Blood Spatter Expert’s Misleading Testimony Results in Overturned Convictions and Innocents Imprisoned
We trust Science to be fair and without bias in situations where no one else is, so what happens when that system fails?
Most True Crime junkies have seen the documentary The Staircase, where author Michael Peterson’s wife Kathleen was found dead at the bottom of the stairs in their home, with large amounts of blood in the stairwell. For anyone who hasn’t seen it, here’s a brief run down:
The Staircase
I highly recommend anyone who hasn’t seen this documentary go check it out whenever they get the chance!
After a trial riddled with scandal, author Michael Peterson is initially convicted of murdering his wife following her death at their home in Durham, North Carolina. There was a tremendous amount of conflicting testimony between experts who were split between her death being a homicide or an accidental fall, but ultimately the jury sided with the prosecution.
One of the key players in Peterson’s conviction was Duane Deaver, a blood spatter expert and agent for the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation. Deaver testified at the trial, explaining that the blood splatter around…
