Linzi Wilson-Wilde’s admission at DNA commission of inquiry

Queensland’s forensic boss has admitted she “could have been clearer” about the failings of an extraction method that has cast doubt over tens of thousands of rape and murder cases.

Queensland’s forensic boss has admitted she “perhaps could have been clearer” in alerting a commission of inquiry about the catastrophic failings of an extraction method that has cast doubt over tens of thousands of rape and murder cases.

Linzi Wilson-Wilde was called upon last year by a commission of inquiry into the DNA bungle at the state laboratory as an interstate expert to examine issues with an automated extraction method.

This method, which is referred to by a report that approved it known as Project 13, has been exposed in recent weeks as a flawed process that failed to detect sufficient DNA and has raised concerns about crime scene samples examined in the nine years it was used by the lab.

Project 13 is currently the focus of a second commission of inquiry into the scandal-plagued facility.

Dr Wilson-Wilde, who has since become the Forensic Science Queensland chief, wrote in a report to the original inquiry relating to the automated method: “I did not find any significant failings that would indicate the final results were not reliable” and that the robotic system was a “reliable and robust method for extracting DNA from forensic samples”.

The DNA boss has repeatedly insisted she was specifically tasked by the inquiry to examine a contamination issue that arose with the extraction method.

Dr Kirsty Wright. Picture: David Clark

But various experts, most vocally whistleblower Dr Kirsty Wright, have slammed this qualification given the enormity of the failure of Project 13.

Dr Wilson-Wilde also admitted she only recommended the FSQ advisory board review thousands of cases impacted by the automated method after being prompted by reporters from The Australian newspaper.

Senior counsel assisting the inquiry, Andrew Fox, grilled the DNA boss on Wednesday morning, citing comments she made to journalists that large sections of Project 13 were “flawed”.

“How can you sensibly reconcile these very strident observations … in these interviews with these two journalists with the very temperate language that you adopted in your report?”

Forensic Science Queensland chief Dr Linzi Wilson-Wilde. Picture: John Gass

In response, Dr Wilson-Wilde insisted there’s a difference between talking with journalists and writing a scientific report.

Mr Fox challenged her further, asking if she should have clearly qualified that her response to the inquiry was related to the contamination issue and that there were also concerns about Project 13 more broadly.

He said: “Why not simply come out in your report, having seen it (Project 13) and on the face of it … you accept that it was flawed, why engage in an exercise of … science speak? Why not just say it?”

Dr Wilson-Wilde insisted she would still use scientific terminology if she wrote the report again but that she should have qualified the detail about the method being reliable.

She said “perhaps I could have been clearer”.