any of those impaired driving cases, assuming they were all in driving cases. Because no examiner goes to court and renders an opinion, I hope, and certainly not at DPS, I know, based on the quantity of Clonazepam in a driver's blood. We are required to look at the case in totality. And we don't interpret based on those numbers alone. So I'm not trying to minimize the significance in terms of the quality control issue. But in terms of its potential impact on a case, I don't see that having much impact. The issue here really is the time delay. That's the critical thing, that when you issue the report and they were obviously identified the issue quickly. The notification to the client with the amended report took five months. And that I think it is what we're being presented with. Maybe six or seven months. My question is were there any of those cases that there was only the drug was present and not any other substance? These were 120 cases that had a variety of different substances in them, so I'm not sure out of all 120 of those, only one was one of the compounds that the quantitative results was [INAUDIBLE]. There's nothing else, no alcohol, just the drug. You may have already answered this, but again, in a nutshell, the testifying analyst didn't have the documentation they had, and as a result, their testimony was not completely accurate because they didn't reference and didn't know about the retest. Right? That is correct. We had the cases in a manager's office waiting for the amended reports, but that one was brought out and brought to court. Has it been determined whether any other analyst, that one or any other one likewise, was in the position where they, when they testified, their testimony may have not been completely accurate because they were missing that documentation? We don't believe so based on notifications to the district attorneys. So, I mean, the lab apparently states taken significant corrective action. What would you tell the commission in terms of the significant action that was taken? One was actually getting repairs done to the LIMS system that would more quickly allow it. Were those fixes permanent, or they were just done for this particular case? Those were permanent. So the toxicology staff, those have the appropriate tools [INAUDIBLE]. The more important changes that we made was that we did put a definite time limit on these types of notifications. So we amended our procedures to ensure that our laboratories are notified of the corrected plans when something [INAUDIBLE]. Five business days? Yeah. But the five month delay between the original report and the amended report, it had been dealt with by the section, it had gone to the quality assurance group, and it was pending. Essentially, the IT department or the LIMS group from making this modification to the system to Justice Tracks. Is that right? That is correct, yes. I'll ask a dumb question as a Justice Tracks user. So you said that the LIMS didn't have the ability to send out an amended report at that time. Why would you not simply make an additional request, and duplicate the request, and send out an amended report, just because that's what I've always done in Justice Tracks? And that's what we do, but the nuances is that when we do an amended report request, it's a child request of the original request, and that brings in all the existing data within Justice Tracks. With 120 cases, as Dr. [INAUDIBLE] mentioned, some of these cases had multiple compounds [INAUDIBLE]. We would have to reenter all that data, and multiple examiners would have to reenter the data in the additional request. We felt that we didn't want to include or give us the opportunity to make additional errors by doing that data entry, that we wanted to have the appropriate reporting mechanism in place before based on the reports. So the risk of a typo was too great, essentially. The risk of data entry error was too great in your assessment. That was our opinion, yes. So the complaints, Green Committee felt that there were too many unanswered questions as of last night. Brady was not at the meeting last night, so we felt it was more appropriate for us to do this in front of the commission and let the commission make a final decision whether or not we felt as though they've done sufficient corrective action to explain and ensure that this type of event would not occur, or we feel as though there are further corrective actions. So that's really what we leave up to the commission. I feel there is no further-- there have been sufficient and there is no further action needed quite yet. I think that there were a lot of questions yesterday, but I think your clarifications today make it much clearer. I would tender a motion to-- oh, I can't today. I can make no motions. I'm moot. I think we had a motion. She made the motion. Is there a second to take no further action? I second that motion. All those in favor? Aye. I can vote but I can't make a motion. The motion is what? No further action is needed? No further action. Yes. They've made sufficient modifications to ensure that this won't occur again. OK. So now we move onto a complaint or a self-disclosure by the Houston Forensic Science Center involving blood alcohol. There was a little bit of-- because at one point, they were part of the Houston PD, and now they're officially part of the Houston Forensic Science Center. So on June 4, 2014, the Houston Forensic Science Center LGC Criminalist Andrea Gooden submitted a blood alcohol related complaint to the commission. Gooden describes an incident that occurred in the laboratory that led to her being removed from casework. She explains that an officer turned in a submission form with labeling of wrong pieces of evidence. The submission form stated it contained blood tube vials from incident number 124796613. The actual evidence envelope was bar coded incident number 124796613. However, a handwritten incident number of 124607913 was present. The blood vials