Reply to Response by FBI Laboratory Filed in Illinois v. Winfield and Affidavit by Biederman et al. (2022) Filed in US v. Kaevon Sutton (2018 CF1 009709)

Authors

Susan VanderPlas, University of Nebraska-LincolnFollow
Kori Khan, Iowa State UniversityFollow
Heike Hofmann, Iowa State UniversityFollow
Alicia Carriquiry, Iowa State University.

ORCID IDs

VanderPlas 0000-0002-3803-0972

Khan 0000-0001-8209-7907

Hofmann 0000-0001-6216-5183

Carriquiry 0000-0002-6428-9427

Document Type

Article

Date of this Version

7-1-2022

Citation

VanderPlas, Khan, Hofmann, & Carriquiry (2022) Reply to Response by FBI Laboratory filed in Illinois v. Winfield and Affidavit by Biederman et al. (2022) filed in US v. Kaevon Sutton (2018 CF1 009709). Filed by the defense in Illinois v. Winfield (15 CR 14066-01)

doi: 10.32873/unl.dc.oth.018

Comments

Copyright 2022, the authors. Used by permission.

Abstract

1 Preliminaries

1.1 Scope

The aim of this document is to respond to issues raised in Federal Bureau of Investigation¹ and Alex Biedermann, Bruce Budowle & Christophe Champod.²

1.2 Conflict of Interest

We are statisticians employed at public institutions of higher education (Iowa State University and University of Nebraska, Lincoln) and have not been paid for our time or expertise when preparing either this response or the original affidavit.³ We provide this information as a public service and as scientists and researchers in this area.

1.3 Organization

The rest of the document precedes as follows: we begin by outlining our main points of agreement with the Federal Bureau of Investigation⁴ (hereafter, FBI) and Biedermann, Budowle, and Champod⁵ (hereafter, BBC) in Section 2. As a threshold issue, we consider the concept of a general discipline-wide error rate in Section 3 in order to correct statistical misconceptions in Biedermann, Budowle, and Champod.⁶ We then describe the statistical concepts underlying our assessment of the discipline of firearms and toolmark examiners in Section 4. Finally, we address specific issues with participant and material sampling (Section 5), study design (Section 6), and the use of inconclusives (Section 7).

¹ FBI Laboratory Response to the Declaration Regarding Firearms and Toolmark Error Rates Filed in Illinois v. Winfield (Aff. filed in US v Kaevon Sutton dated May 3, 2022).

² Forensic feature-comparison as applied to firearms examinations: evidential value of findings and expert performance characteristics (Aff. filed in US v Kaevon Sutton dated April 28, 2022).

³ Susan Vanderplas et al., Firearms and Toolmark Error Rates (Aff. filed in Illinois v Winfield, January 2022).

⁴ Supra note 1.

⁵ Supra note 2.

⁶ Supra note 2.