Elizabeth Ann Pfeifer’s life was troubled from the start. Shortly after she was born on December 10, 1965, she was given up for adoption. The Pfeifer family had already adopted Laura, also from birth. As you can immediately tell, we have a DNA problem here. If we ever find items that may hold biological materials […]
Archives for March 2011
Luke Whyte on maximun security prisons
Meet Luke Whyte. He interviewed a sergeant at Pelican Bay State Prison, California (PBSP). “Pelican Bay State Prison is the end of the line; designed to contain and isolate California’s most dangerous inmates. In the event of an earthquake, its walls are designed to collapse inward.” Pelican Bay opened in 1989, principally to house the […]
The FBI on the 1965 murder of Rev. James Reeb
The FBI’s Cold Case Initiative is investigating the 46-year-old case of James Reeb, a Massachusetts minister who was beaten to death in Alabama while doing civil rights work, a spokesman said Friday. The FBI launched an initiative in 2007 to investigate unsolved murders from the civil rights era. A spokesman with the agency, Chris Allen, said […]
Recap #cclivechat March 11, 2011
With the best intentions, we headed into #cclivechat only to be slowed down by technology. Twitter web was not working as it should. According to some that was because priority was given to tweets regarding the situation in Japan. Others mentioned issues with @mentions and DMs. Anyway, we made an effort and did manage to get […]
Interpretation of a DNA Match
“What Are the Chances? Interpretation of a DNA Match” is a guest blog post by Sue Carney. Didn’t someone once say “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”? Whoever said it is another story, but the point I’m making is that when numbers are used to support a point of view, […]
Illinois abolishes capital punishment
He finally did it. Illinois Governor Pat Quinn abolished capital punishment. Quinn also commuted the sentences of all 15 inmates remaining on Illinois’ death row. They will now serve life in prison. From the Washington Post: “State lawmakers voted in January to abandon capital punishment, and Quinn spent two months reflecting on the issue, speaking […]
Update Manchester Building Female Skeleton
Remember the Manchester Building Female Skeleton I posted about? Police is still trying to find out who the lady was. “Workmen unearthed a skeleton while digging up the former car park on land between Angel Street, Dantzic Street and Miller Street – an area known as Angel Meadow. Police believed the remains could have been […]
Hope for Skinner!
Good news for Hank Skinner: USSC Justice Ginsburg, writing for the majority, said prison inmates may use a federal civil rights law to seek DNA testing that was not performed before their conviction. Lower federal courts had dismissed Skinner’s claims at an early stage, although other federal judges have allowed similar lawsuits to go forward […]
Recap #CCLiveChat Feb 26, 2011
We just hosted the first ever #CCLiveChat on Twitter and really, what an hour it was! Fantastic to see the participation and the enthusiasm. Joe and I were joined by several people and we wish to thank them not just for participating but for the genuine exchange of information: katcop13, lilaclounge, deaddollmovie, littlelawyer, worldcrime, Evie_G_L, Org9 […]
Recap #CClivechat March 4, 2011
Our second #cclivechat on Twitter was another succes. We were joined by authors and cops and had a few great discussions going on simultaneously. The first discussion centered on how cold cases are selected for review. What works to get the media’s attention, how difficult it is to get victims’ family members involved and, in what condition do […]