Word: blood
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...technique called DNA fingerprinting has, since the mid-1980s, become an important tool for police and prosecutors. Matching a suspect's DNA, the genetic material found in most cells, with DNA found in blood or semen at the scene of a crime can provide seemingly indisputable evidence of guilt. But now DNA fingerprinting is itself on trial, and shadows of doubt are falling on detective work that once seemed virtually infallible. Says William Thompson, a professor of social ecology at the University of California at Irvine: "This technology has been steamrollered through the courts, and now it's beginning...
...Bronx, N.Y., courthouse that was depicted in Tom Wolfe's best seller The Bonfire of the Vanities. Joseph Castro, a 38-year-old janitor, stands accused of killing a neighbor and her two-year-old daughter. According to the prosecutors, a portion of DNA extracted from a spot of blood on Castro's watch matched DNA taken from the murdered mother. The chance of such a match occurring at random, said scientists called by the prosecution, was 1 in 100 million...
...eventually agreed that the evidence presented was "not scientifically reliable enough." They did not say the DNA analysis was invalid but asserted that in this case it was not nearly so precise as the prosecution claimed. One expert calculated that there was a 1 in 78 chance that the blood on Castro's watch was not from the victim. That may be a small chance, but to the defense it constituted a distinct shadow of a doubt...
...leaders of the P.L.A. initially seemed torn by the crisis, by week's end most active generals had sided with the hard-liners, out of personal loyalty to Deng and concern for the restoration of order. But a question arose: Could the troops impose martial law without spilling the blood of hundreds and perhaps thousands of fellow Chinese, thereby giving the lie to the army's proud claim to be one with the people...
...year-old secretary who braved a typhoon to participate in a march, asserted, "I am a Chinese British subject with a British passport, but what does that mean? Nothing. I cannot leave Hong Kong. The people in Tiananmen Square are my brothers and sisters. They have the same blood as I do. I am Chinese." The unaccustomed outpouring of emotion left many demonstrators teary-eyed. Even the colony's upper crust showed its support by allowing a racetrack owned by the exclusive Royal Hong Kong Jockey Club to be used during the massive protests last Sunday...