In this episode, Aaron Olson talks to Bethany Pridgen, a seasoned expert in forensic science since 2005. Bethany discusses the accreditation process for ISO 17025 and the roles of different accrediting bodies, such as ANAB and A2LA.
Bethany explains the importance of ISO 17025 standards, the assessment process, and the differences between various accrediting organizations. She also highlights potential conflicts of interest in forensic lab assessments, the significance of best practices versus standards, and the necessity of method validation.
The episode delves into the challenges within forensic science, such as funding, independence from law enforcement, and ensuring scientifically valid methods.
Bethany also shares her thoughts on potential solutions, including the need for independent scientific bodies and additional funding for defense-related research.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Guest Introduction
00:35 Understanding ISO 17025 Accreditation
01:49 Volunteer Assessors and Potential Conflicts
03:11 Lead Assessors and Their Roles
04:21 Differences Between Accreditation Bodies
06:13 Challenges in Forensic Assessments
13:40 Standards vs. Best Practices
17:47 Historical Context and Evolution of Standards
21:56 Current Best Practices and Method Validation
24:47 Solutions and Future Directions
35:14 Conclusion and Final Thoughts
Clips
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Automated transcript (not checked for errors)
Introduction and Guest Introduction
Aaron: Hi, everyone, and welcome back to another episode of the podcast. Today, I'm talking with Bethany Pridgen, and Bethany has been involved in forensic science since 2005, and she has prior experience in the pharmaceutical industry. She provides expert witness testimony and consulting for criminal and civil matters involving seized drugs, cannabis, and forensic testing.
Laboratory Management, Quality Assurance Standards, and Reliability of Testing Methods. Bethany, thanks so much for coming on the show today.
Bethany Pridgen: . No, thanks for having me, Aaron. I'm so happy to be here.
Aaron: Yeah.
Understanding ISO 17025 Accreditation
Aaron: So I wanted to have you on the call today because I wanted to explore your, uh, a technical assessor for ISO 17025. And I wanted to explore more about what assessment is. A lot of clients and people that we work with. They know that a lot of the labs, uh, crime labs. are assessed under this standard, but they don't know as much about what goes on during the assessment and how you become accredited under that standard.
So, tell me a little bit more. How does the process work for becoming accredited under ISO 17025?
Bethany Pridgen: Right. So, ISO 17025, it applies to international, um, testing and calibration laboratories internationally. Um, there is an organization that, uh, essentially accredits the accreditor. So, what they do is they ensure that a, that Uh, organizations like, um, ANAB, uh, the ANSI National Accreditation Board, and then A2LA, the American Association for Laboratory Accreditation, um, meet the standards themselves to be accredited, uh, uh, as an accrediting body, and so that they can essentially execute it. Um, the accreditation of laboratories under 5.
Volunteer Assessors and Potential Conflicts
Aaron: Okay, so they meet these standards and then, you know, one of the things that a lot of people are surprised about when I tell them about, um, ISO 17025 accreditation and the standards is they think that there's this group of independent assessors that this is what they do for a living. They go from one laboratory to the next and they make sure they meet all the standards in ISO 17025 and they're sort of independent.
From, uh, you know, from the people who work in the laboratory, what actually happens is, is that there's a group of volunteers who work for at least for crime laboratories for another crime lab. That's also accredited and they have gone through some training to become assessors. And then they come and assess a different crime laboratory.
And a lot of times these assessors know each other. They go to the same conferences. Um, and I feel like there could be a potential conflict of interest there. Um, yeah. Tell me more about your thoughts on that and is that true of all assessments under 17025 that it's all volunteer related or just the forensic portion?
Okay.
Lead Assessors and Their Roles
Bethany Pridgen: once you complete it, you can apply to be a lead assessor. Um, and then I found out that, um, the actually the forensics group at actually has a different standard, their own set of training for lead assessors, and that you have to be hand selected. by people at ANAB to become a lead assessor. Um, and then A& AB, and then a lot of the, and I should say that a lot of the lead assessors chosen by the forensic part of ANAB, um, they are, they are paid. Lead assessors are typically paid. Many of them are still, um, working in crime labs. Most, the majority that I've worked with are crime lab directors or their quality assurance managers.
