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True-ish Crime: Bloodstain Pattern Analysis · Why We Do What We Do

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: You're listening to Why we do what we do? Welcome
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: to Why we do what we do. I am your
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: dexter host Abraham and I am your squeamish host Shane.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: We are a psychology podcast. We talk about all of
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: the things that people and non people animals do, and
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: sometimes we talk about ideas that they have about how
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: to lard information, whether they're they're doing it all wrong.
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, So today we are talking about b p A,
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: not the plastic but blood stained pattern analysis. So for
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: those of you who are your our true crime fans
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: out there, for those of you who like to watch
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: all those shows that do forensic analysis and stuff, be
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: prepared to be disappointed. Could you ever find out that
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: none of us, none of us is accurate.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: I was I was about to jump in and I
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: was gonna say that, I don't know if if you'll
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: enjoy it as much, but if you are of the
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: myth busting people who enjoy that that sort of thing,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: that variety, then you will enjoy this. Although to be fair,
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: I think where we're going to land is not that
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: this is wholly useless, not like polygraph tests. There is
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: something of utility there, but we need to understand that
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: in the nuance of this particular topic that I think
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: people get very excited about, and I understand why. And
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: there's just a lot to unpack there.
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: So we are going to unpack a few things. We're
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: going to myth bust some things. We're going to kind
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: of maybe draw some nuanced lines here on, like to
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: what degree this will be useful. But before that, we
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: should probably celebrate some holidays, right.
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: We should, because it is February twelfth. Then, as everyone knows,
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: it is Darwin Day.
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: Of course it's also Hug Day, so I guess maybe
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: hug a tortoise.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: Sure. It is International Day against the Use of Child Soldiers. Agreed, agreed.
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: It is Lincoln's birthday, so happy birthday, mister top Haat.
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: It is NAACP Day, Well, hopefully they make it through
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: this whole thing.
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, yes, yes. It is a National Freedom to
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: Marry Day, which also hopefully that makes it through this
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: whole thing.
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, very much. So. It is National Lost Penny Day.
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: It is also National plum Pudding Day, which I've never had.
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: I've never tasted in my life.
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: I don't think I have either. And then it is
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: Oglethorpe Day. But I don't know what that means.
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: I think oglethorpe is just a fun word to say.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: Fact.
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, sure, it's Paul Bunyan Day if you like big oxes.
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: Or painful things on your feet. It is Safety Pup Day.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: I love that, love safety dogs. It is Sick of
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: Food Waste Day, so each leftovers.
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, Celebration of Love Week. That makes sense because
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: it is pretty close to Valentine's Day. In fact, we
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: should just wish everyone happy Valentine's Day.
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I enjoy your Friday, go on a date. It
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: is a Children of Alcoholics Week, so have some awareness
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: for those folks.
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: Oof. It is Congenital Heart Defect Awareness Week, also a
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: thing that's important to know about.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, it is Freelance Writers Appreciation Week because the amount
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: of writing from people who are not hired at places
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: that publish writing is kind of absurd.
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  Speaker 1: And that didn't help clarify. I was going to say
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: this is writers and not riders. Yes, yeah, yes, who
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: make words on things as opposed to ride things. Yes,
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: motorcycles or horses. It is Homes for Birds Week, sure.
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah. It's International Flirting Week as well, so lines up
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: with Valentine's Day.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: It does yeah, and love data week. That lines up
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: with my version of a Valentine's Day.
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: I like that ooh, showing them graphs. And then it's
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: also take a friend's snowmobiling Week a little hard in Florida,
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: but other places might be Okay.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I could do that here. That sounds like fun. Yeah,
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: but those are the things that we like to send
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: out into the world of all of you listening, and
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: even to those not listening who are celebrating in whatever
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: way that they celebrate, or just going about their day
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: not knowing that any of those holidays exist and neither way.
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  Speaker 1: We're going to move on to what we're actually here
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  Speaker 1: to talk about, but before I do that really quick,
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: I would like to let you know that if you
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: are joining us for the first time, then welcome. We
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: are so glad to have you here. I really hope
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: that you enjoy what you hear in this episode, and
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: if you do, then you can, if you wish, support
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: us in some ways, which could include liking and subscribing,
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: leaving us a rating and review, telling a friend, joining
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: us on Patreon, or picking up some merch But I
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: will talk more about that when we get to the
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: end of this discussion instead, as I said, we are
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: going to be talking about some forensic science type stuff
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: and we have actually covered so I was thinking about
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: going into this, we should just do one on junk
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: forensic science that's out there, because there's some stuff that's
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: pretty questionable in its relative actual utility. But then I realized,
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: in looking over it, we have covered a lot of
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: these topics. We've covered polygraph tests, handwriting analysis, criminal profiling,
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: and there's more. There's like more that we haven't gotten
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: to yet, but we're kind of getting through. There's not
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: a ton left. There's a BYTEmark analysis nine to one
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: one call analysis is apparently a thing I found some
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: different like digital online presence profiling analysis, stuff that seems
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: like it's based on very little actual science. But anyway,
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: we're diving into the topic this time of blood and
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  Speaker 1: what we can learn from blood that is not DNA,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: but how that blood looks.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, so let's go ahead and start with I think
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  Speaker 2: probably the most a famous example of like maybe at
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  Speaker 2: least the pop culture example that people often use, and
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: that's the show Dexter. So in the TV show Dexter,
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: the eponymous antihero played by Michael Seehall is seen bashing
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: in fake heads and making vicious or viscous goo. It
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: could be vicious, I guess, because it is a violent crime,
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  Speaker 2: but viscous goo spray around the room. And then he
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  Speaker 2: mounts these red strings to show the trajectory of blood
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  Speaker 2: from the location of the assault to learn about the
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  Speaker 2: nature of the crime.
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  Speaker 1: And this paints, I think, for the view are a
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  Speaker 1: very compelling picture of this brilliant investigator who is meticulously
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  Speaker 1: recreating a murder scene and in doing so unlocks the
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  Speaker 1: critical evidence needed to find and convict the culprit and
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  Speaker 1: have them be arrested and whatnot.
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  Speaker 2: So like it looks very uh, it looks very appealing. Yeah,
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  Speaker 2: it looks very scientific too. I think it's like, not
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  Speaker 2: only does it like put on a good show, but
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  Speaker 2: it looks very scientific. You have these stages to simulate
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  Speaker 2: the crime, you have measurements and visuals to almost and
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  Speaker 2: arguably show that not only could the crime have happened
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  Speaker 2: a certain way, but what almost certainly did happen and
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  Speaker 2: be able to pin down key details to whatever crime
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  Speaker 2: they're investigating.
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  Speaker 1: So there's this whole field that is real, Like this
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  Speaker 1: is based off of in the TV show this is
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  Speaker 1: based off of real jobs that people do. It's called
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  Speaker 1: blood spatter analysis. It's also called blood stain pattern analysis,
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  Speaker 1: which is mostly how we're going to talk about it,
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  Speaker 1: because that's mostly how it's talked about in the research
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  Speaker 1: what research there is. And it is also just called
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  Speaker 1: blood pattern analysis, and there's some other sort of similar names.
