The FBI spent 4 decades grossly lying about their ability to analyze hair. Think about that. The charade actually went on so long that some people would have lived their entire adult life, their entire career lying their asses off. It was later found that at least 90% of cases contained errors.
During this time someone could have similarly proved that it wasn't so because were it so surely someone could have challenged it.
An alternative explanation is that forensic science or indeed any sort of science as practiced by law enforcement has always been a joke and the bar to do something about it is always very very high.
The cost of challenging anything is often prohibitively expensive both in terms of legal costs and in risk of drawing a sentence several times worse than a plea and any case which might result in police losing a valuable tool can be mooted by simply dropping that particular case after that high bar is met.
Remember also that the prosecution and the judge aren't scientists but ARE colleagues. Perceptively evidence from dogs are brought only when they actually find something so even if they don't provably always "work" in the scientific sense they perceptively help them nail bad guys. The idea that the judge would be liable to remove that useful tool because it didn't pass scientific muster is both optimistic and naive.
During this time someone could have similarly proved that it wasn't so because were it so surely someone could have challenged it.
An alternative explanation is that forensic science or indeed any sort of science as practiced by law enforcement has always been a joke and the bar to do something about it is always very very high.
The cost of challenging anything is often prohibitively expensive both in terms of legal costs and in risk of drawing a sentence several times worse than a plea and any case which might result in police losing a valuable tool can be mooted by simply dropping that particular case after that high bar is met.
Remember also that the prosecution and the judge aren't scientists but ARE colleagues. Perceptively evidence from dogs are brought only when they actually find something so even if they don't provably always "work" in the scientific sense they perceptively help them nail bad guys. The idea that the judge would be liable to remove that useful tool because it didn't pass scientific muster is both optimistic and naive.
https://www.fbi.gov/news/press-releases/fbi-testimony-on-mic...