Forensic Science and the Paradigm of Quality Research Paper

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Due to various contexts and processes, forensic science communities may have different approaches, largely influenced by their criminal justice systems. However, forensic science practices share some common characteristics. One is the assurance of a high (scientific) quality within processes and practices.

For most crime laboratory directors and forensic science associations, this issue is conditioned by the triangle of quality, which represents the current paradigm of quality assurance in the field. It consists of the implementation of standardization, certification, accreditation, and an evaluation process. It constitutes a clear and sound way to exchange data between laboratories and enables data-basing due to standardized methods ensuring reliable and valid results; but it is also a means of defining minimum requirements for practitioners’ skills for specific forensic science activities.

The control of each of these aspects offers non-forensic science partners the assurance that the entire process has been mastered and is trustworthy. Most of the standards focus on the analysis stage and do not consider pre and post-laboratory stages, namely, the work achieved at the investigation scene and the evaluation and interpretation of the results, intended for intelligence beneficiaries or for court. Such localized consideration prevents forensic practitioners from identifying where the problems really lie with regard to criminal justice systems.

According to a performance-management approach, scientific quality should not be restricted to standardized procedures and controls in forensic science practice. Ensuring high quality also strongly depends on the way a forensic science culture is assimilated (into specific education training and workplaces) and in the way practitioners understand forensic science as a whole.

(Scientific) Quality

Generally speaking, quality represents the attribute of an element that will make this element different from the others; but it also refers to the notion of grade as a “degree of excellence.” The American Society for Quality (ASQ 2011) defines quality as “[a] subjective term for which each person or sector has its own definition. In technical usage, quality can have two meanings: 1. the characteristics of a product or service that bear on its ability to satisfy stated or implied needs; 2. a product or service free of deficiencies.” Indeed, reaching the highest degree of excellence is relatively symptomatic of the modern society, for which being efficient and effective is mandatory to ensure customers’ satisfaction in a commercial competition. Quality management appears to be a key aspect in monitoring performances and in reaching pre-established goals.

Historically, the quality movement finds its roots in the Middle Ages (thirteenth century), where craftsmen started to organize guilds. These professional unions were dedicated to enacting rules to ensure product quality but also to exercise commercial control over their specific activities. As a sign of positive inspection, craftsmen were asked to mark flawless goods. With time, they added a new mark as an indication of origin that turned to be a pledge of quality related to the craftsmen’s reputation. During the Industrial Revolution and throughout the twentieth century, the original marking practice of the craftsmen changed through manufacturing sector evolution while conserving an inspection dimension with the quality control of processes. Then, the total quality approach emerged from Japan, where quality assurance was no longer only focused on the manufacturing process, but encompassed the whole organizational process. In the twenty-first century, people are developing new quality control systems that involve not only the manufacturing sector but also areas such as healthcare or education, for instance. These quality systems have been developed to become a widely used marketing tool that controls industrial production, without taking into consideration the individual needs of each area.

Quality management is specific to any sector that wants to be competitive while being effective and efficient. For that matter, striving for quality calls for quality assurance and quality control. Quality assurance is the establishment of a program ensuring that quality standards are met through monitoring and evaluating the different stages of a process. Quality control consists of an aggregate of operational activities set up to meet the quality requirements.

The use of the “scientific” epithet before “quality” appears to give a stronger dimension of objectivity and robustness to that notion. This is often cited whenever science comes into the equation. Paraphrasing Jean Ladrie`re (1995), science is a critical mode of knowledge (or “mode de connaissance critique” in French), being characterized by specific principles and methods used through a reflexive and prospective reasoning process, which enables an extension of its body of knowledge. A way to strengthen a science is to challenge its principles and reasoning using a critical approach; this is achieved by establishing validation criteria used to test and control processes and every aspect of this science. Within that context, it can be assumed that the notion of scientific quality is also part of a critical approach of a science. It involves defining sound criteria of quality that require practitioners’ agreement within the scientific discipline in order to evaluate and improve the degree of excellence of methods and processes. The implemented criteria and tools are found in quality management systems to improve performances and to ensure scientists’ competencies in applying scientific methodologies. However, setting up quality criteria for a science implies a serious study of its dimensional aspects. It not only pertains to the science’s application – this is where a suitable quality management system is of importance – but also to its foundations and philosophy, or more simply to its epistemology. In other words, scientific quality is often considered from the management’s perspective in terms of performance when it may be more relevant to consider it from a cultural perspective of the given science.

Within forensic science practice, quality is currently driven by a quality management culture (largely influenced by legal and public funding aspects), whereas scientific quality viewed from a forensic science culture perspective is largely missing.