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  Speaker 1: If you hear description of this that has blood and
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  Speaker 1: pattern are stain and pattern and analysis, it probably is
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  Speaker 1: all the same thing. But this is a strategy used
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  Speaker 1: by criminal investigators. It's a forensic technique in which they
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  Speaker 1: are inventory in the drops, drips, sprays, splatters, and spills
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  Speaker 1: and trails of blood left at a crime scene, usually
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  Speaker 1: one that will involve enough violence to produce blood. There's
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: not blood, then you're not doing this analysis, right, which
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  Speaker 1: should go without but I figure you may as well. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: And essentially the goal here is to reverse engineer that
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  Speaker 1: crime scene that whatever took place, or at least try
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  Speaker 1: and yield some valuable clues about the crime, the victim,
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  Speaker 1: the perpetrator, the weapon, or something else about the assault.
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  Speaker 1: They're essentially trying to use where the blood landed to
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  Speaker 1: interpret how that crime may have played out.
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  Speaker 2: Right, it's very possible that some version of looking at
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  Speaker 2: blood at a crime scene and drawing conclusions about what
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  Speaker 2: it can mean about the crime is something that people
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  Speaker 2: have been doing ever since there has been criminal justice.
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  Speaker 2: Like it's one of those things where it's like, this
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  Speaker 2: is probably something that we've been doing for centuries at
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  Speaker 2: this point in time, but now we just have a
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  Speaker 2: formal name for it, and like some or at least
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  Speaker 2: we have our formal name for it and some science
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  Speaker 2: and how we use it in today's culture.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, if you could imagine if you walk
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  Speaker 1: into a room, and I think we probably should have
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: warned people up front, but the title also could have
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: given it a way. We're going to be talking a
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  Speaker 1: lot about violence and crime and violent crime and assault
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: and murder and some gore that comes along with that.
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  Speaker 1: So if that's not something you're comfortable listening to, you
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: might want to sit this one out. Nevertheless, I do
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: think we're going to do our best to handle this,
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: you know, I think professionally and somewhat gently, But there
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: is a way to describe some of these things that's
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: a bit more visceral than you might be prepared to hear.
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  Speaker 1: And I'll kind of give the example of this next one,
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  Speaker 1: which is to say that, like when you walk into
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  Speaker 1: a crime scene, or when these investigators would, you might
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  Speaker 1: see blood sprayed all over the walls and ceiling. And
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  Speaker 1: even before there was any attempt to try and bring
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  Speaker 1: science to this kind of the scenario that they find themselves,
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  Speaker 1: you could understand pretty intuitively that that kind of evidence
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  Speaker 1: left behind, you know, blood in the walls and ceiling
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  Speaker 1: is a pretty different altercation than if the only blood
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  Speaker 1: was pooling up under the individual who's like laying on
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  Speaker 1: the floor, right, And so it is likely that people
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  Speaker 1: were implicitly regarded the relevance of these factors even before
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  Speaker 1: they were trying to use them to systematically determine something
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  Speaker 1: about the recreation of that crime, and before any special
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: attention or any name was given to that you could
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  Speaker 1: still make some assumptions and draw some conclusions just by
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  Speaker 1: walking in and seeing a scene that looks one way
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  Speaker 1: versus a totally different way that it could look.
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  Speaker 2: If that makes sense, Yeah, absolutely, I mean yeah, I
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  Speaker 2: think you can rule in things pretty quickly, or like
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  Speaker 2: at least rule in hypotheses, right, Like it gives you
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  Speaker 2: a better it gives you more than just saying a
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  Speaker 2: crime happened, which is, you know, a good start for
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  Speaker 2: an investigation. I think you know, it's like a start.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, like at very least a crime happened in
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  Speaker 1: this case, adds.
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  Speaker 2: So we've been going on and on about blood, but
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  Speaker 2: let's talk about where this came from, not blood, but
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: the actual blood stain pattern analysis and what we're talking
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  Speaker 2: about here. So because the argument about where blood came
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  Speaker 2: from is oh, it's its own separate episode.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, was it mud? Was it from? You know, where
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: did it come from?
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  Speaker 2: Did it come from a higher power? Snapping us in
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  Speaker 2: new existence? Now? The first methodological study to bring a
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  Speaker 2: scientific lens to blood pattern analysis was published in eighteen
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  Speaker 2: ninety five by doctor Edward Pietrowski, and this was titled
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  Speaker 2: Quote concerning the Origin, shape, direction, and Distribution of the
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  Speaker 2: bloodstains following head wounds caused by blows riveting reading.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, rules right off the tongue, rules.
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  Speaker 2: Right off the tongue. And this actually kicked off a
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  Speaker 2: line of research that influenced several prominent investigators around the world.
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  Speaker 2: So this was a big deal. When this came out,
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: everybody went, oh, we can study this and actually prompted
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  Speaker 2: a brand new line of research at the time.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, let's just continue unpacking I think the history
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: of this. There was a landmark case in nineteen fifty five,
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  Speaker 1: the State of Ohio v. Samuel Shepherd, in which doctor
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: Paul Kirk submitted in an affidavit suggesting that the blood
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: spatter pattern indicated a left handed attack by the assailant,
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: but the defendant here, Shepherd, was right handed, So essentially
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: this was in favor of the defendant, suggesting that it
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: was likely not the culprit in this particular case.
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  Speaker 2: Right. So, bloodstained pattern analysis had systematized some features of
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: what you could largely think of as fluid dynamics, where
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: the fluid is blood, and until about the nineteen seventies,
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: droplets of blood were categorized as low, medium, or high
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: velocity impact splatters. Looking at LVIS, mviis hviis right. So
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  Speaker 2: as an example high velocity impact spatters where low velocity
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  Speaker 2: was caused by gravity blood dripping straight down. Medium velocity
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: was faster hit the surface with greater force, such as
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: from a swing of a blade, and high velocity was
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  Speaker 2: the fastest spray of blood such that might be produced
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: from a gunshot.
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  Speaker 1: Right, So that's they're starting to get more categories to
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  Speaker 1: develop up being here in terms of what they might
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: assume about the nature of the assault right now. After
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  Speaker 1: the seventies, these definitions changed to refer to the speed
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: of the weapon rather than the speed of the blood impact.
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: But that sort of begs the question, what happened in
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  Speaker 1: the nineteen seventies A man named Herbert McDonald. Happened in
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: the nineteen seventies, Oh, Herbert McDonald.
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  Speaker 2: So, Herbert McDonald got very involved in blood patter analysis.
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  Speaker 2: In nineteen seventy one, he published the titled flight Characteristics
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  Speaker 2: of Human Blood and Stain Patterns, and this was a
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  Speaker 2: DOJ or Department of Justice funded report which acknowledges the
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: lack of statistical rigor. And subsequently he began teaching institutes
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: which sound like training seminars on blood patter analysis. So
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: basically put together these training programs to start doing this
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  Speaker 2: analysis right.
