Department of Justice Announces It Will Not Renew National Commission on Forensic Science Charter; Exploring Other Steps

By Steve Pierson posted 04-10-2017 10:58

  
At the final meeting of the National Commission on Forensic Science (NCFS) under the current charter, Associate Deputy Attorney General Andrew Goldsmith announced the Department of Justice (DOJ) will not be renewing the NCFS charter. Goldsmith also announced several measures the DOJ would be taking "to advance forensic science and help combat the rise in violent crime." The 4/10/17 DOJ press release listed the following: 
  1. "In the coming weeks, the Department will appoint a Senior Forensic Advisor to interface with forensic science stakeholders and advise Department leadership;
  2. "The Department will conduct a needs assessment of forensic science laboratories that examines workload, backlog, personnel and equipment needs of public crime laboratories and the needs of academic and non-traditional forensic science practitioners, and issue a report to Congress; and
  3. "The Department will publish a notice in the Federal Register seeking public comment on how the Department should move forward to strengthen the foundations of forensic science and improve the operations and capacity of forensic laboratories. The notice will remain open until June 9, 2017.
The late Stephen Fienberg served on the NCFS as the only statistician. After his death, a call for a statistician to succeed Fienberg was issued and to which the ASA responded. 

The ASA Forensic Science Committee, under the leadership of Karen Kafadar and Hal Stern, will be advising the ASA on its response to this news and how the ASA should respond to the call for comments. Any comments from the statistical community can be provided to the committee through an email to me

During the first morning of the 13th meeting of the NCFS, a commissioner shared that they have a draft letter to Attorney General Session urging continuation of NCFS.
 
Statisticians and the ASA have been active to help strengthen the scientific foundation of the forensic science for over a decade. The ASA activities are outlined on this webpage and also described in many blog entries, most of which are linked from this 2014 blog entry, ASA Makes Recommendations on Forensic Science Reform for National Commission on Forensic Science

See also this Washington Post story, Sessions orders Justice Dept. to end forensic science commission, suspend review policy.

[Updates starting 4/12/17:


See other ASA Science Policy blog entries. For ASA science policy updates, follow @ASA_SciPol on Twitter. 
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