Quality In Forensic Science

Since quality is defined differently depending on persons or activity sectors, scientific quality in forensic science should be determined by forensic science practitioners and researchers. Willis (2010) introduced this specific notion of quality but further added the need for competencies. She highlighted the Japanese two-dimensional vision of quality, which implies that quality must be adapted to specific needs while taking into account customers’ considerations. This position is currently widely shared by the forensic science management communities. Quality notions in forensic science are oriented according to the business relationships between customers (defense attorneys, prosecutors, etc.) and (forensic science) service providers. This approach is clearly dictated by the quality movement coming from the manufacturing sector and driven by public administrations.

This vision was first applied to the laboratory examination stage. This is likely because this stage could largely benefit from methods that were already standardized and because it is the easiest one to get into a quality management system, at least for routine analyses, such as with drug or toxicological samples. Now, international forensic organizations tend to expand that vision to the pre- and post-laboratory examination stages, thus including the investigation scene as well as the opinion and report transmission. This is where the forensic science culture truly becomes important: Although it was relatively straightforward to define and implement a quality system with laboratory procedures, it is a whole other problem with scene examination or opinion development. The forensic science community struggles today with the comprehensive quality approach because it failed to develop its own approach, instead, mistakenly copying the work from the manufacturing sector.

Quality System In Forensic Science Practice

Since the early 1990s, the quality triangle, presented by Lawrence Presley, a former quality assurance unit chief at the FBI laboratory, stands for the “paradigm of quality assurance” (Lentini 2006, 2009) for forensic science. Standardization, accreditation, and certification are the three sides of the quality triangle, which, when assembled together, represents the actual quality management system that should prevail. The evaluation process is used to test different aspects of the institution, such as its degree of expertise and the quality of the processes and results produced by it.

The forensic science quality movement traces its roots back to the mid-1970s when the Forensic Sciences Foundation (FSF), which was funded by the US National Institute of Law Enforcement Assistance Administration (LEAA), conducted a study about proficiency performances in American crime laboratories. The 3-year project had the following objective: “to determine the feasibility of proficiency testing as a tool to uncover problem areas in laboratory performance” (Peterson et al. 1978). Two hundred nineteen laboratories from the United States and Canada participated in the project and performed up to 21 controlled tests. Despite results showing a wide range of performances between laboratories, the authors found a positive outcome by stating that “properly supported, laboratories [could] be extremely proficient.” Since then, crime laboratories and professional organizations, recognizing the heterogeneity of practices characterized by a lack of regulations and quality control aspects, had worked to implement a culture of quality in forensic science. Initially, the American Society of Crime Laboratory Directors (ASCLD) initiated the accreditation process through its ASCLD/ LAB (Laboratory Accreditation Board) program. The four conditions shown in Fig. 1 are part of this culture that has expanded over the last 40 years.

Forensic Science and the Paradigm of Quality Research Paper

Proficiency Tests

Proficiency tests appear to be the starting point of the forensic practitioners’ interest for quality issue. Even though they are still performed today, they are no longer the focus point of current quality systems, which are rather based on accreditation programs and certifications. However, proficiency tests represent a valuable process that helps monitor the performances of the institution and, by extension, the robustness of their quality system. As such, they are part of a whole revolving around the quality triangle and cannot be dissociated from the other quality processes.

Proficiency tests are meant to evaluate different aspects of the service producer’s practice. There are different types of proficiency tests. Blind proficiency tests are sent to a laboratory like regular casework, thus rendering the analysts unaware of the presence of an evaluation process. These tests are the most optimal for evaluating the entire process (administrative and scientific) of a laboratory without any bias. On the other hand, failing to pass the test does not enable to accurately identify where the problem lies. Known proficiency tests are usually utilized to evaluate a given part of the examination process. Some proficiency tests are designed to evaluate solely the interpretation process (e.g., a fingermark identification), while some others focus on the examination process (e.g.,, enhancement of fingermarks on a sheet of paper). However, since the analysts know they are working on a proficiency test, different resources may be attributed to the test than when working on regular casework.

As a result, proficiency tests are not limited to the evaluation of inter- and intra-laboratory/ practitioners’ knowledge, skills, and abilities. They (may) also include the evaluation of laboratory procedures and administration. In any case, they represent a useful tool to ascertain that the requirements for the accreditation process are met. In general, proficiency tests lead to the interlaboratory comparison of the results. This is a way of placing participants “on a scale of agreements given by the consensus conclusion of the participants’ population” (CTS website). Pointing out potential differences in their conclusions when compared with colleagues and expected results provides an opportunity for confronting the robustness and reliability of methods and constitutes an interesting tool for analyzing what could be practically improved. However, foundations of quality systems are not based on interlaboratory testing, but on standard methods and practices (Lentini 2009).

