SUSPICIOUS

NYPD to Review 800 Rape Cases

DNA evidence may have been mishandled.

This sounds like it could be a great arc for Law & Order. The NYPD said Friday that it will be reviewing some 800 rape cases after allegations that DNA evidence had been mishandled or overlooked by a lab technician. According to the medical examiner’s office, supervisors have discovered 26 cases where the technician did not detect biological evidence when some actually did exist. The director of forensic biology at the medical examiner’s office insisted these errors are linked to false negatives, not false positives—and she insisted that “nobody was wrongfully convicted.” The office has yet to conclude its review of 412 of 843 cases it intends to examine. The cases span from 2001 to 2011, when the technician left.