had incident number 124607913. All the discrepancies were documented and the case reported by an analyst, Ms. Gooden before her examination was performed. So essentially, what we had is the names were different, and the incident numbers were wrong. The outside had an incorrect incident number of 124796613. However, the blood vials had an incident number, 124607913. I believe the names on the tubes did not match their name on the outside submission. Gooden explained that analyzing the sample was technically administratively reviewed by her interim manager, and the report was generated with incident number 124796613, which is the incorrect number. And that occurred on 1/10/2014. On April 6, 2014, Gooden discovered incident number 124607913 only had breath alcohol test administered. Gooden then tried to notify her interim manager, and then the laboratory director and quality assurance manager. After Gooden discussed the facts of the case with the quality and interim managers, the interim manager decided Gooden should not continue with any other case work until the issue was resolved. Ms. Gooden was instructed to write a memo about the case and everything she did related to the case. The laboratory report was then recalled for reissuance. Soon after, Ms. Gooden discovered email correspondence between the officer, ADA interim manager, and another analyst that were never documented in the case record. The correspondence stated that incident number 12476613 should have been incident number 124607913. Gooden believes that the issue is a level three non-conformance where a report should have been recalled and amended and provided to the customer. Gooden explains none of the alleged incident was documented in accordance with ASCLD lab procedures. Gooden alleges her interim manager told her the handling of the issue would be "informal to protect her career." That was in quotes. Gooden alleges that to date, the report has not been corrected with the correct incident number and name, nor the customer been notified. Gooden complains that she was removed from case work and has yet to be placed back on case work. Gooden feels her removal from case work is unjustified. On July 16, 2014, the laboratory provided a response in the form of a memorandum by William Arnold, acting toxicology manager and acting director of information technology. The memorandum was a bit difficult to follow, but seems to indicate Ms. Gooden is at fault for generating a final report using the incorrect information. It also indicates that another analyst had been working with submitting officers to correct the error, and that Mr. Arnold had been attempting to locate the missing evidence that had been submitted under this case. Mr. Arnold references a CAPA, Corrective Action Report, related to the case, but this does not describe [INAUDIBLE] generated or why Ms. Gooden was under the impression that no CAPA had been generated. We had Ms. Irma Rios here at the meeting, and she's here again today, that really talked about this from her perspective. We were very confused as to who and why things were done the way they were, and really felt as though we wanted to have a full discussion with the commission here to ultimately come up with some conclusions. We were not comfortable making any recommendation at the time. I think there was a recommendation. There was. OK, to refer to a panel? Yes. That's correct. Was there any information that we wanted to ask Ms. Rios? I think she had an update on some information. I think there were a number of questions we were missing, records to evaluate the complaint yesterday, and I believe they may have been sent just before the meeting was called to order this morning. I'm not sure that that gives us an opportunity to distribute them to the commission. So I guess the recommendation would be to refer this to an investigative panel for further investigation of the incident. And since Irma is here, maybe Irma can give us a synopsis of the material that she sent electronically this morning. Some of the material, we talk about the CAPA. I talk about a memo documenting that information, [INAUDIBLE] piece of information. So the CAPA is complete but has not been-- This is the background information for the CAPA where I talk about [INAUDIBLE] documenting information regarding the root cause analysis. That was sent this morning. The other requests were for the reports that were issued. Those were also sent over. The other question was about the administrative review, was it done by Will Arnold, both the tech review and the admin review, and the answer is yes. Those were the three questions I had on my notes. I think the discussion and the concern yesterday related to the fact that-- and I'll just give a synopsis here-- there were two alcohol results, one's a breath, one's a blood, and a blood report is issued with a result and the name of a defendant who was breath tested. So a blood and a breath alcohol test are mixed up because of an issue with the submission documents. But that was documented before the testing was done. And the records that we have indicate that that discrepancy was documented in the case folder, correct? That's correct. So the fact that there was a mix up with the identification of the evidence was in the case folder. So the challenge was, and yet that case was still tech reviewed. It wasn't caught in tech review and it was not caught in admin review, resulting in a blood alcohol being reported on a subject who was breath tested. Is that correct? That's my understanding. And in the material where it says they can tell from the LIMS system, they make the reports available to the client, to the DA's office, and they tell whether it's been accessed, and that report was not accessed, but it was made available. So by chance, they never pulled it off, according to what the audit shows. That's correct. But it was made available. I think yesterday we were asking for the dates of the report, because it's