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Bite Marks as Evidence

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An innocent prisoner named Ray Koone walked out of prison in Yuma, Arizona on April 8, 2004 after serving 10 years for the murder of a cocktail waitress. The evidence that convicted him was a set of bite mark that matched his teeth with the bite marks on one of her breasts. Throughout this entire time, he always maintained his innocence. It turned out 10 years after his conviction he was exonerated due to DNA evidence on the victim’s clothes turned out to match that of another man.
When it comes to bite marks unless the victim is found immediately after the bite happens and victims are not found immediately after they have been bitten, bruising and abrasions will start to appear and continue to change the skin the longer it takes before the victim is found. If very many hours go by it is even hard to tell if the marks are even bite marks. One time bruises thought to be bite marks were actually bruises made by a hair band. Bite marks are subjective and unless the victim is immediately found right after they were bitten it is impossible to even come close to identification of the suspect. The only positive way to match up the victim with the suspect is if DNA evidence can be gathered along with the imprint of the bite that matches both suspect and victim (Randerson, 2004).
Also bite marks can be made while a body can be in many different body positions and skin has elasticity to it and stretches which can cause distortion of the bite marks. The identification of mistaken identity has been reported to be as high as 91%. Not only Ray Koone as mentioned above, other high profile cases such as Calvin Washington in Texas, James O’Donnell in New York and Dan Young in Illinois were also exonerated when DNA evidence proved they were innocent after being found guilty from bite mark evidence (Lewis & Marroquin, 2015).
Knowing the facts above about skin and bites, the bite mark should exclude the subject. I feel that knowing the facts above, bite marks should not be used until a true absolute scientific method is developed that can prove the bite marks belong to the suspect. Collected DNA at the scene, especially at the site of the bite mark should always be included as evidence.

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