And then you have your recently retired people. The lead assessors are not typically full time assessors. They usually have a full time job, they're
Aaron: Yeah,
Bethany Pridgen: part. Yeah.
Differences Between Accreditation Bodies
Bethany Pridgen: Um, it's not necessarily that way at A2LA. There's the two organizations that accredit for forensics, um, in the United States.
So, A2LA, um, they, uh, most of them are independent contractors. Um, A2LA has some full time staff that do, uh, do go in and perform accreditations and they're trained specifically for assessing to 17. 025 standards. So, these lead assessors aren't necessarily. Out of the forensic science field, only they may come from other fields and other experiences and what their real expertise is, is being experts at the standard and then a to L.
A. will bring in technical assessors to assist and then some of the technical sensors can. train and conduct enough assessments and be observed by the A2LA staff to the point where they'll be approved to be a lead assessor. Um, because there's too much work for the small staff, you know, at A2LA alone to do all of, all of the assessments.
Um, the technical assessors are independent. Some of them are still working in the field. Some are retired. Um, some are like me, independent contractors. I, You know, do other work. And then this is something I do on the side is go in and do technical assessments. And in that area that I'm considered a technical expert, um, and those all of those positions are paid positions. Um, and, uh, so they aren't necessarily, you know, we're not accrediting, you know, we're not lab, um, Employees that are going into labs that are only accredited by A2LA to assess them. We're, we're doing all types of other work that is applicable to technical assessments. And there are, um, there are actually technical assessors who work in ANAB accredited labs that do technical assessments for A2LA. So it's interesting difference in the two different organizations.
Challenges in Forensic Assessments
Aaron: that that is interesting and you mentioned that for a and a B, there's a separate forensics part that deals with 17025. And then there's, uh, separate. Part that deals with just laboratories in general who are, you know, dealing with what other whatever testing and calibration. Does that is there? Is there anything seems a little unusual that if you have one standard that you would need two separate entities and and the forensic entity that's doing this is all hand selected assessors.
It seems that one standard should apply to every every part equally. Do you see any issues with with those two sort of ways of doing things?
Bethany Pridgen: My big, my biggest issue is that I think that the, that they lack the advantage of having technical expertise from other industries coming into their labs and assessing them. Because if you're doing testing, for example, and sees drug. You know, chemistry, right? And you're using gas chromatography mass spectrometry for identifications. You don't need some, you know, on drug drug samples. You don't need someone who's only use G. C. M. S. for drug samples to assess your method and protocols and make sure you're following them and that it's a valid method. Anyone who's working as an expert using gas chromatography mass could come in. And I think that it's an it's it's at a distant. My and this again, this is my personal opinion, but it's at a disadvantage to the forensics group to be separate from the rest of the parent organization in how they select their assessors, because they're not getting in. Like, they kind of get to stay in their silo of forensics only. Um, and whereas when I've worked with a to a, like, uh, I've worked with calibration guys who are calibrating breath alcohol labs who've never worked on. Calibration of a breath instrument. These guys are, that's all they do is calibration of these highly technical instruments. So they are on calibration, but it doesn't have to be just breath alcohol testing instruments.
They, they're, on all different ones. So they're able to bring, you know, how they do things, you know, different ways of looking at the statistics, maybe, you know, um, an uncertainty that Hasn't been considered because typically, you know, if we stay in our silo, we only look at what everyone else is looking at.
And, and we're only being exposed to that. So I really, I mean, I don't know that there's a right or wrong way to do it, but I do see it as a little bit of a disadvantage. And, you know, it was a little disappointing to realize that, you know, you can train with the parent organization. And be approved as a lead assessor, but a subsidiary or a sub part of the organization doesn't accept their own parents organization training without them hand selecting you.
