Original Article Lab errors erode confidence in system, some lawmakers say Gary Scharrer Austin Bureau AUSTIN -- Some key Texas lawmakers say crime lab errors resulting in conviction of innocent people such as Brandon Moon must be corrected or the public will lose confidence in the criminal justice system. The Moon case and hundreds of tainted cases handled by the Houston Police Department's crime lab have inspired legislative hearings intended to find out what happened and how to fix those problems. "I think, temporarily, the publicity given to the Brandon Moon case and those cases coming out of the Houston lab erode the public's confidence in the forensic evidence and analysis of that evidence," state Sen. Robert Duncan, R-Lubbock, said Tuesday. State Senate Criminal Justice Chairman John Whitmire, D-Houston, will collect testimony at a hearing Jan. 4 in Houston to learn why criminal forensic labs are making so many mistakes. "We want to review the El Paso case carefully and learn what happened and to make certain we do everything possible to prevent another similar incident," Whitmire said. "I don't think we know the depth of the problem." Moon's lawyers contend that sloppy or faulty analysis of semen at the scene of a 1987 sexual assault of a West Side homemaker played a crucial role in influencing an El Paso jury to convict the former UTEP student and sentence him to 75 years in prison. He was released Tuesday because of DNA testing showing that Moon was "conclusively excluded" as the rapist. The Department of Public Safety's crime laboratory in Lubbock handled the evidence, and prosecutors touted the DPS as being "like the FBI of Texas" before agency serologist Glen David Adams testified at Moon's trial. The DPS expert told the El Paso jury that the semen from the assailant came from a person whose blood type could not be detected in such bodily fluids as saliva or semen. Such a person is considered a non-secretor. Adams determined that the crime scene evidence came from a non-secretor and told jurors that the victim's husband and son were secretors. Moon was part of a small group of the population who could have left the semen, according to the DPS serologist. But Adams' analysis was faulty because he failed to properly identify the victim and her husband also as non-secretors, Moon's lawyers said. Duncan agreed that the state needs to fix the problems, of the type coming out of the Department of Public Safety's Lubbock office, that helped convict Moon. Those DPS tests performed by serologist Adams "were far from 'reliable' -- indeed, they appear to be marred by incompetence, fraud, or both," Moon's lawyers said in court papers. "A very strict review of these labs is appropriate in order to repair the public's confidence in those labs," Duncan said. He is the author of legislation that state lawmakers passed in 2001 giving inmates such as Moon another chance to prove their innocence through DNA testing. Adams, who no longer works for the DPS, declined opportunities to rebut criticism or to defend his work. In a statement, DPS officials in Austin said Adams' trial testimony concluded that Moon could not be eliminated as a suspect. The evidence was tested in 1987 using the most up-to-date serology tests available at the time. Gary Scharrer may be reached at gscharrer@ elpasotimes.com; (512) 479-6606.