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20 Feb, 5 tweets, 2 min read
New from me. This is an important, first-of-its-kind study.
washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/…
I currently know of three men sentenced to death b/c a medical examiner determined a child death the defendant said was an accident to be a homicide. All three determinations have since been challenged by multiple other medical examiners.
First is Jeffrey Havard. Convicted b/c of Shaken Baby diagnosis and sexual abuse claims, all since refuted by multiple other MEs. Judge recently ruled SBS is questionable enough to change death sentence but not conviction. Which doesn't make much sense.

washingtonpost.com/news/opinions/…
Then there's Jimmie Duncan, still on death row in Louisiana. He was convicted in part due to bitemark evidence, despite the fact that video shows a forensic examiner creating the very marks on the corpse that would be later matched to Duncan.

reason.com/2009/02/19/man…
Finally, there's Devin Bennett, still on death row in MS. Convicted after SBS testimony from notorious medical examiner Steven Hayne, despite contrarian testimony from a former state medical examiner (whom Hayne and his allies had forced to resign).

reason.com/2008/03/02/mis…

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Radley Balko Profile picture
21 Feb
Based on the comments at the WP to my piece yesterday, I think an explanatory thread is in order.

The study I wrote about was designed to see if medical examiners' manner of death determination can be influenced by cognitive bias.
washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/…
This is important because we tend to think of an ME's opinion as grounded in science than, much more so than, say, a tire tread or fiber expert. But determining "manner" of death is typically much more subjective "cause" of death. This, despite ...
... the fact that a manner of death determination is profoundly more consequential. If an ME determines a death was an accident, we have a tragedy. If an ME determines a death was a homicide, there's a very good chance someone is going to prison for a long time. As I point ...
Read 21 tweets
Radley Balko Profile picture
26 Jan
This piece provides receipts for what I agree is regrettable anti-First Amendment sentiment among some elite journalists and academics. (Though I'm not sure it's all that new). But it also undermines its own premise by conflating that with . . .

tabletmag.com/sections/news/…
. . . non-state pressure on private companies (social media, cable providers, app stores, etc.) to prevent the spread of misinformation. It also does some eye rolling at the very idea that misinformation is something worth worrying about. Which I find baffling.
OANN and Newsmax built their audiences flattering the president with favorable coverage so he'd promote them. Which he did. The outlets' sole purpose was to present the lies of the man who led the most powerful country on earth as truth. I just don't see how private actors ...
Read 7 tweets
Radley Balko Profile picture
29 Dec 20
In the city’s nearly 200 year history, Little Rock’s city council (which is called a board of directors) has never held a no-confidence vote on the city’s police chief. Today, driven by the police union, it will hold one for the black, reformist chief Keith Humphrey.
The head of the police union just stressed the importance of accountability and law enforcement officer being held to the highest standard. So. Ok.
Little Rock blogger Russ Racop just told black opponents of the no-confidence resolution to “Shut the fuck up.” Then told Mayor Frank Scott: “Fuck you, too.”
Read 5 tweets
Radley Balko Profile picture
2 Dec 20
There are many possible reasons violent crime has spiked this year. Record unemployment. Social upheaval from a pandemic. Mistrust of police. Mistrust of government.

The least likely explanation: defunding the police. Because it hasn’t really happened.
A few cities did immediately abolish some specialty units. But among the dozen or so jurisdictions that cut police funding, most cut only a small percentage, and from what I’ve seen, none of the cuts took effect until FY 2021, which began 10/1. The crime surge began much earlier.
Ah, opponents of police reform say. But the protests still could have spurred the surge in violence, either by encouraging anarchy and mayhem, or by angering police and triggering a de-policing Ferguson Effect.”

So let’s look at crime this year in specific cities:
Read 13 tweets
Radley Balko Profile picture
10 Nov 20
So shortly after the 2016 election, I pointed out how odd it was that the Reason homepage was dominated by stories either mocking and ridiculing the left for being fearful of what was to come, or articles about how Trump might actually be good for libertarians.
Now, in 2020, we have one party so upset about the election, they’re openly fomenting a crisis of democracy. Here’s the Reason homepage today. There’s one article about all of that. There’s a hell of a lot more about the threat posed by Joe Biden. And more riciduling the left. Image
I’m picking on Reason. And I’ll add that there are people there who have sufficiently grasped the threat the last four years, despite the general editorial direction of the magazine. But it really underscores the disappointment I’ve had with my fellow libertarians in general ...
Read 13 tweets
Radley Balko Profile picture
9 Nov 20
A few links on the nonsense claim that Benford’s Law proves “irregularities” in the Biden vote tallies.

First, it’s far from clear that Benford’s Law is useful for detecting election fraud:

cambridge.org/core/journals/…
Second, even if it were, district level tallies are likely too fragmented for the law to apply. When you aggregate the data into larger geographical groupings, it’s fine:

alpha-xone.medium.com/do-bidens-vote…
Third, the posts you’ve probably seen on this have manipulated the data.

There’s also lots more discussion of the first two points at the link.

skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/4978…
Read 4 tweets

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