That's just. Interesting and odd to me. Um, and it kind of, to me, takes out what, what I would think is you want to have some objectivity and how you're choosing the people to look into your labs. I'm not saying they're doing anything wrong. I just found it odd and interesting that they, you know, that the parent organization wouldn't say, well, we're doing this training and it applies to our entire company.
Aaron: Yeah, I mean, I do find it odd. I think, um, know, in 2009, the National Academy of Sciences came out with a report talking about how forensics needs more object objectivity, more independent assessment, and when you have, uh, an accreditation body that's very insular and that, you know, basically people who work in other crime labs.
The technical assessors are going to, uh, another crime lab and then vice versa. In a few months, they're going to come and assess you. It seems way too kind of like an in-group mentality. Whereas, like you said, if you get people from other areas of industry coming in and say, Hey, why do you do things like this?
You get more questions, um, more openness and objectivity. I think that that would be a lot better for everyone.
Bethany Pridgen: Oh, yeah, I would agree. And I think, too, I mean, the really wonderful thing about forensics labs is that we're not really, you know, like I always used to tell my staff when I ran a lab, we're not competing with the other labs for business, right? So there is a huge openness to share. Right. So, like, if I'm trying to figure out how do you test for this new drug, you know, we're starting to see this, you know, this drug designer drug on the market.
We've never seen it before. Who else has seen it? I mean, there is no limit to the number of people that will respond to you in the community. To assist and help and send information. And I think that is really great. I love that that part of the community, um, but
Bethany Pridgen: not a true method validation and evaluation, you know, of possible breakdown compounds or other compounds that could look very similar that you, You know, there's a lot of research going on. Right? I look at methods all the time and people are taking a standard running on the instrument and they're like, that's it valid. And that is not a method validation. Right? So, so that gets
Aaron: Yeah,
Bethany Pridgen: lab and they don't really know much about method validation, but they're like, well, it works for them. Okay. So it's working for us. And so then they start using it. So now and then another lab, right? So now let's say you have five different labs that have started using. This so called method that's actually never been valid, validated properly, and, and because someone else is doing it, there's that assumption that it was done right somewhere along the line, um, and then you have, you know, someone from one of those five labs who gets selected to go to this lab because while they're using their method, they don't know anyone there.
There's no conflict of interest. I don't know these guys in Oklahoma. They're not my friends. So I can go assess their, these drug testing, right? So they go in and they go, Oh, look, they're using the same method we use. It's valid. now we move forward. So then you have this. We're working in an environment where everything we're doing is accepted in the scientific community, except for the problem is the community is not being truly scientific and making sure that their methods are properly validated and believe me, I'm not like throwing rocks at people. I, I live this, I did this too. I live this world, right? Where you're like, I'm trying to get casework out. The state lab knows what they're doing better than I do. Probably they got a lot more people, right? But then when you have the time to step back and really start looking, you start to realize, oh, this act, the questions that should have been asked before this ever got used, have never actually been asked.
So we actually haven't established that we're using valid science and, and that is. The concerning, right? Because then when we say on the stand, and everyone's being honest when they say on the stand, I am doing something that's accepted in the scientific community. In their mind, they are being honest, but we're basically in a circular situation, right, where you're just using what they use.
And then you came in and didn't know it came from them. And it's the way you do it. So it must be right.
Aaron: yeah, I think that's exactly the problem you just outlined there.
Standards vs. Best Practices
Aaron: Um, you know, maybe that's, that's a good place for us to jump off into standards versus best best practices, what the differences are, and some. Maybe some common things that you've seen between the differences, you know, between the standards of 17025 and best practices and so forth.
Bethany Pridgen: Yeah, so, okay, so the standards, those ISO 17025 standards, again, they're not specific to forensics, right? So, um, any type of testing lab or calibration lab, um, you name the industry that does testing or calibration, they're, if they want this, they're, You know, to be accredited internationally, ISO 17 025 is their standard.
