What you think you know about arson
Before I forget to post this, I read (and I rarely find time to read the actual whole articles it seems, but this one I could not put down) an article in the New Yorker called Trial By Fire by David Grann about a man, Cameron Todd Willingham, who was accused and convicted of burning his three children to death, and who was executed in the state of Texas, and who was most surely innocent of the crime.
This article leads you in by basically explaining why this man was absolutely a murderer, showing all the pieces of the crime, how they went together, and how this was such an obvious case of arson and therefor murder that you had to wonder why even take a second look.
But when you do, when you see how the arson investigators come to their conclusions, and how much (or little) their theories are derived from real fire science, its really sickening. And when you think that all over the country, the same 'science' is being passed down from one arson investigator to another, how many innocent people are being put in jail, or how many innocent people are being denied insurance claims?
Its really an article worth reading. And it certainly puts into question not only the death penalty, but the entire judicial system.
This article leads you in by basically explaining why this man was absolutely a murderer, showing all the pieces of the crime, how they went together, and how this was such an obvious case of arson and therefor murder that you had to wonder why even take a second look.
But when you do, when you see how the arson investigators come to their conclusions, and how much (or little) their theories are derived from real fire science, its really sickening. And when you think that all over the country, the same 'science' is being passed down from one arson investigator to another, how many innocent people are being put in jail, or how many innocent people are being denied insurance claims?
Its really an article worth reading. And it certainly puts into question not only the death penalty, but the entire judicial system.