fabsroman
04-01-2005, 11:33 PM
I was wondering if you had heard about this case I watched on TV tonight. It happened in Florida and I believe the defendant's name Sybers. He was accused of poisoning his wife to death, but they couldn't find any poison in the body for 8 1/2 years. Supposedly, the motive was that he had a mistress, which he admitted to, and that he had 6 million in assets.
After 8 1/2 years, the prosecution was finally able to find a lab that found succinyl monocholine, a poison, in the tissues from the body. The FBI lab concurred that the poison was in the tissue. Most of the evidence was circumstantial and the jury pretty much hung its hat on the results from the lab. The man spent two years in prison as a result.
After that, prosecutors were sending tissue to the lab left and right on cold cases to see if poisoning, with this almost undetectable poison, was the issue. Turned out that it was in almost all of them. The FBI lab analyst got a little suspicious at this point, and asked for some tissue samples from some cadavers that had died of known natural causes. When tests were done on this tissue, where poisoning wasn't a factor, they were all found to contain succinyl monocholine. Hence, the test wasn't valid, yet a man had spent two years in prison as a result.
While I wasn't there for the entire trial, from what I saw on the show tonight, there really wasn't much evidence to convict this guy in the first place and that was why the prosecutor waited over 8 years to try him. After he was released, the prosecutor debated trying him again, but they worked out a plea bargain where he plead to manslaughter, but didn't admit guilt, and his sentence was time already served.
Yep, the justice system has problems, but that is because of a scientist that didn't know what he was talking about. So, does science have a problem or is it the justice system. The appeals court did throw out the test results and let the guy out of jail before the FBI analyst found out that they were really faulty, so maybe the justice system does work. Then again, this guy was a doctor that was able to afford some pretty good attorney. I would imagine that the appeal was quite costly. If it was some poor person, he would have been sitting in jail a little while longer.
After 8 1/2 years, the prosecution was finally able to find a lab that found succinyl monocholine, a poison, in the tissues from the body. The FBI lab concurred that the poison was in the tissue. Most of the evidence was circumstantial and the jury pretty much hung its hat on the results from the lab. The man spent two years in prison as a result.
After that, prosecutors were sending tissue to the lab left and right on cold cases to see if poisoning, with this almost undetectable poison, was the issue. Turned out that it was in almost all of them. The FBI lab analyst got a little suspicious at this point, and asked for some tissue samples from some cadavers that had died of known natural causes. When tests were done on this tissue, where poisoning wasn't a factor, they were all found to contain succinyl monocholine. Hence, the test wasn't valid, yet a man had spent two years in prison as a result.
While I wasn't there for the entire trial, from what I saw on the show tonight, there really wasn't much evidence to convict this guy in the first place and that was why the prosecutor waited over 8 years to try him. After he was released, the prosecutor debated trying him again, but they worked out a plea bargain where he plead to manslaughter, but didn't admit guilt, and his sentence was time already served.
Yep, the justice system has problems, but that is because of a scientist that didn't know what he was talking about. So, does science have a problem or is it the justice system. The appeals court did throw out the test results and let the guy out of jail before the FBI analyst found out that they were really faulty, so maybe the justice system does work. Then again, this guy was a doctor that was able to afford some pretty good attorney. I would imagine that the appeal was quite costly. If it was some poor person, he would have been sitting in jail a little while longer.