Standardization

The standardization process consists of a normalization of (scientifically validated) procedures, considered as a valuable attribute of the quality system by forensic science practitioners and their partners (police, magistrates, public). This contributes to enhance the confidence of forensic science partners, presented as customers. However, it is (mistakenly) perceived as an assertion of reliability and validity of measurements and analyses.

Established norms for output format combined with the use of standard methods allow for interlaboratory comparisons and are necessary in data-basing. In this regard, the use of a common language is the question that must first be addressed when a quality system is implemented.

Specific sources produce references within the forensic science field such as the following: Scientific Working Groups (SWG), where forensic practitioners of a specific discipline meet to update their knowledge and, as mentioned in the framework for expert working group of ENFSI (European Network of Forensic Science Institutes), to promote quality assurance, develop professional standards, and harmonize methods.

ASTM International. A significant list of standard practices, test methods, and guides for forensic applications has been developed by ASTM International Committee E30 on forensic sciences. These standards are based on specific criteria accepted in the forensic science community.

Accreditation

The accreditation is defined as “a procedure by which an authoritative body gives formal recognition that a body or person is competent to carry out specific tasks” (ASTM E1732 2009). While ASTM International mentions accreditation for persons, the authors reserve the term “certification” for persons and the term “accreditation” for institutions.

This recognition process highlights the competencies of the accredited body to produce results using reliable and valid methods. Perceived to be of public benefit and as a quality safeguard, many institutions emphasized the implementation of accreditation as vital. Two examples are the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), which declared the implementation of accreditation and certification programs to be mandatory (NAS 2009), and the ENFSI, which requires pre-member institutes to be accredited (or in the process) to become members of its forensic science experts’ network. The accreditation process is influenced by the business-oriented approach to the quality process, which is mainly focused on guaranteeing a high degree of customer satisfaction within a given economical environment.

Management and professional entities support this culture of quality focused on tools applied to solve forensic science problems and, most particularly, laboratory processes. A substantial list of standards and guidance has been adopted and published, with the objectives of strengthening analytical procedures and ensuring more transparent actions in order to limit (or even cancel out) error risks. Within the collective perception, this analysis stage appears to be the place where problems occur; for most legal and forensic science communities, the forensic science process starts in the laboratory, without consideration that the process should be largely adapted to handle imperfect, incomplete, dirty trace specimens whose relevancy may also be questioned. This has become particularly evident with the increased sensitivity of techniques (such as DNA) and the problem of managing contamination issues. Pre and post-analysis steps have become subject to difficult accreditation issues, requiring adaptation and specific guidance for the application of the norms.

The main accreditation norms introduced within forensic science are the following: – For crime laboratories: ISO (International Organization for Standardization) 17025-05 (General requirements for the competence of testing and calibration laboratories), associated with the guidance ILAC-G-19 (2002), specifically concerns forensic laboratories. This standard leaves proficiency tests as a minor activity within the quality assurance.

– For scene investigation: ISO 17020-98 (General criteria for the operation of various types of bodies performing inspection) is perceived to be more flexible than the previous norm leaving some scopes of adaptation to practitioners. Two specific standards comply with this norm: IAF/ILAC A4 (2004), guidance on its application, and the European standard EA-5/03 (2008) (Guidance for the implementation of ISO/IEC 17020 in the field of crime scene investigation). Interestingly, Australia has chosen to follow the stricter standard ISO 17025 (Horswell 2004).

– For data evaluation and interpretation: There is no accreditation norm emanating from ISO for the evaluation stage. However, the AFSP (Association of Forensic Science Providers) has proposed standards for the formulation of evaluative forensic science expert opinion in the UK (AFSP 2009; Brown and Willis 2009), although they are not compatible with most European continental legal systems.

In order to become accredited, an institution must go through an accreditation body, i.e., another institution that can verify that the accreditation standards are met and officially recognize it. In this regard, many accreditation bodies for forensic science have flourished around the world, such as ASCLD/LAB; Forensic Specialties Accreditation Board (FSAB); National Association of Testing Authorities, Australia (NATA); and European co-operation for accreditation (EA).

