Blog
Transference
Mar
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I came across a piece of research about transference. I’m familiar with this concept in my counsellor training. Roughly stated, it concerns complications in the relationship between therapist and patient.
But this particular study of transference is very different. It was about the possibilities of transferring my DNA to another person I had never met, let alone never touched.
My faith in the infallibility of DNA results was greatly weakened.
This research on ‘secondary transfer’ was conducted by a credible researcher in an appropriate laboratory setting.
Hang onto your hats. I quote one paragraph from the longer story of a true crime event.
“Volunteers sat at a table and shared a jug of juice. After 20 minutes of chatting and sipping, swabs were deployed on their hands, the chairs, the table, the jug, and the juice glasses, then tested for genetic material. Although the volunteers never touched each other, 50% wound up with another’s DNA on their hand. A third of the glasses bore the DNA of volunteers who did not touch or drink from them.”
Wow! I was stunned. To clinch the point, it has been shown that a father’s DNA can show up on his daughter’s underwear even after washing.
Just pause for a moment and reflect on the implications this has for forensic science, from near certainty to genuine uncertainty.
In the particular crime of a bloody murder, the focus of the article, a man’s DNA was found on the victim. The perpetrator was found and charged. Case closed, so to speak, except for the work of a conscientious and thorough public defender. This, despite the perpetrator having been in an alcoholic blackout at the time, stated that maybe he did do it.
In this case, the perpetrator had an ironclad alibi. He was in the hospital, having been transported by ambulance to the local hospital at the time of the murder.
This was the same ambulance crew that was called to the site of the murder and who attached the medical device to the fingers of the victim and perpetrator. The same ambulance crew wearing the same uniforms.
Much research has been done over the years on DNA, but little on its transfer. I never knew that there was such a difference in the flake-ability (my term) of DNA.
So, where does that leave me? In our current age of doubting everything, news/fake-news lies/lies repeated loudly and frequently, I yearn for a greater level of certainty. Life is so much easier if I voluntarily don’t look under the hood or behind the curtain. But wanting something to be true is not the same as something being true. The police understand very well the concept of ‘confirmation bias.’ I try to be vigilant.
Please give this a bit of a think. Have you ever noticed something that doesn’t pass the sniff test? That frequent yet often unnoticed human check we use from a whiff of iffy food, now that’s the true sniff test, to an I don’t think that information is correct. It doesn’t make sense. But you can’t put your finger on why it doesn’t seem right.
Please comment by sending me an email with your bit of a think. I am curious about your thoughts.
Thanks to the folks at Wired magazine for the article Framed for Murder by His Own DNA.
Photo by Louis Reed on Unsplash
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