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  Speaker 1: And you know, he was I think, you know, in
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: reading a little bit about McDonald's history, I think that
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: he kind of was a scientist at heart. He was
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: very interest in forensic science specifically, and so he sort
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: of put together there are things you can learn about
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: blood and here is my workshop teaching you how to
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  Speaker 1: make these interpretations about what you see. So if you
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: had the following criteria, if you had a pulse, some
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: amount of working vision, and about twenty dollars, you too
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: could become a professional expert bloodstained pattern analyst. Just sign
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: up for McDonald's training seminar and you'll walk out of
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: there as fully credentialed as you could hope to be
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: about this. Yeah, this was very very minimal criteria which
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: has really not changed very much. We'll talk more about
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: that as we get through it. And the twenty dollars
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: figure I kind of made up. I don't know how
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: much he was charging, but you know, this is back
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: in the seventies, and so this is a forty hour workshop,
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: So you're basically spending a weekend, maybe a whole week,
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: learning from this guy, and then you have a whole
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: new career ahead of you.
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: That fun. It's kind of like being a cop, you know,
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: same thing. Look at forty hour train not I'm just kidding.
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: It's close though. Now. McDonald conducted hundreds of his institutes
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: throughout the nineteen seventies and eighties, and his trainees often
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: went on to do their own trainings, exponentially expanding the
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: burgeoning field of bloodstained powder analysis with people who lacked
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: critical training in related fields of medicine and fluid dynamics,
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: but nevertheless believed themselves to be experts. So you can
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: see where this maybe is turning into a competency problem.
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so he's going on, he's training people, he's written
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: the manual. He's kind of the guy. He's like the
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: bloodstain pattern analysis guy. And in the nineteen eighty five
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: murder case McDonald as a as a testimony giving testimony
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: or as some kind of expert testimony or whatever, he
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: surprised a Texas courtroom by setting up an elaborate demonstration
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: where he this almost looks like a carnival act. He
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: has a mirror, a T shirt, a vial of his
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: own blood that had been drawn at an nearby hospital.
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: He climbs onto the stool and he's demonstrating different bloodstain
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: patterns by dripping his own blood onto the mirror and
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: across different clothing surfaces to sort of show how it
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: drips across like fabrics and stuff. And he argued, using
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: this demonstration that the blood found at the scene of
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: the crime, placed the defendant at the crime scene. So
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: he's very theatrical in his presentation.
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: Right, He basically charmed people in the believing that was
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: the case.
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: But the jury found this so convincing that they convicted
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: twenty one year old Reginald Lewis of murdering his family.
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: Two years later, Lewis was granted a new trial when
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: an appeals court found evidentiary flaws in his case.
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: Right, So this was But importantly here what happened was like,
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: this testimony was used, and it was used convincingly. And
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: although there was certainly going to be other pieces of
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: evidence that were entered, there were other arguments that the
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: lawyers tried, the prosecutors probably the DA in this case
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: that we're trying to establish guilt here, this was a
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: key piece of testimony that was given. And what was
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: really important about that is that set a precedent. His
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: victory in this case set a precedent for getting bloodstained
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: pattern analysis accepted as credible evidence in the court of law.
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: And essentially this cemented the strategy of bloodstained analysis as legitimate,
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: as a legitimate tactic that investigators could now use moving forward.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: As they're approaching crime scenes, and that precedent piece is
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: really important. We'll come back to that, right absolutely.
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: Now, the more often McDonald and students actually in all
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: those trainees, the more often the testified in court and
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: got that on public record, the more broadly the legal
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: system accepted their reports as credible evidence, especially as it
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: was used to convict people of Christ right xonerate yeah
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: or exonerate right. So it became kind of like this
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: interesting thing where they just send and more, and it
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: like it ended up being being accepted more and the
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: foundation of the precedent managed to supersede the importance and
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: relevance of scientific evidence and empirical analysis. That's going to
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: be critical as we continue to unpack this.
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: Initially there was very little even attempts to use this
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: in any kind of court rooms. More states around America
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: began accepting bloodstained pattern analysis, and there was like sort
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: of different stages of how this was accepted. Initially it
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: was like it could be included as part of testimony,
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: and eventually the very first case in which this was
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: like entered as evidence the report for this and was
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: used specifically, I mean many of them were used in
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: convicting these But like where it essentially became cited by
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: the court as acceptable evidence that can and should be
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: submitted when available was in California, and I want to
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: say the nineteen seventies or so, but it exploded from there,
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: like it just more and more and more states started
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: allowing some version of this and eventually even saying like
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: this is definitely good evidence. You should include it when
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: you can, right, And so it just it became just
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: accepted like that was just it was just a thing,
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: and people were, the courts were, We're happy to have it.
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: The investigators were happy to provide it and to use
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: these two great effect in these trials.
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: So this goes further, right, So not only is it
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: being used in trials, not only are these institutes set
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: up in the nineteen eighties McDonald's it actually helped found
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: the International Association of Bloodstain Pattern Analysis or the IABPA
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: and the Advanced Bloodstain Institute, so the ABI. So now
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: not only do you have this kind of practice and
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: you have these training courses and these quote unquote certifications,
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: now you've got these formal organizations, like these organizations inside
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: of this practice that are all like are going to
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: be used to offer new trainings, offer resources, possibly lobby
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: for the use of these tools inside of the These
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: organizations do a lot of different things, and so now
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: you've got professional organizations that back up this practice.
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and so essentially all layers or it all lends
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: a very powerful air of credibility to it. Like you
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: could be you could have received training at the Associate
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: of the Bloodstain Institute, right, you could have credentialing or
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: like some kind of formal recognition for your contributions to
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: courts or bloodstained pattern analysis through the association, or you
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: could belong to that and go to presentations and talks
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: and that sort of thing, carry around your little certificate
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: of attendance to talk about, let's say. And of course
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: the fact that this was being used more and more
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: in courts where bloodstained pattern analysis might be warranted in
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: case just it further cemented in this as being like
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: sound evidence. So like, yeah, this is a thing, Like
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: we're moving forward with this, but of course, all good
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: things must come to an end, and we are here
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: because of the issues that also arise with bloodstained pattern analysis,
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: and also that sometimes a good run of dialogue comes
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: to the end when it's interrupted by ads.
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: Okay, so you know, if you're listening to this show
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: that we tend to be skeptics, and I think that
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: we're going to kind of spend a little bit of
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: time unpacking the skeptical side of this in what this
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: looks like, and so just so you know what the
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: bias is kind of going into this, But we are
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: going to we're gonna give it a fair shake. So
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: to be fair, there are aspects of blood pattern analysis
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: that are totally legitimate. For instance, the diameter of a
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: blood A drop of blood increases with height up to
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: a point, and that is the size of the splatter
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: of a drop of blood that drips six feet from
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: the ground is much larger than a drop of blood
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: that originates from only one foot above the ground. That
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: makes sense, there's legitimate science behind that.
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Like you can understand something about the blood from
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: that very specific piece of information. Another thing that is
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: pretty well established is that blood starts clotting after about
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: fifteen minutes. So if the blood is in various states
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: of clotting, that might indicate different moments of bloodshed, of course,
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: depending on how fresh the scene is. But like, if
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: you can have some information about when that clotting and
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: what stage it's in, then that could tell you something
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: about when the blood struck that surface.
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: Absolutely, Also, the pattern of blood tends look very different
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: by the type of weapon used. Guns will often produce
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: a different type of spray of blood than someone who
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: was stabbed or maybe struck with a blunt object, or
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: even like something like tripping and falling and scraping yourself like,
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: all of those produced different patterns as a result of
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: the way the blood was pulled from the body.
