2010030404

Ex-FBI Agents To Review NC Crime Lab Problems After Murder Case

By Edward R. Brown, The Raleigh Telegram

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

RALEIGH - After it was revealed that a State Bureau of Investigation lab technician withheld important evidence at a murder trial in 1993, NC Attorney General Roy Cooper has asked two former Federal Bureau of Investigation agents to review state crime lab cases and practices.

The request for a review of the State Bureau of Investigation policies came on the heels of a North Carolina Innocence Commission ruling that said that Gregory Taylor, a Cary man who spent 17 years in jail for the murder of prostitute Jacquetta Thomas, was innocent of all charges.

The three judge panel unanimously said in their ruling on February 17th that Taylor’s attorneys had “proved by clear and convincing evidence that [he] is innocent.” Taylor has been set free and is now asking for a full pardon from the governor.

During testimony at the hearing, NC State Bureau of Investigation agent and crime lab technician Duane Deaver admitted that although he had final lab results that showed that red splotches in Taylor’s truck were not blood, they were not included in his report to the courts.

Instead, Deaver submitted an initial preliminary report that stated that the blotches were blood.

The final report was never revealed to Taylor’s defense team in 1993 and that evidence was cited by at least one juror as key in convicting Taylor, according to his defense team.

Deaver said that withholding the results in the final report was standard SBI policy.

"The SBI had a protocol for everything that we did and the way things were stated," he said during the hearing.

Former NC Supreme Court Justice I. Beverly Lake, one of the three judges on the innocence commission panel, said after the February hearing that the SBI’s handling of the blood evidence was one of the key factors in their decision.

"I had no idea that was their policy. And apparently they do have some policy like that. And I think it's atrocious," Lake told WTVD ABC11 in an interview shortly after the innocence panel’s verdict.

Cooper Requests External Review

On Friday, March 5th, North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper announced that he was requesting an external review of the SBI crime lab policies.

Cooper’s office said that Chris Swecker and Mike Wolf, both former Assistant Directors with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, will head up the review.

“They will examine the state lab’s historic practice and policy on disclosure of lab analyses as well as its internal methods and reporting of scientific analysis,” said Cooper’s office in a statement to the media.

Chris Swecker is a well known former FBI agent from North Carolina. A Wake Forest University graduate, Swecker was the former FBI Special Agent in Charge for the entire State of North Carolina.

Swecker was also actively involved in the North Carolina Infragard organization, which is a partnership between the FBI and businesses to combat high tech crimes and cyberterrorism.

The Attorney General’s office said that Swecker also served as executive assistant director in charge of nine FBI divisions, including the science and forensic lab division.

According to the Attorney General’s office, former agent Wolf has a Masters degree in forensic science and previously served as FBI Special Agent in Charge for Connecticut. Wolf also served as assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Critical Incident Response Group and “led an inspection team brought in to fix problems at the FBI crime lab in 1998-1999.”

In addition to the external review, an internal investigation will also be performed by the State Bureau of Investigation, said Cooper’s office.

Cooper’s office also stated that unlike the 1993 case, analysts’ lab reports and bench notes are now electronically available to “prosecutors to be shared with defense attorneys through the discovery process.”

:: END