“To say that DNA evidence has revolutionized the system is an understatement,” said best-selling crime author and former New York prosecutor Linda Fairstein during a speech to promote her new book, “Entombed.”
The event was part of the Virginia Institute of Forensic Science’s program called Forensics and Literature.
“Our mission is education,” said Linda Carne, the institute’s executive director.
Fairstein, who now serves on the institute’s Board of Directors, graduated from the University of Virginia School of Law, and has written several forensic-based crime novels.
In her speech, Fairstein described her background and experiences as chief of New York’s Sex Crimes Prosecution Unit for 25 years.
When Fairstein started her career, she said, no sexual assault task forces existed and very few evidence-collection kits included DNA evidence.
In 1986, Fairstein was working a case that had the need for DNA analysis, but the only DNA lab in the country was controlled by the FBI in Quantico. Cases then, she said, had to have a lot of press attention for the FBI to run tests on the evidence and even then it took six months to get a preliminary report. Even after the DNA evidence was examined by the bureau, she told the audience it was not accepted as credible evidence by the judge in that case.
“It was another three years before DNA was considered as being reliable in the court room,” Fairstein said, adding that just recently one of her cold cases from 1972 was solved by DNA evidence collected from a recent criminal.
“I always wanted to be an author when I was growing up,” she said, explaining that she tried to balance her writing with her prosecutorial job, which was difficult, but prosecuting always came first. Therefore, she would write in the mornings from 5 a.m. to 7a.m. before going to work.
But since retiring in 2002 Fairstein writes seven days a week.
“Writing gives me a chance to solve the cases that I never could when I was prosecuting,” she said.
The audience of 160 consisted of Fairstein’s fans, institute supporters and employees of the institute.
When an audience member asked where she sees DNA capabilities in the next five years, Fairstein asked fellow board member Dr. Kevin McElfresh, president of The Bode Technology Group, to respond to the question.
“We should see the machinery catch up with the biology,” he said. “We should be able to analyze smaller samples and different items for DNA comparisons. Hopefully, it will keep pushing the limits, and the machines will get smaller and faster.”
While some waited in line to get Fairstein to sign a copy of her newest novel, after her presentation others lined up for a tour of the institute’s labs, Virginia’s chief medical examiner’s office and the morgue in Virginia Biotechnology Research Park on Jackson Street.