So the standards basically outlining, you know, things that should be done, management procedures in place, auditing procedures, um, you know, do you have protocols in place? Are you doing method validation? So the standards are just ensuring that you have these, they should meet certain criteria, but the ISO standards don't tell you how to do anything. just because you have, okay. the standard of ISO 17025 doesn't necessarily mean you're doing it right. It just means that your documentation and everything is meeting their criteria. And it is a rigid criteria, so I'm not like, you know, sweeping it off as like, oh, you know, it doesn't matter. It does matter. But then you have like that step down from the standard to the accreditation body standard, right? So accreditation bodies are going to be a little more specific to different industries, right? So you're going to, you're going to, you're going from like anyone and everyone that does testing and calibration, you know, at the international level.
Now we've got a nat, two national, um, bodies that accredit, and then they're focusing at least on, forget the rest of ANAB and just talk about the forensic part of ANAB and then A2LA, the forensic part of ANAB, they're focusing. Solely on forensics, right? So then they're gonna have their own standards.
So they're, we call them supplemental standards, you know, where they're, they're adding standards that are gonna be a little bit more specific to forensic clients. So chain of custody issues, evidence handling, um, that type of stuff of reporting court testimony. Like they're usually gonna have something in there about testimony, how people get, you know, authorized to testify, how they're reviewed and assessed, um, on their technical content of their testimony.
So. Um, and then, um, and then you've got the labs, right? So then the labs are setting their, they write policies and procedures, they're setting their standards, the standards that they require of themselves. Do you have at least a three-tiered approach of different standards that they expect themselves to follow? And what, what, what you hope to accomplish from this accreditation process is that people are meeting the standard and that they're able to show that what they say they do, they're actually doing. Right. They've got policies and procedures in place to guide what they're doing, and then they can prove it when someone comes on site and looks at their records, you know, do the records reflect that they're following policy and procedure. So, again, you can evaluate all of that. And if you're meeting all those standards, your own, the accrediting bodies and, um, the international standard. Then you definitely have some, you, you, I mean, obviously, this is way better than having nothing in place, right? I mean, you, you have, you have some, you know, you have some, something that you've got to attain to, you just can't, it's not the wild, fully the wild west anymore. Um, but what all of those do not entail is best practices. Right. And so, um, in, for example, in, um, environmental testing or food testing, you've got the FDA, you've got the EPA, right? These are, you got regulatory bodies that produce method validations, best practices, uh, GMP for pharmaceuticals, and, you know, They're, they're going in, they're regulating, and they're ensuring that you're following not just accreditation or whatever standards you have, but you're actually following best practices or, and again, some, some of these industries require you to only follow certain methods and your method validations must Uh, adhere to certain criteria and in forensics.
Historical Context and Evolution of Standards
Bethany Pridgen: We've never really had that. Um, it's always been a little bit. Um, I hope I'm not talking too long on this one, but it's kind of a big subject. Um, uh, it's always been a voluntary thing, right? Because we don't, we don't have a regulatory body. And so years and years and years ago, um, the FBI, along with some other agencies, developed what we refer to as the scientific working groups or the swigs. And so they develop these, Working groups, um, for toxicology, drug testing, fingerprints, DNA, and it was like, it was, hey, we're going to publish some. Some best practices for everyone, um, so that at least we know that we're all trying to do things the same way and that we don't have somebody just doing rogue work.
That's not non scientific at least, you know, that's the goal Um, but again, it's voluntary, right? So those existed for a long time and there was stuff that's published but you know Again, you know, people would say, Oh, we're going to follow the swig drug thing. We're going to follow the swig tux. Um, not required. Um, and then you talked about the national academies of sciences report that came out. And so then there was this uproar because I think what they realized is, well, I think it's great that the industry developed something because before swig drugs, I mean, who, every lab's doing anything the way they want to.
And that still is the case, but at least people were, Okay. Reaching to adhere to some type of best practice, and not all labs were doing that, but a lot of them were, um, and then after National Academies of Science report, I think that was 2009. Is that what you?
