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Nature Medicine 12, 1110 - 1111 (2006)
Published online: 29 September 2006 | doi:10.1038/nm1006-1110

News feature: Crime and punishment

Alisa Opar1

  1. Alisa Opar is an intern at Nature Medicine.


DNA is often the most incriminating evidence in a courtroom, but sloppy analysis has sent dozens of innocent people to prison. Alisa Opar reports on the efforts to lock down error-free tests.


In 1999 Josiah Sutton, then 16 years old, was sentenced to 25 years in prison for rape. The evidence seemed airtight: the victim had spotted Sutton walking down a Houston street five days after her attack, and crime lab analysis from Houston's police department showed his DNA was an exact match with semen from the crime.

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