DNA breakthrough for justice

Less than two years after a podcast investigation by The Australian’s Hedley Thomas into the 2013 murder of Shandee Blackburn, 23, in Mackay on the central Queensland coast uncovered failings in the state’s forensic laboratory, the consequences of those failings are finally being addressed. As David Murray and Thomas reported on Saturday, the slaying of a pregnant woman, whose body was stuffed by her killer into the boot of a car, is one of several serious crimes resolved as a direct result of major reforms to the state’s DNA testing lab.

The scientist now in charge of the lab, Linzi Wilson-Wilde, said fundamental changes to the way crime scene evidence was being tested are already resulting in resounding successes for police and the criminal justice system. Professor Wilson-Wilde and Queensland Health have highlighted the killing of pregnant woman Kardell Lomas in 2019, as well as separate sexual assaults, as early ­examples of breakthroughs achieved since the start of a massive overhaul of the lab. Lomas, 31, was seven months pregnant when she was killed by her partner, Traven Fisher. Evidence suggested he placed her in a choke hold. Her body was found in the boot of her Holden Commodore, in the yard of their home at Ipswich, west of Brisbane. In March, Fisher was jailed for 14 years for manslaughter.

The overhaul of scientific processes and procedures followed the inquiry into the laboratory led by Walter Sofronoff KC. It was sparked by the Shandee’s Story podcast. Working with independent forensic biologist Kirsty Wright, Thomas exposed serious, systemic failures at the laboratory. “When we are going back to cases, we are identifying suspects, we’re identifying offenders, we are getting results that we didn’t get before,’’ Professor Wilson-Wilde told The Weekend Australian.

In another case involving a 2019 sexual assault, previous test results had found no links to the suspect’s DNA. As part of a 2023 review, samples were sent to New Zealand for specialised DNA Y-STR testing, targeting the male Y-chromosome, and this obtained a link to the suspect. The case is before the courts. The Sofronoff inquiry was told Y-STR analysis was available in almost every lab in Australia but not Queensland. It is particularly useful in sexual assaults because it ­enables detection of tiny amounts of male DNA in mixed profiles that might be masked by female DNA.

Under previous managers, fundamentals of good science such as training and the proper validation of DNA testing methods were jettisoned, and the lab did not keep up with developments in forensic science. Trawling back through years of cases will take a long time. Past failures at the laboratory, however, make such efforts essential if justice, however belatedly, is to be delivered.