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: Yes, and there's kind of a we could do a
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: whole like segment on understanding basic fluid dynamics and sort
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: of how liquid works. But suffice it to say that
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: just due to how how liquid works, blood will hold
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: a certain shape while it is traveling through the air.
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: The shape liquid takes is going to depend on in
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: part on the contents of that liquid. So like droplets
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: of things, depending on how viscous they are, might are
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: likely to be certain sizes and shapes. But blood has
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: a very particular chemical composition, so it tends to have
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: in particular shape when it flies through the air, which
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: means that when it strikes a surface at a particular angle.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: So if it's like straight on, like dripping to the ground,
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: that's usually going to produce something that looks more like
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: a circle, versus if it is traveling through the air
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: and it hits it hits a surface at an angle,
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: it's going to usually produce this more elongated droplet, more
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: like an oval. And you can even try this if
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: you had, like a if you had some paint nearby
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: and wanted to if you flick a drop of paint
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: at like a piece of paper at an angle, this
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: will inform you which direction it was traveling. So like
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: the people who are doing this investigation could see these
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: elongated drops and gather some amount of information of that
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: it must have been traveling at an angle to the
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: surfaces opposed to straight on, and that at least informs
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: which direction the blood likely originated and to some extent
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: the velocity at which it may have been traveling. So again,
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: like those are things that you could get from analyzing
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: a liquid of sorts if you have a nice, sort
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: of clean, tidy sample in that way.
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: Right. However, in cases around the country, what we have
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: found is that cases were being acquitted and sentences overturned
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: in cases which bloodstained pattern analysis was used as a
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: piece of evidence to convict defendants, not to describe the case,
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: but to literally convict the defendants. So we found that
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: there are some discrepancies with how this was used in
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: those spaces.
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: Right, and again it gets part of it gets into
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: essentially here what claims are being made, because as we
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: just described, there is a lot of legitimate fluid dynamic
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: science that can be done to help just elucidate the
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: nature sure of what has done, what may have happened
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: in a particular with some fluid in this case blood.
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: But in bloodstain pattern analysis, they tend to claim that
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: they can reconstruct a crime scene by interpreting bloodstains, they
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: can determine the location of the attackers and victims, identify
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: the type of weapon used, and so they sort of
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: broadly make these claims as if they were just that's
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: just how it is. But the ability to do so
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: is actually pretty deeply subjective. It's much less objective than
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: it sounds like it should be. And there were even
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: instances where if you put two different analysts at the
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: same scene and just had them there at different times,
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: you could get too dramatically different, very almost opposite conclusions
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: about some of what they find in that bloodstain pattern analysis.
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: They will both speak with equal levels of conviction about
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: the accuracy of their interpretation, but the fact that you're
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: getting two different interpretations shows how subjective it really is.
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: Absolutely, and at that point in time too, it's important
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: to understand that there is no universally accepted scientific standard
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: for analyzing bloodstains, so it makes the results really inconsistent
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: in the field, lacks controlled experiments and statistical validation, relying
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: instead on precedent and expert opinion, So it's essentially being
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: entered as fact when there's not enough research or literature
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: to back up the fact like how it works, or
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: or even get like just basic inner radar agreement, making
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: sure that two people can even agree on the same
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: thing and get the same outcome as a result of
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: their analysis.
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: Right. Yeah, And again this comes back to this whole
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: thing on precedent and what we're talking about, and what
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: we mean by this is to say that because this
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: was ever established that it could be presented in court
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: in that way. That essentially meant that court saw future
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: attempts to introduce that as evidence as being acceptable because
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: it had already been done, and this was to the
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: exclusion of requiring like a careful scientific scrutiny that would
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: otherwise be brought to that process, which I would think
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: you would really want to ensure that you have got
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: like the best clearest analysis of some amount of information
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: and data available. But proponents claim that this is a
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: reliable forensic discipline that can provide these definitive answers about
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: crime scenes. But the experts will frequently commonly overstate the
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: certainty of their findings when presenting in court, and they
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: will testify with this absolute confidence despite the highly variable
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: nature of blood spatter, which we're going to get to
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: a little bit more in just a moment. And again
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: importantly here, juries and judges are often very swayed and
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: persuaded by these experts presentations, and you might even put
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: experts in sort of air quotes here. Sure this assumes
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: that bloodstained pattern and noalysis is as reliable as DNA
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: or fingerprint analysis. And because of this, and it's not
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: like that's the problem, is like, it's the way that
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: it's being presented, the interpretations that are being drawn. They
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: include a ton of subjectivity. But what can happen in
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: those instances, is that there are a high number of
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: cases that end up being overturned if they depend on
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: bloodstain pattern analysis or some of the other things that
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: we've unpacked, you know, criminal profiling and polygraphs, like, those
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: types of tools tend to be faulty, at least in
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: the way that they've often been presented. Meaning there's a
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: lot of people who get wrongfully convicted and then their
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: case is overturned, and in the meantime, while they're serving
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: time for a crime they didn't commit, the person who
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: did commit that crime is out there possibly doing more crime.
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and so one of the major issues that we're
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: finding is that this type of field, and part of
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: the reason that it's so subject and part of the
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: reason why they can make these outrageous claims is because
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: there's a really low standard for training. Now that's not
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: to say that training couldn't be high quality in the
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: time that they get, but the low shandard is is
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: that there's a low barrier entry.
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: They claim to be training highly trained forensic experts, but
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: the most qualification, the most common qualification, i should say,
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: is a forty hour course, which is not enough to
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: develop expertise in fluid dynamics, physics, or pathology. And just
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: while we were talking, I looked at the price for
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: some of these courses. The ranges anywhere between about four
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: hundred and fifty dollars to close to twelve hundred or
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: thirteen hundred dollars for a forty hour course. So that's
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: that's the barrier of entry to get into blood pattern analysis.
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: And again that could be your career, right, and we'll
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: get to this, but you might imagine the kinds of
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: people that specific career attracts. But we'll get there.
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: Anyway, many of these bloodstained pattern analysis practitioners, actually I
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: wanted to get to right now. There are law enforcement
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: officers they were or they were like the were previously
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: officers who now are becoming bloodstained pattern analysts, and they
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: often usually most of the time, have little or no
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: scientific background. And the judges, however, will admit the bloodstained
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: pattern analysis, which we could call BPA, as you mentioned,
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: they'll admit this. This testimony is simply because other courts
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: have admitted that testimony, right, rather than in any way
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: scrutinizing the analysts actual qualifications or the relative scientific rigor
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: that they brought to their analysis. They are simply treated
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: as experts because they carry that title that like certificate
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: of attendance, and they and they say it with such
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: confidence like this, this is what happened based on the
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: bloodstain pattern analysis, but that might not have been what happened.
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's important to distinguish, like they might
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: be accurate in describing the actual fluid dynamics and being charitable. Right,
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: they can describe the actual patterns of blood, but what
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: they what they kind of overexaggerate, are what their findings are, right,
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: So they go they might say the blood likely fell
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: from about six feet, and that is pretty accurate. You
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: could probably get a few people to get some IOA
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: on that. But then they go further and say this
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: person was murdered at six feet and it's like, that's
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: not maybe what happened in the scenario. Or they were
• 31:19
  Speaker 2: struck at six feet from a six foot height, and
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: they might do that and that might not actually be
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: what happened.