not the testing that's in question. The failure of the review process is really the question here. So the first report date was when? Do you have that in the second report? It was January 10, 2014, and the other one is August 1, 2014. That was finalized in the report, so the date is on that final report. There is information that I can provide that the DA's office was notified about the issues and the steps that they took on that particular case. I think I talked to a couple of committee members who were here yesterday. My understanding yesterday was that it had already been finalized in the LIMS and pushed out with the date, but it was not when I checked this yesterday or this morning. So it was sent out today? The finalized was today, right, on the LIMS. What is the reason for an eight month delay? It was an oversight from the first one, obviously, from the April. There was an oversight on the technical review from one, and then when it was identified, it was pulled in the first batch in January. And you can tell from the document that I sent this morning, when we did a root cause analysis, that it had already been pulled from that batch back in January for it not to go off of the review, [INAUDIBLE] analysis. So one of the things that's stated was that Mr. Arnold, he just testified or he just gave us information that he was the one who actually technically reviewed and administratively reviewed the report, but he was claiming he could not locate the missing evidence or report and that added to the delay. But did he have the reports? Certainly. This is the issue we had. We had a submission form with Subject A, which is the breath test. They submitted a sample evidence under this case, and it was a blood sample, different name. The DA's office was looking for Subject B, but it's under the LIMS under Subject A, and that's why it was difficult to locate because the LIMS was not identifying the blood tube inside. The outside was marked with Subject A. How can the subject's name be missed on the review, on the tech or the admin review? Like you said, that's an oversight. There's really nothing. It was missed. It is on the documents. And the examiner was aware that the name was incorrect, and therefore did not move forward. So I'm trying to understand, since the documentation seems to place the blame on the examiner, how was the examiner at fault? So there's the batch of blood alcohol cases that are processed. They can be 25, 30, however many are processed and tested. This case is flagged because there's a discrepancy between the submission form and the blood test. Initially, everything else went to the supervisor that was there at the time, Mike [INAUDIBLE]. This sample was pulled. Later, after Mike leaves, this case is sent forward into the technical review process and finalizing. During the technical review, that discrepancy doesn't get caught. But it was in the file. Yes. It was in the file. So part of the review doesn't include looking at the file, the case folder. It does include-- I don't know. Obviously, I can't tell. I think it was missed. It's in the file. So when the original lab manager, when there was a full time manager in place, they were aware there was an issue, it was put to the side, and it was when there was interim management that there was an oversight. It got forwarded for review, and then presumably during that review process, the name wasn't verified or the review didn't take place? Again, the assumption is the name is on the paperwork where the blood tube is noted, Subject B's. The original report went out in January, and this was identified in April, and a corrective action is still pending? That's correct. So what would be a reasonable time frame to complete a corrective action? That's four months. What would be a reasonable-- is it still pending additional action or documentation? Do you need something additional to complete the corrective action? It has been sent to me for review. I need to take a look at it as soon as I can get back into the office. Does it typically take that long to issue an amended report? On this particular one, what I'm doing now is when something like this happens, I put it on my calendar now. It's unusual. I've never had this happen before. The [INAUDIBLE] gets analyzed and it gets sent. So corrective action for me is following up on the corrective action. I would expect for something like this to take a week for it to be done, a week or two weeks. I have a question. So in this period of the time that you know from April to now, what happened to the reviewer? Still reviewing the cases? Now, as of, I would say, the last month [INAUDIBLE] review has had some reviews, but very little. We have other individuals that can review. So was it typical for the acting toxicology manager and acting director of information to review ongoing case work, both technical review and administrative review? Was that a normal process? After the manager that we had, the [INAUDIBLE] manager, left, or resigned, we did [INAUDIBLE] to oversee some of the reviews-- not all of them, but some. And it's not unusual that the same person does both technical and administrative review, but he was doing both. Right. And then acting as the acting director of information technology. And the current corrective action that you have, is that focusing on the lapse in technical review, or is it focusing on something else? On multiple areas we're looking at. So that particular review, looking at, what happens when a sample comes in that it doesn't match the submission form, or the officer has identified the wrong case. We've already done some work through the captain [INAUDIBLE] talking to them, making sure that when they submit the evidence, that it matches the submission form. We have that information in training. It has multiple facets, but yes, some of the technical review. Some of it is on me as well. If there's an issue like this, I have a timeline on myself to make sure I stay on