Chuck Grassley: “I have spoken before this body several times about the serious problems in the FBI crime lab. The Justice Department's…”

“I have spoken before this body several times about the serious problems in the FBI crime lab. The Justice Department's Inspector General has done the country a great service by uncovering the sloppiness and wrongdoing of certain lab examiners. A dozen such examiners are criticized in the IG's April 15 report for testifying beyond their expertise, and for changing lab reports. The IG found no criminal violations. Yet the wrongful testimony and the altering of reports by these examiners almost all redounded to the benefit of the prosecution, rather than to the defendant. This is a curious phenomenon, in my mind. Why weren't the changes more randomly distributed? How come they all benefitted the prosecution? Those are rather obvious questions. And so I thought a lot about what was done by the IG to determine motive or intent on the part of the examiners whose actions he criticized. And I have come to the conclusion that the IG's methodology was insufficient for determining motive or intent. And so, further investigation is warranted.”