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: Right, very much so. Further, the way that BPA is
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: interpreted and used in court presumes that they can determine
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: if the suspect was present at a crime scene, which
• 31:36
  Speaker 1: they really can't how an injury occurred, which maybe, but
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: there are a lot of different ways that blood can
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: like end up in a particular place, whether the blood
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: was transferred or spattered, and like there's all of these
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: things that they're sort of they're claiming that they can
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: know that they can't necessarily know. And again, blood behaves
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: very unpredictably in real life or death scenarios, and there
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: are many other factors to consider an understanding, like in
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: trying to interpret what's going on with blood, Like, it's
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: just more complicated when you're not in like a training scenario.
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: And maybe they use real cases in those workshops, I
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: don't know, but the point being that, like in real life,
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: when you're looking at a crime scene, a lot of
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: things can complicate your ability to do an analysis of
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: what might have taken place.
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah, one of the things that often gets in the
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: way when you do try to do an analysis is ads.
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: Okay, so we're trying to unpack here where you might
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: go wrong in trying to interpret at a crime scene
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: what happened. And one of the things is that oftentimes,
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: in the instance of a violent crime, there's not just
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: a single thing that happened in which blood was produced.
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: There might have been many incidences throughout a struggle where
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: blood happened here because of some puncture or some damage
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: that was done, and then blood happened here, and then
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: blood happened here in the midst of the struggle. Blood's
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: flying all over the place and coming from different angles,
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: and so there might then be many overlapping stains in
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: the same space, and that can make it really difficult
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: to understand anything about what any one pattern might mean,
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: because you might be conflating one pattern as belonging to
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: another when they actually were two separate incidences, right, And
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: so it's very likely that in some of these real
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: life scenarios it's just much messier than it would then
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: you would seem, And then they have to make some
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: guesses about what that might mean in terms of understanding
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: those different blood spatters, if particularly if they assume that
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: they belong to the same event, which they might not
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: have right now.
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: And there's also other environmental and like even human variables
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: that might interact with how the blood lands and how
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: it travels. So a couple of variables like airflow, fabric,
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: surface type, surface texture, they can all alter the way
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: that blood lands, which will complicate your analyzes things like
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: blood makeup. You know, if somebody has certain medications in
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: their blood, it could thin their blood to a degree
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: that like maybe like there's lots of things that can
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: happen to like the chemical makeup of blood and what
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: that looks like. So there are just several things that
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: can happen that might influencer complicate that analysis, right.
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: And then the other thing is that the movements that
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: we make when we're just moving around in these instances
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: that usually involve multiple humans, presumably when there's some kind
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: of attack going on, those movements will also change the
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: trajectory of blood, making it very unreliable to determine relative
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: positions and actions because very different actions can produce very
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: similar blood spatter that results. And so you lacking more
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: in you could make some assumptions about what happened, but
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: you could probably speculate all day long and have like
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: reasonable hypotheses that wouldn't make sense but weren't actually what happened,
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: because there's only so much you can get from it,
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: sort of like you know, paleontologists who have been studying
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: dinosaur bones, like they do their best to try and
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: understand what could have what could those dinosaurs' behavior could
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: have been, what they might have actually looked like. But
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: we don't have very much to go on. And you know,
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: like if we were to look at at human remains,
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: like tens of millions of years later, and all we
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: had were skeletons, we might know we might not know
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: if they had hair, We might not know where they
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: had fatty tissue or cartilage, because cartilage doesn't last very long, right,
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: So like some alien or some future sentient being on
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: planet might find old human skeletons and look at and see, like,
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: assume we have these very very short noses because they
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: didn't know that we had cartilage that came off where
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: the bone of our nose ended in rejected further off
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: our face. And anyway, same thing with when we're talked
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: about paleontologists, like the soft tissues we can't know about,
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: and that means and why am I talking about dinosaurs
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: because it's yeah, it's dinosaurs rule, But just thinking about
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: like you you can't know what you don't know, right,
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: and like there's there's a certain there's just a certain
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: amount of that in some of these post talk scenarios
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: where all you have is the result and not how
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: it got there. And you can make all kinds of
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: reasonable guesses about how it got there, and you might
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: even be right some of the time, but you they
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: are guesses.
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: Absolutely So to that point, even when science is involved,
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: it tends to overstate its claims. The technique has never
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: been properly validated. When we talk about BPA, specifically, when
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: we've moved on from dinosaurs, where back to blood pattern now, yes, yes,
• 36:49
  Speaker 2: So the technique has never been properly validated, and there
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: has never been a large scale scientific study that has
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: confirmed the reliability of BPA interpretations. That's critical. So the
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: point that we would make here is because we have
• 37:04
  Speaker 2: no large scale studies that show that we can reliably
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: interpret these but they are being used in court. People
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: are being wrongly convicted, people are being put in jail
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: or exonerated when maybe they did commit a crime. It's
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: faulty evidence in these situations that are actually probably diminishing
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: the system at large. And like a justice system that
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: is fair.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, great point. Yeah, whether you're.
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: Not that our justice system is fair, just to be clear,
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: But what I'm saying is it's this is making it
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: less fair.
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, this is part of the problem with the lack
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: of equity that seems to exist. Yes, but yeah, you
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: make a really great point in there that I want
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: to highlight really quick, which is that whatever side of
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: like whether you tend to be very pro like every
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: time they convict someone the cops are right and like
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: that person needs to go to prison, or very like
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: innocence project anti wrongful conviction. Sure, I think a lot
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: of times the people who are sort of the more
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: pro cops tend to have the well, they probably did
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: something that they deserve to be in jail for anyway. Right. Anyway,
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: whether or not you fall on that that side of
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: things like this could be also letting people off the
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: hook who are guilty, so like, if you tend to
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: be pro put them in jail, like this is also
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: working against that interest. And whether if you tend to
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: be pro not putting innocent people in jail, which I
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: would hope most of us are, then this also tends
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: to be somewhat problematic. But these BPA interpretations are presented
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: in court, as we mentioned, as if they are objective,
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: empirical facts, but these analyzes are often influenced by the
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: needs of law enforcement and prosecutors. They have an agenda
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: and they need the interpretation to fit their agenda. And
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: as we mentioned, many of these analysts, these experts are
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: former police officers, which, as you might imagine, tends to
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: lead toward a potential bias in favor of the prosecution
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: of the law enforcement side. And then these so called
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: experts are often hired with a specific goal in mind,
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: which is to prove the suspect was present at the
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: scene and that the crime unfolded and the way that
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: they believe that it unfolded, which of course leads to
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: confirmation bias. Thus, these prosecutors frequently us BPA to reinforce
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: circumstantial evidence rather than to try and discover new information
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: or to confirm like important aspects or details of a case.
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: It's just and again, it's not that there's nothing here.
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: It's just over selling what it can really do, what
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: it can tell us.