Great. So, um, then they, they, you know, they went into their presidential council, um, for, uh, sorry, the presidential council of advisors on science and technology PCAST. And I believe it, I believe it was under Obama. And they said, Hey, like, Okay. Maybe we should have something, you know, more formal for forensics. I mean, obviously, there's some issues that need to be addressed. This is a pretty scathing report. And so maybe we should do something about it at a higher federal level.
So, the PCAST brought in OSACs for forensic sciences. So, I never get this one right. I should probably look it up, but it's like the organization, Of scientific advisory committees, I believe, and, um, OSACs have existed under PCAST for other industries as well, but now they're like, okay, we're gonna have some OSACs for forensics, and then we're going to actually start getting serious about, you know, we're going to take all this hard work from SWIG drugs, I mean, SWIGs, and we're going to develop, you know, we're going to work with those, you know, because this is what a lot of the labs are already following, and we're going to start building best practices for Take care. You know, our labs and they're going to be, you know, and this, um, is, was, you know, overseeing the OSACs for this process, they're bringing in like hundreds of scientists at the local, state and federal level to assist and developing these in kind of formalizing a process of best practices. Um, and so they started developing documents and, um, some got published, I think, but not all. Um, then, but then all of that got kind of taken away. Um, 2018, 2019, 2020, the federal government decided they're not going to fund that anymore, right? Um, but when the OSACs were working on developing standards, they were working with the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, um, to do this. So it was kind of like a lot of the prior documents will say OSAC AAFS. Um, then when the OSACs went away, they started publishing the documents under the American National, Standards Institute and the American Academy of Forensic Sciences standards board. So, ANSI, which is the A in A and AB, has now published best practices with the Academy standards board, and now there are available free online.
All you have to do is enter your email address. You can get it. Best practices for all these different areas of forensic sciences. And so, again, there's no requirement to follow them, it's the only published best practices that we have.
Aaron: Yeah. Yeah.
Current Best Practices and Method Validation
Aaron: What have you found in your experience as far as some of the lab's biggest oversights between either standards or best practices? Do you have anything that come to mind?
Bethany Pridgen: Oh, yeah. Um, I mean, I think the, the 1 that's recently stood out to me. The most is, I mean, I think that. again, the best practices, none of it's perfect, but it's certainly, um, I, I really like the method validation one that they put out for toxicology. I mean, it's pretty clear on what they expect you to do for a validation, how many points on your calibration curve you should have for method validation.
Maybe, you know, how many points on your calibration you might need on for routine casework. I'm just, you know, all the different matrix effects, things that you should be addressing and looking at to ensure there's no matrix effect. Um, so they do a really good job of bringing down. These are all the things that you should be looking for and addressing in your method validation. So I
Aaron: Uh
Bethany Pridgen: that have been published by ANSI.
Aaron: huh.
Bethany Pridgen: I've got labs who, you know,
It'll say you need to have a six-point calibration curve for your alcohol or any quantitation toxicology. Um, And then once you've established a successful six point calibration curve for your method for routine analysis, you can get away with using four. And these labs, I mean, are using three. Why? Like, and why hasn't someone said, hey, that doesn't meet the best practice. And I mean, so I'm, it's just interesting to me because I'm like, this is, these are published by like, you know, a and a visa subsidiary of ANSI and. No one's like they're not requiring adherence to best practices that they themselves have published.
And I just find that ironic, but it's also important because, you know, when I look at it, for example, why do I care about a calibration curve and only three points? Well, what we know is that a three point calibration curve at three points, that's the very first data point where we can start to see what the error is of the method. So if we're using a three point calibration curve, we're only looking at what the minimal potential error is on that curve on that method. So, I mean, good science would say, well, you want to see more than the. time you could see error. Like let's go out a couple, two or three standard deviations, um, to see, you know, what does the error, you know, is it worse?
Is it, does it get better? Um, and so that's probably been one of the more shocking ones for me, to be honest.
Aaron: Yeah, yeah.
Solutions and Future Directions
Aaron: What do you, what have you thought about for solutions? I know, you know, working with, uh, in a government lab, um, governments are, you know, slow to change and, and anyone who's working in a lab doesn't want to have their practices picked apart. Um, but, you know, and another problem is, is, What does that say for all their previous work?
