Australian civil libertarians were yesterday calling for evidence in the murder trial of British backpacker Peter Falconio to be reexamined following concerns over the DNA testing method used.
Low copy number DNA testing has been drawn into question after a judge last week criticized the DNA evidence when he acquitted a man charged with murder over the deadly 1998 Omagh bombing in Northern Ireland.
The technique was used to help convict Bradley Murdoch of murdering Falconio, a British backpacker who disappeared while on a road trip through the central Australian desert in 2001.
Murdoch was also convicted of abducting and assaulting Falconio's girlfriend and travelling companion Joanne Lees before she was able to escape from the ordeal near Barrow Creek, 300km north of Alice Springs.
The Australian Council for Civil Liberties said the British case meant that evidence used against Murdoch must be reviewed.
"Mr Murdoch should be immediately given a special grant of legal aid with a special component to examine the forensic evidence," council president Terry O'Gorman said.
"If there's a serious question mark over it, it should go back to the Court of Appeal and the Court of Appeal should reconsider whether his conviction is safe," he told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.
O'Gorman said the technique, a relatively new and sensitive form of testing which allows a small number of human cells to be analysed, should be suspended here ahead of a British review.
"This is not any special call for sympathy for Murdoch," O'Gorman said. "The reality is it's absolutely imperative that forensic evidence used in criminal cases be highly reliable."
O'Gorman said the DNA samples used in the Falconio case were those said to have been found on the ties used to tie up Lees and a microscopic sample of blood on Murdoch's clothing.
Murdoch was sentenced to life in jail in December 2005 after he was found guilty of shooting 28-year-old Falconio to death beside a remote outback highway. Falconio's body has never been found.
DOUBLE-MURDER CASE: The officer told the dispatcher he would check the locations of the callers, but instead headed to a pizzeria, remaining there for about an hour A New Jersey officer has been charged with misconduct after prosecutors said he did not quickly respond to and properly investigate reports of a shooting that turned out to be a double murder, instead allegedly stopping at an ATM and pizzeria. Franklin Township Police Sergeant Kevin Bollaro was the on-duty officer on the evening of Aug. 1, when police received 911 calls reporting gunshots and screaming in Pittstown, about 96km from Manhattan in central New Jersey, Hunterdon County Prosecutor Renee Robeson’s office said. However, rather than responding immediately, prosecutors said GPS data and surveillance video showed Bollaro drove about 3km
Tens of thousands of people on Saturday took to the streets of Spain’s eastern city of Valencia to mark the first anniversary of floods that killed 229 people and to denounce the handling of the disaster. Demonstrators, many carrying photos of the victims, called on regional government head Carlos Mazon to resign over what they said was the slow response to one of Europe’s deadliest natural disasters in decades. “People are still really angry,” said Rosa Cerros, a 42-year-old government worker who took part with her husband and two young daughters. “Why weren’t people evacuated? Its incomprehensible,” she said. Mazon’s
‘MOTHER’ OF THAILAND: In her glamorous heyday in the 1960s, former Thai queen Sirikit mingled with US presidents and superstars such as Elvis Presley The year-long funeral ceremony of former Thai queen Sirikit started yesterday, with grieving royalists set to salute the procession bringing her body to lie in state at Bangkok’s Grand Palace. Members of the royal family are venerated in Thailand, treated by many as semi-divine figures, and lavished with glowing media coverage and gold-adorned portraits hanging in public spaces and private homes nationwide. Sirikit, the mother of Thai King Vajiralongkorn and widow of the nation’s longest-reigning monarch, died late on Friday at the age of 93. Black-and-white tributes to the royal matriarch are being beamed onto towering digital advertizing billboards, on
POWER ABUSE WORRY: Some people warned that the broad language of the treaty could lead to overreach by authorities and enable the repression of government critics Countries signed their first UN treaty targeting cybercrime in Hanoi yesterday, despite opposition from an unlikely band of tech companies and rights groups warning of expanded state surveillance. The new global legal framework aims to bolster international cooperation to fight digital crimes, from child pornography to transnational cyberscams and money laundering. More than 60 countries signed the declaration, which means it would go into force once ratified by those states. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described the signing as an “important milestone,” and that it was “only the beginning.” “Every day, sophisticated scams destroy families, steal migrants and drain billions of dollars from our economy...
RSS