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: Yes. So, as an example, the National Academy of Sciences
• 39:40
  Speaker 2: commissioned a watershed report in two thousand and nine that
• 39:43
  Speaker 2: casts significant doubt on the validity of the analysis drawn
• 39:46
  Speaker 2: from bloodstain pattered analysis. The actual report stated that quote
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: the uncertainties associated with bloodstain pattern analysis are enormous end quote,
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: and generally that experts opinions are quote more subjective then scientific.
• 40:01
  Speaker 2: So this report is pretty big deal.
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: And they further identified that there was, as we mentioned,
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: there's the significant lack of peer reviewed empirical research that
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: would otherwise corroborate the techniques being used to conduct and
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: interpret bloodstained patterns and doing that analysis piece, which is
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: to say, I mean, I feel like that's putting it
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: very gently. Essentially, they're saying there isn't any like this
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: needs to exist. It could be done, but they're like,
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: there's just none. There's almost none, like really good, actual
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: peer reviewed research that will show that this is how
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: you do this technique to most reliably yield valid interpretations.
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: That study just seems to not exist.
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: Right, And going further, that's not to say that this
• 40:46
  Speaker 2: that BPA couldn't be useful. They specifically say it can
• 40:49
  Speaker 2: be useful, but it does have those limitations. And this
• 40:52
  Speaker 2: is particularly true in presenting the findings in court, as
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: there is a high potential for over interpretation and context bias.
• 41:00
  Speaker 2: Thinking about this, I was like, okay, so if you
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: gave a blood pattern analyst, like if it gave like
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: somebody to analyze like a set of data, but you
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: removed all the context of the crime and just said,
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: analyze these data and tell me what happened here, Like
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: it would significantly change their interpretation. I would imagine the
• 41:16
  Speaker 2: minute the additional details there were two people, there was this,
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: there was that. Then that's already going to skew the
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: analysis of the bloodstained pattern. But we'll talk about I
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: think we're going to talk about that at some point
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: in time.
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: I would imagine in this report and other reports and
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: like understanding these issues. We're not the first people obviously
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: to have like brought like talked about this in sort
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: of a format such as this. Like other people are
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: aware of this, even people who are in bloodstained pattern
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: analysis in forensic sciences. They understand the issues here, and
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: many of them have started to suggest how we might
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: move forward with this and make it a more useful
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: and more reliable tool. And that's great. So we will
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: be getting to that a bit more as we moved
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: through this conversation. But I do think it's I think
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: it's always helpful to paint the human picture here, but
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: benefits the costs the whatever, Like the human picture that
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: is involved. And as we mentioned, there have been times
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: when people have been wrongfully convicted, and there have likely
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: been times that people were wrongfully exonerated. But we do
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: have a few cases of people who are wrongfully convicted
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: that is that it's worth at least sort of sharing
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: some of their stories. So additional warning here, there's some
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: graphic content. This is like true crime stuff that we're
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: not going to be like in any way trying to
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: exacerbate or elaborate on the details of their crime, but
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: it does depict acts of really significant violence that again
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: we're going to talk through as sort of objectively and
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: plainly as we can. We're really not trying to embellish here,
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: but I just want to warn you going into it
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: that that is about to happen in the next several minutes,
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: so to give you like a buffer period will play
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: an ad first. Okay, so we've been talking about this
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: whole time. You know, we've summarized so far the history
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: of bloodstained pattern analysis. We've talked about what legitimates information
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: can be gleaned from bloodstained pattern analysis, and a lot
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: of the issues that people have generally or that I
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: guess this field has generally faced around the subjectivity of
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: this and the sort of quote unquote expert testimony and courts,
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: and so following that, there were some specific, sort of
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: high profile cases that we can talk about where bloodstained
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: pattern analysis was used but in a faulty way.
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: Right, So let's start with the case of Joe Brian,
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: the man with two first names. This was a case
• 43:48
  Speaker 2: that happened in Texas in nineteen eighty five. So he
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: was convicted of killing his wife based on flawed BPA testimony,
• 43:54
  Speaker 2: even though he was one hundred and twenty miles away
• 43:56
  Speaker 2: at the time of the murder and had no motive.
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: He spent more than three thirty years in prison until
• 44:01
  Speaker 2: his conviction was overturned in twenty eighteen when evidence conclusive,
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: conclusive evidence proved his innocence. So he was able to
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: demonstrate that he was innocent this entire time, and because
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: of that flawed BPA testimony, he actually lost thirty years
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: of his life. He was stuck in a prison because
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: of that.
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: I mean, depending on how long you live, that is
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: like a third to half of your life, right, that's
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: a long time, and like presumably the time of your
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: life where you could have been the most productive is
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: like during that time and yeah, I mean again, there
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: were other pieces of evidence that they tried to use,
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: but one critical piece was the BPA testimony. Thirty years
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: like that is wild, thirty three is actually I'm thinking
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: of his last three years counted to him quite a bit,
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: so for sure they would to me having lost them.
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: That is okay. The next case is a man named
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: Cameron Todd Willingham. This is also Texas, nineteen ninety one,
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: so he was actually convicted of multiple things, but essentially
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: he was wrongfully convicted of starting a fire. That fire
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: eventually killed his family and by me and eventually, I
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: mean it wasn't I don't know. He was convicted of
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: starting a fire, so he was convicted of arson that
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: led to the deaths of his family. So it was
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: like in that same incident there, So this is nineteen
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: ninety one. He was actually executed by lethal injection, but
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: later evidence found that there were forensic important critical forensic errors,
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: including BPA mistakes. So he was someone who was put
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: to death incorrectly put to death, like his life was
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: ended based on faulty testimony. Like that should never.
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: Happen, right, I mean that should be the case example
• 45:46
  Speaker 2: for ending any sort of capital punishment like that. But
• 45:49
  Speaker 2: again that's a different episode. Now let's talk about David
• 45:53
  Speaker 2: cam from Indiana. So we'll get out of Texas for
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: a little bit. We'll go to Indiana in two thousand,
• 45:57
  Speaker 2: so he was twice wrongfully convicted of killing his wife
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: and kids twice. Yeah, he was convicted in part due
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: to faulty BPA testimony. He was exonerate in twenty thirteen
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: after thirteen years in prison. He spent thirteen years in
• 46:10
  Speaker 2: prison as a result of this faulty testimony.
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: Interestingly, he was actually a former police officer as well,
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: or some kind of law enforcement personnel of some sort.
• 46:18
  Speaker 2: Interesting.
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that there was like a retrial or
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: something like that and convicted again. But yeah, they again
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: found that that was incorrect and lost thirteen years of
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: his life in prison for doing nothing. And he maintained
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: his own sense the whole time, of course. But yeah,
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: very important. Okay, Well, as we've been talking about this
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: here in understanding that there are issues, and again I
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: do want to make sure that we do impart importantly
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: that it's not like there is nothing of value here.
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: Bloodstained pattern analysis can be used to provide some evidence
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: and help increase the amount of information that we have
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: about a particular case. It's just important to know where
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: the limitations are. And so so even fifteen years after
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: that report that was put out by the National Academy
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: of Sciences that found so many issues with it, there
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: is still very little peer reviewed evidence that supports bloodstained
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: pattern analysis and like specific techniques to enhance interpretations such
• 47:18
  Speaker 1: that they're more systematic and reliable. And there are basically
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: no studies to evaluate the accuracy of interpretations of bloodstained
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: pattern analysis. So where do we go from here? Right?