If they start, if they admit that, yes, we need to do it different now. Well, then we're cases under the previous validations or methods. Were those still accurate and reliable? You know, and then these kind of bring up tricky questions that a lot of labs don't really want to answer. Um, have you thought about any solutions and paths for past forward?
Bethany Pridgen: I mean, I, I, I'm always trying to think of like, how do we fix this? Because I come from the forensic science industry. I come from crime labs. Like I said, I've been guilty of doing some of these same things and feeling very good about the work that I do. And I don't want them to feel bad about the work that they do.
They're doing great work. They're usually overworked. Um, they usually don't have time. didn't have time to look into in depth into all these issues, right? It's like, you got to get your casework out. It's, you know, you're busy. Um, you've got people who are way more experienced than you saying, Hey, this, you know, this looks good.
This is how we do it. We're signing
Aaron: Silence.
Bethany Pridgen: the labs that have never had true experience with method validation, for example, anything else out like, you know, we talked about coming in from other industries, any exposure to industries outside of. The forensic science world and it's such a small world, you know, that's there's only I think there's like 20, 000 or fewer forensic scientists in the United States, at least. So I've read that recently. It could be more could be less. But I mean, that's not a really, that's not a lot of people. So it's a really small community.
And then when you're just not really getting that opportunity to have exposure, and then you also have limited resources. And,
Aaron: Silence. Silence.
Bethany Pridgen: I'm a cop because I couldn't, I couldn't deal with biology or chemistry in high school, right? I mean, so, um, I'm a daughter of a cop, you know, it's like, I, I get it, like, it's not
Aaron: Okay.
Bethany Pridgen: scientists managed by law enforcement, they don't, if they're getting the results they need, they don't, they don't really understand that it's not being nitpicky or dorky or too analytical to say, hey, we need to at these types of issues that we're finding in the lab.
They don't want to hear it. You know, they don't want to have a scandal. They don't want to have, they don't want to ruffle feathers, you know, either politically or from their upper management, um, depending on whether, you know, how, how far in are you, are you in at the local, state, federal level? Um, so there's just a lot of, I think, pressures that people probably don't even realize that they have that keeps them from being able to do that. And I think, I mean, personally, I think one of the solutions could be, I mean, I really think if we're going to give some, They still have a lot more funding than who are looking at this from the outside, right? I mean, most people that are looking at it from the outside, people like you, people like me, other colleagues we know, um, we're doing this on our own. we don't have funding, we don't have research facilities, and sometimes it's almost impossible to get access to some of the equipment that they can, because some of the companies themselves don't want People to scrutinize the work that's being done, which is bizarre to me because, you know, as a scientist, you know, we're thinking we just want to make sure we understand everything's done.
Right. And I don't want to, you know, burn some lab to the ground. What I want is to improve forensic science, right? Because that's my passion. I've wanted to be in forensics since I was, you know, 10 years old. I always found it fascinating. dad was a detective, you know, so I was always trying to figure out stuff, you know, about forensics.
I thought it was really interesting. So, yeah, it's like, I don't want forensics to look bad. I just want it to get Better, but it takes those perspectives from different angles to be able to do that. So I think that there should be funding for the other side. You know, there are, you know, for other experts who aren't, you know, um, Obligated to a different master, for example, you know, so like I don't, you know, I like to don't have to answer to maybe a law enforcement person who doesn't understand science, you know, and I think that's probably where I agree with the National Academy of Sciences report and many other reports since then that have said, you know, forensic science really should be independent of they should just be independent scientific bodies. Right. That are run by scientists. Um, and it would give them that flexibility. And then, and again, they should maybe they will not. Maybe they shouldn't only be available to one side of the justice system. You know, I mean, we should have neutral organizations that are available to all sides because that would take away, you know, this mentality of.
