Font Resize
They're creepy, they're crawly, and a lot of people are freaked out by them. But bugs have been used to overturn wrongful criminal convictions and put the right people behind bars.
On Tuesday night, John Wallace, a board-certified forensic entomologist and professor at Millersville University, spoke about the link between bugs and solving crimes during a program at Martin Library in York as part of the library's summer GO! series.
"All of them have a loose bug theme," said Allison Meckley, the special events manager for the library, of this year's GO! series.
Wallace touched on how forensic science can help determine how long a body has been decomposing. But, unlike in popular television shows such as "CSI" and "Bones," the investigation "doesn't happen in an hour," he said.
Forensic science has been in the spotlight recently because of the shows -- something Wallace calls "the CSI effect."
"I bet a lot of you guys came out because of this," Wallace told a crowd of about 40 people.
Wallace is one of 15 board-certified forensic entomologists in the United States and is a founding member of the American Board of Forensic Entomology.
Wallace has assisted police in convicting murder suspects and has helped the Innocence Project, a nonprofit organization that works to exonerate wrongfully convicted people.
According to the case profile from the Innocence Project's Web site, Kennedy Brewer of Mississippi had been convicted of murder and sexual battery
Wallace said the prosecution cited bite marks on the victim's body that a dentist testified to be Brewer's.
But, when Wallace had a chance to look at the bite marks and compared them to bite marks from a crayfish, he noticed how similar they were.
"The marks looked like nothing that a human would have done," he recalled.
Wallace said the dentist who originally testified turned out to be "corrupt as a three-dollar bill" and new DNA evidence officially cleared Brewer's name. The real murderer later confessed to the crime and to the murder of another young girl.
"The bottom line is, he was freed," Wallace said.
ABOUT THE PROGRAM
The show: CSI is a series of shows on CBS that involve groups of forensic examiners investigating crimes.
Locations: There are three different shows, located in New York, Miami and Las Vegas.
Awards: The three shows have combined to win six Emmys.
MARTIN LIBRARY
Martin Library's GO! series runs until Aug. 9. For more information or to register for any of the programs, visit go.yorklibraries.org or call 846-5300, ext. 222, for more information.
Longevity: The original show has been on the air for nine seasons.
Sources: www.imdb.com,
www.cbs.com/primetime/csi