• 47:31
  Speaker 2: So, given the number of cases in which bloodstained pattern
• 47:33
  Speaker 2: analysis was central conviction that have since been relitigated and overturned,
• 47:37
  Speaker 2: several systems have attempted to create standards and regulations to
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: maintain the utility of bloodstained pattern analysis without those problems.
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: So that might include overreach, That might include some different
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: standards on what they're allowed to comment on, like I
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: think of like our field and how much we're allowed
• 47:53
  Speaker 2: to kind of bring into a court space where we
• 47:55
  Speaker 2: can maybe talk about our data and the analysis of
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: our data, but we can't talk about we can't like
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: extrap those data We can't go back and be like, well, yeah,
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: this person should live with this parent or anything like that.
• 48:05
  Speaker 2: We can only really comment within the scope of our competence,
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: in the scope of our practice, you know.
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, So essentially, I think one of the best
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: things that can be done in this space, and many
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: judges and forensics experts have called for this is having
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: stricter education requirements to be a bloodstained analyst, like to
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: be considered an expert, and advocated for having like an
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: accreditation system where you have to be a board certified,
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: you have to have gone through the training, had certain
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: a number of like mentoring, have education in things like
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: pathology and medicine and fluid dynamics that will really help
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: inform this and that just by adopting that measure alone,
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: by making it so that it is requires a higher
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: degree of trained expertise, which seems like it's not asking
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: that much right, that that would significantly move the field
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: of BPA forward into being like providing the most useful
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: data and information towards these cases. They're pushing for this already,
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: but the adoption of these measures, of these these strategies
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: to try and improve the quality of this have been
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: very limited to only a handful of states, not even
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: necessarily very thoroughly implemented in all of those states, And
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: this just leaves a very questionable future for the field
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: of bloodstained pattern analysis absolutely now.
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: Prior to his death in twenty nineteen, McDonald was asked
• 49:32
  Speaker 2: about whether he would change his teaching criteria and given
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: the number of instances of people who completed his course
• 49:37
  Speaker 2: giving faulty testimony, like, I think I would have a
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: hard time going to my deathbed having that on my conscience, right,
• 49:43
  Speaker 2: that the amount of people that failed as a result
• 49:46
  Speaker 2: of my teachings would feel awful. You would think, you
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: would think, you would think so, He responded that quote,
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: you can't control someone else's thinking. The only thing you
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: can do is go in and testify to the contrary
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: end quote. So doesn't really care seems like or didn't
• 50:01
  Speaker 2: really care.
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: I guess he feels like he. It sounded to me
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: based on that quote, like he was trying to justify
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: that he had done as much training as he should
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: have been expected to do to get people like ready
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: to do that job. I would argue that the evidence
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: is pretty overwhelmingly clear, just based on other fields that
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: have experts in them that when you do provide sufficient training,
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: you can ensure some amount of like appropriate scrutiny brought
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: to these things. Yeah, I wouldn't call it control someone
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: else's thinking, but like you can have them be more
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: or less informed. And I think that's essentially what we're
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: asking for. So anyway, as I was just saying, it
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: would make sense to help prevent the misapplication of this
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: technology simply by requiring that more training, more credentialing, and
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: not allowing analysts with only forty hours of training to
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: testify as experts. And again, like we talked about before,
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: the amount of time itself isn't so relevant, but like
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: we're talking about essentially complex degrees in here. If we
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: want them to have enough background in medicine and pathology
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: to be able to do this, enough background in fluid
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: dynamics to be able to do this, accomplishing all of
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: that in forty hours seems like a very tall order.
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: Like we're talking about like potentially a couple of years
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: of schooling in higher education to ensure that you get
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: the appropriate training. Yeah, so yeah, we're talking about like
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: potentially a couple of years of systematic education and training
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: to ensure that you are as informed as possible going
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: into that space.
• 51:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, I think another thing too that
• 51:47
  Speaker 2: we can look at is that court should not treat
• 51:49
  Speaker 2: BPA as hard science because it's not quite there, especially
• 51:52
  Speaker 2: when it's mostly interpretation based as it stands now, revisions
• 51:56
  Speaker 2: to the process or advanced training or peer review research
• 52:00
  Speaker 2: or any of those things can be really helpful, but
• 52:02
  Speaker 2: we don't have that yet. So right now, you can't
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: treat it as hard science with clear cut interpretations, and
• 52:08
  Speaker 2: lawyers should avoid using BPA to reinforce week cases rather
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: than objectively assess evidence. I think that that's what needs
• 52:15
  Speaker 2: to happen going forward too, is that you need to
• 52:17
  Speaker 2: be an objective analysis of what they see and not
• 52:20
  Speaker 2: extrapolating that into situations that are our hypothesis that can
• 52:25
  Speaker 2: actually convince jurors and sway their decisions.
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, so, as I said, having you know, BPAY
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: requiring advanced scientific education for example physics, chemistry, fluid dynamics.
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: But an important piece in addition to that that I
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: think comes from a good science training is that bpaid
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: testimony should also include error rates. They should also like
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: elucidate the uncertainties rather than present them as absolute conclusions.
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: So if you could say something like this is how
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: we interpret this, it could also be interpreted this way.
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: Here's like how conclusively I can say this with a
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: margin of error of this sort of certainty and this
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: amount of error. I think that would help to couch
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: those testimonies in appropriate levels of confidence, like how much
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: we've is actually known and again, don't mis presented either
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: like h with one hundred percent certainty, the ninety nine
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: percent whatever it is, Like it should be accurate to
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: like how certain you really are, because it's okay to
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: be like, have some partial information, that's at least information,
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: but knowing that that's incomplete information is far more helpful
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: than believing it is complete. That's almost more harmful than
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: having no information at all. And then I think a
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: final piece here that would really help is that the
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: judges and attorneys also be educated about the limitations and
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: risks of BPA. They don't necessarily have to be experts.
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: All they need to know is where the issues lie
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: so that they can use that as effectively as possible,
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: and also reaching a conclusion in these cases one percent beautiful, Well,
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: look at that we kind of actually ended one on time,
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: and I was thinking this would be so long it
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: might need to be a two parter. But I think
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: we got through it. We wanted to get through.
• 54:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that feels good at the end of
• 54:13
  Speaker 2: the day. I think we just land on this can
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: be helpful, but it has its limitations and everybody needs
• 54:18
  Speaker 2: to be aware of them before they start making big, huge,
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: life altering decisions about people using this stuff.
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: Right exactly anyway things to know, you know, like I said,
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: we could have gotten into like the very specific science
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: about how you know, a blood stain at a higher
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: velocity will make a similar angle to a blood stain
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: that hits at a different angle but traveling at a
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: less intense velocity, and so you like could be off
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: in terms of a little bit in terms of the angle.
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: But I felt like that was a bit more over
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: the top than what we had plans to or what
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: would make sense for what people trying to get out
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: of this, because really what I think my approach and
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: trying to understand this is why are people treating it
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: the way that they are and why is it so prominent?
