Did forensic profile go too far?

Psychological profile helped convict teen who maintains his innocence

Police detective Jim Broderick in Fort Collins had set his sights on 15-year-old Tim Masters. He was convinced that the boy had kidnapped, sexually mutilated, and murdered a woman.

No physical evidence tied the boy to the crime. But for years after the 1987 crime went cold, Detective Broderick continued to insist that Masters was the killer.

The detective was haunted by Masters’ oddness during questioning, his collection of survival knives, and the timing of the woman’s death - within a day of the fourth anniversary of the boy's mother's death. But most troubling of all, according to a Denver Post expose on the case, were Masters’ violent sketches. Especially one featuring a blade tearing into a diamond shape.

Finally, in 1995, Broderick telephoned forensic psychologist Reid Meloy and asked him to study Masters' artwork. “Meloy had developed a reputation as an expert witness on sexual homicides,” writes Post reporter Miles Moffeit. “He even disclosed a deeply personal fascination with the subject, according to court testimony, saying he himself had sexually sadistic fantasies.”

Without interviewing Masters, Meloy wrote a damning opinion: Masters fit the profile of a killer because he was a loner who came from an isolated or deprived background and harbored hidden hostility toward authorities as well as violent fantasies. This was a displaced sexual matricide, stemming from Masters' feelings of abandonment by his dead mother. "The killing of Ms. Hettrick translated Tim Masters' grandiose fantasy into reality," Meloy wrote.

Meloy’s profile helped garner a conviction, and in 1999 Masters was sentenced to life in prison.

Now, a legal team has launched what the Post characterizes as “one of the most ambitious and expensive bids ever in Colorado to prove a man's innocence.” The investigation focuses on a sexually deviant medical doctor who lived near the scene of the killing; the doctor committed suicide and police destroyed much of the physical evidence that could have tied him to the crime.

Watch the Denver Post's online video, “The Story of Tim Masters,” which shows details of Masters' interrogations at the hands of police.

My more recent posts on this topic are here, here, and here.

Thanks to Denver forensic psychologist Michael Karson for bringing this case to my attention.

Crusade for abused women in prison

California has a "unique law" intended to assist domestic violence victims in prison. Under the law, a woman who killed her abusive partner and who was convicted before 1992 is entitled to petition for a new trial if she did not have an expert witness on battering.

The law was enacted in 2002. The problem is, many women in prison did not hear about it. Then, a young lawyer named Olivia Wang began a crusade. Her Habeas Project has grown into a statewide coalition that is celebrating victory in the freeing of Joyce Walker, who spent 16 years in prison for killing her horrifically abusive husband.

The story is featured on page 1 of Sunday’s San Francisco Chronicle.

The Habeas Project has helped win freedom for 19 domestic violence survivors serving life sentences in California.

Drug courts: Do they work?

Drug courts are expanding nationwide in the United States. But do they work? And do they save money?

A series of new reports suggest that the answers to these questions is "Yes."

Several new reports are now available online:

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Center for Substance Abuse Treatment has issued a 161-page outcome report about one type of drug court – the Family Treatment Drug Court. The report focuses on courts in California and New York.

A report on California’s drug courts is available at the web site of NPC research.

And, finally, the National Institute of Corrections has a full page of excellent reports and resources on drug courts.

Should special witnesses summarize expert testimony?

Can jurors really understand all of the data presented to them in complex legal cases? Or should a special witness be allowed to summarize the information for them?

That is the issue coming up before the U.S. Supreme Court in Harms v. United States (Docket number 06-990, 442 F.3d 367, 5th Cir.).

In that worker’s compensation case, the prosecution called a summary witness who presented a flow chart of the information that the jury had heard.

A Fifth District appellate court ruled that the case was complex enough to justify this special witness. The testimony was allowable because it was both impartial and accurate, the court ruled.

In this month’s “Judicial Notebook” of the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues, attorney/psychologist Jennifer Groscup writes that more psychological research on this topic would better inform the upcoming Supreme Court decision.

The limited empirical research suggests that summary information might help jurors understand information and make better decisions, Dr. Groscup writes. Such summaries might be especially useful to increase understanding of complex testimony by expert witnesses.

Dr. Groscup's article, co-authored by Jennifer Talon, is available online.

Attorneys in the testing room – Yes or No?

Hey, you forensic psychologists: When an attorney asks if she can sit in while you test her client, what do you tell her?

If you think there is one accepted answer, think again.

The National Academy of Neuropsychology and the American Academy of Clinical Neuropsychology say you should keep that attorney out. Her presence may violate test standardization, skewing the results.

But some forensic psychologists, such as Randy Otto, say banning third-party observers may be legally problematic. Some states allow defendants in court-ordered evaluations to bring in observers. And when a defendant speaks another language, we may need an interpreter in the room.

This issue is heating up, as the Committee on Psychological Tests and Assessment (CPTA) of the American Psychological Association’s Board of Scientific Affairs prepares to issue a policy statement on third-party observers.

You can watch the fireworks as proponents debate their positions at the American Psychological Association convention in San Francisco next month. The debate, “Third-Party Observers in Psychological and Neuropsychological Forensic Psychological Assessment,” will be Saturday, August 18, at noon.

Another source of information is the latest issue of the journal Ethics & Behavior. Robert Cramer and the eminent forensic psychologist Stanley Brodsky have co-authored an article, “Undue Influence or Ensuring Rights? Attorney Presence During Forensic Psychology Evaluations."

The article summarizes the neuropsychological literature on extraneous influences in testing and the limited literature on the effects of attorney presence in the testing room. It also discusses legal and ethical mandates pertaining to attorney presence and offers suggestions for forensic evaluators on how to answer the attorney who asks to sit in.

Requests for reprints of the article may be sent to crame001@bama.ua.edu.

“Romeo and Juliet defense” bucks sex offender trend

Back in the day, many 16-year-old girls dated 18- or 19-year-old guys. After all, the conventional wisdom went, girls are more emotionally and physically mature than guys their own age.

That was back before politicians discovered the quintessential vote-enhancing bogeyman, and began enacting an ever-widening array of sex offender laws.

Never mind the growing evidence that such laws may do more harm than good to victims of sex abuse and to society more broadly. Now, in many states, an 18-year-old man who has sex with his younger girlfriend can be required to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life. This limits opportunities for jobs, college, and even for student loans.

Take Indiana. When sex offender registration laws were first enacted there, they were reserved for the most serious of sex offenses, primarily rape. As time went on, more and more offenses were added, until some sexually active teenagers in dating relationships found themselves caught up in the political dragnet.

But now, Indiana legislators have created a loophole for teenagers in love.

Public Law 216, which went into effect this month, decriminalizes consensual sex among teenagers in a dating relationship if their age difference is within four years. The new law can protect a 19-year-old man from felony charges if he has sex with his 15-year-old girlfriend.

It will be up to the accused to prove all the elements of the new “Romeo and Juliet defense.” He must be younger than 21, he must be in a dating relationship with the girl, and she must be at least 14.

The state prosecutors' association, Indiana Prosecuting Attorneys Council, supported the legislation.

One thing about pendulums is that they always swing. If it’s swung to its most extreme side in Indiana, I suspect it may start swinging back toward moderation in other states as well.

Public Law 216, also called House Enrolled Act 1386, is available online. In the "Go to Bill" box, type 1386. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click on "Enrolled Act." New portions of the statute are in bold type.

For an excellent opinion piece on the unintended consequences of sex offender laws, see Amanda Rogers’ blog. Also see my April 10 blog post, "Sex Offender Laws Gone Amok," for some extreme examples of sex offender laws in practice.