Oregon State Police, confronted by suspected quality lapses by its handwriting analysts, have commissioned external examiners to review dozens of criminal cases to make sure they weren't tainted by mistakes.
The two analysts were suspended with pay last spring and the head of the state police Forensic Services Division was reassigned after state police officials identified problems with handwriting analysis in a Umatilla County case. The number of cases under review has grown to more than 30 and may rise, said Lt. Gregg Hastings, a department spokesman.
"In addition to those reviews (that) haven't been completed, other cases are also being considered for independent review," according to a state police statement on the investigation.
A state police lieutenant and an investigator in the Clackamas County District Attorney's Office conducted a criminal investigation of the handwriting analysis problems last spring that concluded on June 15. A prosecutor reviewed the evidence and decided not to take the case before a grand jury, state police said.
Officials declined to comment on specific problems identified in the Clackamas-based handwriting analysis unit, saying their investigation is ongoing.
"At this time, the complex review has not indicated that any of the analysis work was directly responsible for someone being convicted of a crime," state police stated in their written response.
Capt. Randy Wampler, who headed the Forensic Services Division when the handwriting problems were discovered, was reassigned last April. He retired on June 30.
The handwriting analysts at the center of the investigation have worked since 1999 in the Questioned Documents Unit of the Forensic Services Division.
The Oregonian first reported in April that state police had shut down the handwriting unit because they used procedures in a criminal case that did not conform to agency policy.
State police handwriting analysts have examined evidence in an average of 80 cases a year during the last three years for state and local law enforcement agencies across Oregon. They have examined a wide assortment of paper evidence. Common examples of the work include handwritten wills, checks, demand notes in robberies, threatening letters, or personal notes on scraps of paper.
"We're taking (the inquiry) very seriously," said Capt. Mike Dingeman, who took over as head of the Forensic Services Division on Aug. 1. "We are concerned about how this may or may not have impacted people. We want to make sure everybody gets due process."
The need for handwriting analysis has waned in recent years, Dingeman said, because the great bulk of the communications reviewed by police investigators is generated on computers.
State police commissioned a private handwriting examiner in the Midwest and another West Coast law enforcement agency to conduct the external review, Dingeman said. The department is looking for more outside document examiners to speed up the review.
Dingeman said state police want to make sure none of the suspected lapses in handwriting analysis tainted evidence or trial testimony. He pointed out that it is the rare criminal case that hinges solely on handwriting analysis. Fingerprint and DNA analyses are typically far more critical, he said.
"We're still looking at all of the cases, and we haven't been able to make a determination (that) any of them (were) tainted," he said. "We still have a lot of work to do, and it's a complex and difficult process."
The external examination is projected to cost about $30,000 and not expected to exceed $75,000, he said.
State police opened their investigation by notifying district attorneys, sheriffs and police chiefs across the state that the handwriting analysis unit has been shut down.
Law enforcement agencies are still submitting requests for document examination. But state police are vetting those cases and forwarding serious ones – involving violent crimes or property crimes of more than $15,000 – to FBI document examiners in Quantico, Va., Dingeman said.
Other cases are being considered on a case-by-case basis, he said, and forwarded to handwriting analysts outside Oregon.
-- Bryan Denson
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