top of any CAPAs throughout the multiple disciplines. Do you have a list of the testimony that Ms. Gooden has given, and do you have any examples of testimony she provided before April 16 of 2014? I haven't purchased the transcript yet. It's $5,000, so I'm trying to get through purchasing the transcript, so the answer's no. The only thing I have a mock, is some recordings that I have where we've had the DA's office work on testimony with her as well. OK. So in terms of the timeline, is the first time she testified in court with a real lawyer, cross exam, direct, the whole thing, is it April 30, 2014? I don't know. That's the first one. I know she testified three times since she's been employed. Could you forward that to me? The? The dates of her testimony-- live testimony in court, not mock exam. Thanks. Do you want case numbers on that too, just the dates? Yeah. Case members? I think one of the issues is going to be identifying the prosecutor that handled her as a witness. That seems a little bit different than what I recall yesterday. I thought that she had testified previously, and the discussion was had about favorable response from the DA, but the question that the DAs may not want to say things negative. I believe-- I recall her having testified previously. She testified and she was actually observed by a member of the lab testifying, and that countered the positive reviews, and that led to the problem, and that was the reason she was not allowed to testify. I believe the six hour testimony that she was in was monitored by an in house person, but I don't know about the previous, whether it was only district attorney, or whether there was an in house monitoring. I thought it was just the six hour. Do you know the answer to that? I don't know. So just for clarification, her initial removal from case work, was it unrelated to this event? Was it due to a question regarding her testimony, or was it a-- I think we need to develop her more in terms of being able to testify in court. This is an internal observation that we've made. That's sort of separate from the disclosure here, which relates to this blood alcohol case, correct? Her statement seems to say that there's a connection between her bringing this to the attention of the lab and her being removed from case work. Based upon the documentation I've read, upon this being brought to the attention of supervisors, one of their responses was, we are removing you from case work because of that issue. There's no reference in this paperwork to any issues about testimony being brought up on that time. Yeah. The quality manager mentioned it. Irma, I thought you had indicated that as of today, she's back doing case work. Yes, she is. But that's been relatively recent. Yes. I think because of all these questions, the complaints screening committee felt as though perhaps this needed to go to an outside individual to further review this case and address some of these questions. I have one other question, because it's probably something that you've already looked at, but in our complaint, the disclosure states that Gooden alleges that she was told that the issue would be handled informally, and by that, I assume that to mean undocumented, to protect her career. What do you think that means? Have you investigated that further with the individual that she may have spoken to in lab management, or whomever? In terms of review of that, I haven't figured out what she means by that. I have asked, but I'm not getting anything concrete because everything has been documented, and it's been provided, again, recently. When the incident occurred, it's documented, dated, and timed, so [INAUDIBLE] issue on this. So when the commission received this disclosure on-- looking for the date here. June 4. In June. So between June and the beginning of August, has the Houston Forensic Science Center management or the director done any investigation into that allegation, that it was undocumented to protect her career? What do you mean in terms of investigation [INAUDIBLE] in general or something like that? No. The answer's no. I think internally, have you-- Internally? I have asked the supervisor about that. There's no information that I believe that that's accurate. I have no concrete evidence because there is other evidence that shows a memo being written to document all these issues in April. So that allegation is denied. In terms of [INAUDIBLE], there's nothing like that because there is a memo in our files documenting this incident. And I think I hear you saying, but I want to be clear about this, so she has said there's a conversation. You have spoken to the person that supposedly had this conversation with her. They are denying that they said that to her? They are not coming forth in saying that that's an accurate statement. Well, not coming forth and saying it's accurate is different than denying. Are they denying? They don't-- Do they recall the conversation? They don't recall, I guess is a better statement. All right. Thank you. So is there any further discussion? I think we either have to move forward with a committee or we table to get more information if there's more that's of relevance coming forth, but I think we've got to do something with this. Is there a motion to establish an investigative panel? I move that we establish an investigative panel now. Second? Second. All those in favor say, aye. Aye. All those opposed? I want to report one thing. ASCLD/LAB is investigating this, and they've assigned Patty Williams to do that investigative work. I received an email from her saying that we can coordinate any on site interviews together with them to minimize disruption at the laboratory. And we have worked with Patty Williams before, and to say she is thorough at her job would be an understatement. She's very, very diligent. She's bright and very good. Right, Richard? That's right. Can we have a short break? Sorry? A short break. Oh, a short break. Yes. Five minutes.