Certification

Most norms ensure that procedures are followed according to rules of quality; they do not evaluate competences of the scientists behind the procedures. Certification is carried out as an independent process, established to monitor a forensic science practitioner’s expertise and proficiency. Mostly conducted on a voluntary basis, certification is defined as the process that will recognize a minimum or certain level of competences evaluating the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSA) of a scientist in a given field. Forensic professional organizations have to define the expected KSA in relation to their discipline. Setting up these programs is not an easy undertaking. There are as many definitions of KSA and conceptions of their evaluation, as there are professional certification programs. This situation shows a relative lack of homogeneity in assessing forensic scientists’ competences. Every program has its specificity and requirements regarding the expected level of education (with or without academic degrees), experience (number of years), and examination type (written, oral, practical). Ideally, a certification program should attest to a forensic scientist’s competence to carry out his/her duty, thus contributing to ensure a scientific quality within his/her practice. Unfortunately, in practice, certification does not always equate to competency.

Nevertheless, the expected KSA, the evaluation process of these competencies, and the conditions for maintaining certification should be well defined and harmonized within the whole forensic science community. The certification purpose should be specified, whether it is to ensure that a forensic scientist has reached a minimum level of competencies or to recognize a certain degree of expertise and excellence acquired through the practice (Stauffer and Schiffer 2007): two different perspectives that require their own approaches. It also means that the way forensic science is taught through various existing learning processes (education curricula, in-house training, continuing education) has sound and accepted foundations. For example, in the USA, certification programs do not require academic degrees as a condition to sit for the crime scene investigator certification exams, whereas university degrees, such as a Bachelor of Art (BA) or Science (BS) in a natural science, are required for analytical positions in a crime laboratory. Despite the fact there are many educational means of entering forensic practice, such discrepancies can be explained by a difference in the consideration of some forensic disciplines by forensic practitioners. For example, crime scene investigation is often not considered as part of the forensic science process by many practitioners, particularly laboratory ones. And yet, this is where the whole process begins. Surprisingly, many forensic science disciplines that require a strong and sound scientific basis suffer from a lack of relevant formal scientific education programs. This is the case with firearms/tool-marks examination or fingerprint examination.

Forensic science is a science with specific rules and a specific methodology that cannot be improvised or mastered through apprenticeships, but needs to be taught as a whole through a suitable and specific education program. It cannot be sufficiently emphasized that one must acquire the forensic science culture and formal education should not be mishandled. The needed harmonization of certification programs cannot be achieved unless the approach to forensic science education is fully reconsidered.

The Customer-Provider Relationship Approach

The standard terminology for forensic science (ASTM E1732-09) emphasizes that “In quality management, consideration is given to economic aspects.” In reality, this approach has been taken to the extreme in the UK, where economy, effectiveness, and efficiency (named the 3 E’s, coming from the circular 114/83 that had a strong impact on policing policy in UK in the 1980s) are linked and are part of a performance quest. Eventually, such a vision led to the closing of the Forensic Science Services (FSS) in 2012 (Lawless 2011).

A customer-provider relationship focus could limit and bias forensic scientists’ vision in view of providing the best scientific information for their customers, the prosecution or defense rather than for justice or the courts. Quality assurance is important, but the way it is perceived and applied, i.e., through an economical perspective rather than a scientific one, leads to restraining the vision of forensic science from a complete process to an easily usable and high-performance tool for the sake of a client within the criminal justice system. Although forensic scientists provide results, which are considered valuable products, criminal justice system stakeholders should not be considered customers to satisfy, but partners to work and interact with in an open and effective way. Approaching the forensic science process through an economical perspective leads to fragmentation and compartmentalization that is detrimental to scientific inquiry. As Willis and Brown (2009) stated, it is a “complicated end-to-end-process,” and market forces cannot rule it.

To cite Willis (2009), “Quality assurance is increasingly seen as one of the safeguards of good science. It is sometimes mistakenly considered that quality systems guarantee good science and though this is definitely not the case, a quality system is vital in an organizational setting.” It is vital because it helps to harmonize methods and practices throughout forensic science practice. Furthermore, it helps to focus on the necessary KSA that forensic science practitioners must have to be good forensic scientists. Also, it forces crime laboratories to show some transparency in how things are done, a definite paradigm shift from the secrecy that these laboratories benefited from for decades. However, this race for standardization and accreditation should not be the first that forensic scientists should run.

Standardization is reached through peer consensus within a discipline and leads to processes of varying rigidities. In general, a standard puts up a structured and rigid frame, meaning that the analyst must not deviate at all from it. It is ideal to perform routine analyses, such as drug of abuse or toxicology analysis, since they can be ensured by calibration and comparisons with standards and accredited according to international quality norms. Alternatively, a standard could also offer some flexibility in its application, allowing the analyst to utilize other ways of achieving the desired result. Any standard can specify whether it is intended as a rigid frame or to offer some flexibility. The use of the wording “may,” “could,” “should,” and “shall/must” usually defines the level of rigidity of the described action. However, the approach to standardization can only apply to specific and repetitive tasks on similar samples. As such, it does not allow for a view of the overall process that the forensic science practitioner has to face on a daily basis. This is where harmonization comes into play.