You know, I'm a prosecutions expert and I work for the lab and the police department and we put bad people in jail. Like none of those comments should ever like putting bad people in jail should never be a goal of a forensic scientist. In, in my opinion, like that is has nothing to do with science. I mean, yeah, we feel good when we reach a conclusion and find out, you know, by scientific, you know, reasoning, Oh, like looking at all this information, you know, with good science, you know, we got someone who drove drunk, you know, they're going to be held accountable.
And, you know, I mean, you feel good that you're able to do that, but it should be about doing good science. And doing something good for your society, but also saying like, you know, Hey, I did good science and this person doesn't appear that that was what it was, you know, maybe, uh, I mean, I've had cases where we did the testing and it was a medical issue that seemed like, you know, an impaired driver.
Right? So you feel like good when you're like, wow, that sounded, you know, I heard about this case and it sounded like, you know, um, This guy was really impaired, but he had no alcohol, but he had a lot of acetone or, you know, so you, you get excited because you, as a scientist, you should just be happy that you found an answer that can be useful to find the truth and justice, right?
But not, be looking for the answer to one side of the case or the other. So I'm like, if they're not going to, if they're not going to allow crime labs to be independent, it would be great, you know, and this is, you know, pie in the sky. I don't, I don't see this happening, you know, that there would be some type of funding to assist and research, you know, for, for defense, you know, beyond, you know, some funding, but to public defenders offices to let them hire, you know, an expert here and there. Um, but like to have some type, you know, there has to be a way to create some type of method or facilities or groups that are independent, but allow not just prosecution and law enforcement access to the lab.
Aaron: Yeah, absolutely. I think that your idea is a good one. And you know, for example, in breath alcohol testing, um, getting access to just the devices that measure breath, you can't access it from the lab. They don't want it. to give it to you because they don't want it scrutinized and you can't buy it from the manufacturer because they don't want to sell it to someone outside of law enforcement because they don't want to face any scrutiny either.
And you know, your idea of having like a independent, uh, maybe, maybe experts who had an independent laboratory access to some, to some devices for testing or things like that, that I think that's a really good one. I don't think I like you. I don't think it's going to happen, but, um, it's an interesting idea.
Silence.
Bethany Pridgen: if they wanted to, to research and answer that question. You know, and I always think, man, if I just had access to a facility and I could do the, you know, do this experiment just to answer the question, you know, it doesn't have to be a lot. It's just a, you know, there's just these questions that pop up all the time. Um, and I'm, oh, I just, I'm always like, man, it would be so great to have access. myself or access to someone where it's because if I want to do that, um, either i'm gonna have to pay out of my Pocket and you know, i'm not making loads of money to be able to pay out of pocket for all for research Um, or you get your client your client has to and again How unequal is it that you know? the clients you know, or the clients really of the attorneys are got to pay out of their pocket. So some of the Like cases where we've been able to answer questions that we really want to get answered have only come, you know, out of, I don't know, the, probably the last, I don't know, 80 cases that I've worked on, you know, I would say maybe two have been able to really afford to go beyond, you know, just some basic testimony case review, you know, like, and said, Hey, yeah, I want you to get this Um, and it just shouldn't be that way because, you know, without them being able to, you know, I read these, you know, orders, sometimes it's in the cases and it'll say, well, the defendant or the, you know, other side, if it's like civil could have, you know, child custody cases, the other, they could have, you know, done their own testing to, to oppose the other expert.
Well, how, with what money?
Um, and that that's disheartening because I it makes me sad because I feel like it's We're not trying to just say they're wrong, but we just wanna answer the question to make sure that they're not wrong too right? I mean, 'cause you just hate for someone's life to, to be destroyed by, by a presumption that if it comes out of a crime lab, then it, it's the end all, be all of you know, the situation.
And that we don't need to ever question or look any further.
Aaron: Yeah. Yeah.
Conclusion and Final Thoughts
Aaron: Well, I think that's a good place for us to end. Bethany, I thank you so much for sharing your insights with us, and maybe we'll have you back on the podcast again to talk about other topics. Bye.
Bethany Pridgen: Awesome. Thanks Erin. It was really fun.
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