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: And I think that the issue largely arose with the
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: precedent that was set that like, this testimony is good
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: enough as is, essentially meaning no further analysis required. You've
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: convinced me, you know, right, right, and that the courts
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: just kept moving forward with that. And then of course
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: we're always in favor of just advocating in general that
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: like a good scientific approach is going to be the
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: one that yields the most useful information. You nailed it beautiful,
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: all right. Well, if you would like to tell us
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: about your experiences with bloodstained pattern analysis or dexter or
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: a true crime or anything else, we would love to
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: hear from you, and so you can reach out to
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: us directly by emailing us at info at wwdwwdpodcast dot com.
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: We're also on blue Sky and I guess on some
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: of the other asinine social media platforms, at least a
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: couple of them, so you can try and reach us there.
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: We look forward to hearing from you about anything that
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: you have to say. Now, i'd also like to say
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: we are going to recommend some things for you if
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: you're joining us for the first time. We end all
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: of these discussions with some sort of you know, non
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: sequitor recommendations that are just fun. We're going to do
• 56:10
  Speaker 1: that again today, but first I need to get through
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: the credits. So if you would like to support us,
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: you can join us on Patreon. If you do go
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: over there, you can sign up for like whatever dollar
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: amount makes sense for you, and at the different levels
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: of membership you get certain perks such as ad free episodes,
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: early episodes, notes, videos, behind the scenes content, that sort
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: of thing. And if you do, we very much appreciate you.
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: And in addition to that, just for joining, all you
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: have to do is join at any level. I'm going
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: to come on at the end of each of these
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: episodes and I'm going to read the names of people
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: who have taken that leap and to whom I am
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: eternally grateful, and that is Mike, m Megan, Mike T, Justin,
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: cam and Brad, Stephanie, Olivia, Brian, Ashley and Kiara. Thank
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: you all so much for your continued support.
• 56:55
  Speaker 2: You all are the best, forever, always.
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: Forever and always. In addition, my team of people help
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: make this show a show, and that is writing and
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: fact checking from Shane and myself. Our social media coordinator
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: is Emma Wilson, and the person who does all of
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: the sound so that you get a podcast worth listening to.
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: Is justin thank you so much all of you for
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: your work. You're the best, and thank you for recording
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: with me today.
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: Shane hey Hat, thanks for having me, and thank you.
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: All for listening. But there is some more to say, because,
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: as I said, we're going to recommend some things after
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: some ads oh recommendations. I am recommending a recent Ish movie.
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: This I believe this is an Apple TV Plus original movie.
• 57:52
  Speaker 1: It's got quite the cast, so this is it's called
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: fly Me to the Moon. This has got Scarlett Johansson
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: and Channing Tatum, Woody Harrelson, Ray Romano. There's quite quite
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: a few really good people in here. It's a comedy.
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: There is an aspect of sort of romance to it,
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: historical fiction, drama sort of not really drama, mostly comedy
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: sort of thing. And it's essentially about I mean, if
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: you see the trailer for it, I don't think it's
• 58:18
  Speaker 1: really giving anything away. It's about hiring someone to help
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: fake the moon landing in case a fake moon landing
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: is needed, right the way I would put it. And
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: so it's it's about the real moon landing mostly, but
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: there's a huge amount of it is about the potential
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: for faking moon landing. And anyway, I thought it was
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: a really fun movie. I really enjoyed it. It didn't
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: get the greatest like review ever, but I actually thought
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: it was quite good, and so I think most people
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: would sit down and enjoy this. I don't think this
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: is a ground you know, it's not like the best.
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: You'll probably watch better movies this year. But I liked it,
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: so I think that it's worth checking out. It's available
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: on the Apple TV. Plus I'm sure it's available on
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: other platforms as well, but that was where I watched it.
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: So fly Me to the Moon.
• 59:07
  Speaker 2: It sounds so fun.
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: I like that.
• 59:09
  Speaker 2: I do appreciate Chanting Tatum's comedy chops. I think it's
• 59:12
  Speaker 2: pretty He's pretty funny. Yeah, all right, I'm recommending a record.
• 59:16
  Speaker 2: So last week, at the time of this recording, it
• 59:19
  Speaker 2: was last week this band of Maguai put out a
• 59:21
  Speaker 2: new record and that record is called The Bad Fire.
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: So if you're not familiar with Magui, they have put
• 59:25
  Speaker 2: out lots and lots of records. They are an interesting
• 59:28
  Speaker 2: kind of sort of pseudo instrumental band that just does
• 59:31
  Speaker 2: really fun, interesting things. So they put out nine full
• 59:35
  Speaker 2: length Records. They have a bunch of movie soundtracks they've
• 59:38
  Speaker 2: done as well, so they've scored movies and stuff and
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: they've done some really cool things. And I just think
• 59:44
  Speaker 2: that their discography is pretty incredible. But their new album,
• 59:47
  Speaker 2: The Bad Fire is their newest original work. That is
• 59:50
  Speaker 2: their album. They put it out on their record label
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: called Rock Action, and the first song on it is
• 59:55
  Speaker 2: called God Gets You Back, So you know, it's the
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: fun they they kind of have, like you can tell
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 2: they've got like a little bit of a tongue in
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 2: cheek feel about them. You know. They have an album
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: called Happy Songs for Happy People, and the songs are
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 2: all very sad and quiet. On this one, there's a
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 2: song on here called Pale Hippie or Pale Vegan hip Pain,
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: which is just strange and fun. So it's just a
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: lot of fun. Like they're just they're interesting and they're unique,
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: and it's it's if you like background music, it's good
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 2: for that if you are somebody who's really interested in
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: listening to kind of like the nuances and like really
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 2: great musical composition. It's in that world. I would say,
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 2: like I said, it's pseudo pseudo instrumental a lot of
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 2: shoegaze if you like Explosions in the Sky but like
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 2: a little bit more of a shoegaze feel to it.
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 2: It's got that a little bit of electronics in it.
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 2: But I really enjoy it. And this record is on
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: my Records of the Year so far list, so I
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 2: love it.
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: Wow, I'd forgotten about Explosions in the Sky. That's a
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: good reminder. Yeah, that's great, okay, perfect, Well, that's fun.
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: I will I'll be interested to check that one out again.
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: For those of you who this is your first time
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: hearing an episode from us, we don't get paid by
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: these publishers to recommend these things. We do it just
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: for fun. If they would like to pay us, we're
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: happy to take the money. But right now we're just
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: recommending things that brought us joy. And so that's just
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: in case that was a concern any of you listeners had. Yeah, absolutely, okay,
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: but I think that that is what we have to
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: say about bloodstain pattern analysis and fly Me to the
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: Moon and Mogwai movies and music and that sort of thing.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: As I said, we're happy to hear from all of you.
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: I appreciate all of you for listening and I think
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: that that is everything. Is there anything that I forgot
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: or anything you'd like to add before we wrap up today?
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 2: No, I think that covers it. Great.
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: This is Abraham and this is Shane. We're out.
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 2: So yeah, you've been listening to Why We Do What
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 2: We Do. You can learn more about this and other
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 2: episodes by going to WWD WWD podcast dot com. Thanks
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: for listening, and we hope you have an awesome day