Harmonization, similarly to standardization, is based on agreement reached among expert groups such as ENFSI guides. Nevertheless, it is not meant to be mandatory or rigid, contrary to standards. Harmonization leads to recommendations and guidelines for which the scientist is able to choose fit-for-purpose methods to apply when faced with peculiar or less than perfect specimens, as it is the case with the investigation of a scene. Best practice manuals (based on a harmonized approach), edited by professional organizations such as ENFSI, should provide solid and sound tools for tackling every non-standardized specimen based on a scientific and critical approach. This perspective reinforces that a forensic specimen, or physical trace, does not have to adapt to practice but that practice has to adapt to the specimen or trace.

This is why the focus of forensic science practitioners should be on the harmonization process that leads toward quality developments rather than the standardization and accreditation of specific tasks that do not offer an overall view of a case.

Finally, independently of his/her KSA, a forensic science practitioner must adhere to a professional code of ethics. In this regard, professional associations, such as AAFS, American Academy of Forensic Sciences; ABC, American Board of Criminalistics; ANZFSS, Australian and New Zealand Forensic Science Society; and ENFSI, promulgate codes of ethical practice to which members must adhere. Without the ethical behavior of the forensic science practitioner, all the quality assurance and quality control systems in the world cannot offer any guarantee as to the validity of the examinations performed at the scene or at the laboratory. This is also where the process should sometimes start.

Strengths And Weaknesses Of The Existing Forensic Science Quality Assurance Paradigm (Table 1)

The focus on quality in forensic science should differentiate various steps and applications in the whole process.

Forensic Science and the Paradigm of Quality Research Paper

Strict controls and standards are necessary for routine applications that need interoperability (between laboratories and authorities), strict limits, or possibility to share databases, allowing comparisons between results originating from different laboratories that can be trusted along calibrated ranges. This means that data are of a comparable instrumental analytical nature and sufficiently routine to be used, as in a manufacturing plant. This is the case for DNA, some narcotic drug analyses, vehicle paints, blood alcohol concentration, etc.

However, standards and controls are clearly not adapted to deciphering information about criminal phenomena or activity-level information in forensic intelligence, investigation, or interpretation of an inferential nature. Yet, this is where forensic science is often the most useful and a valuable asset for the criminal justice system and for society (Ribaux et al. 2010a, b). Harmonization of the detection process here is essential.

One further difficulty in the way quality is perceived is the fragmentation and compartmentalization of data that feed linkage blindness. This phenomenon has been identified as the single most important factor in failed criminal/terrorist investigation (Egger 1984). A sound quality system for operational tools and methods is essential, but this is not where most problems lie when faced with crime-solving difficulties.

Concluding Remarks

Mainly attributed to laboratory management matters, quality issues are the engines for standardization and accreditation programs. All is related to evaluation processes through controlled and monitored actions based on standard operative procedures or specific attributes (criteria) considered as representative of what quality is. The criteria that are used are numerical, useful for lay people who need tools to evaluate and consider what seems to fulfill their high-quality requirements, and avoid errors and a lack of validity and reliability. Indeed, risks of miscarriages of justice are a reason that explains this quest for absolute quality assurance. Interestingly, perspectives diverge in perceptions of error sources and advanced solutions within forensic science circles and their partners (Schiffer 2009).

Quality within the forensic science process is a difficult question to answer to and a priority. However, as long as it is considered through the legal and economic perspectives, it is not consistent with case-oriented, strategic, and operational needs. To ensure the overall quality of instrumental processes and competences is a good start, but it is clearly insufficient, as it does not focus on the right issues: understanding criminal activities, diminishing linkage blindness, and solving crimes (Ribaux et al. 2010a, b). Legal and economical systems, rather than science, condition the way forensic science is approached as a profession. Forensic scientists should become the driving force in defining who they are and what they are working for. Ensuring and improving quality does not only find solutions in quality assurance and controls, where criteria are associated with performances management and market forces (Lawless 2011), but also in the overall definition of the profession. The scientific foundations of forensic science define its values and performance as well as its position within a criminal justice system as an independent discipline. It provides a challenging perspective in this matter by emphasizing the whole process and the interdependence of the different parts of forensic science.

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