clipped from www.innocenceproject.org

In the wake of the Feb. 15 hearings that cleared two Innocence Project clients after a combined three decades in prison for crimes they didn’t commit, more allegations of misconduct have been raised against medical examiner Steven Hayne and forensic dentist Michael West. An attorney for a New York woman charged with manslaughter in the death of her daughter has asked for a state review of Hayne’s finding that the victim was suffocated. But since Mississippi has lacked a state medical examiner since the mid-1990s, there is not an official avenue to review Hayne’s findings. The Innocence Project sent a letter Feb. 14 to the commissioner of the Mississippi Dept. of Public Safety, asking him to appoint a State Medical Examiner immediately.