Joseph Sledge
Two counts of murder
Two life sentences
August 31, 1978
January 23, 2015
37
Hair Microscopy
Case Summary
Charges:
Sentence:
Convicted:
Exonerated:
Years Incarcerated:
Contributing Forensic Discipline:
On September 6th, 1976, Josephine and Aileen Davis were robbed, sexually, assaulted, and stabbed to death in their home in North Carolina. Joseph Sledge, a man on the run after escaping from a nearby prison for a nonviolent, theft-related offense, was an immediate suspect. However, Sledge immediately cooperated with the authorities and since there was no evidence linking him to the scene of the crime, police decided not to charge him.
However, two years later, pressure to find the killer increased and police turned to former inmates of Sledge in hopes to uncover damning information. Both inmates claimed that Sledge had confessed to them. He was indicted by these informants and was further linked to the crime by hair found at the scene. During his trial, the prosecution’s allegations largely hinged on the testimony of an FBI agent who claimed that the pubic hair discovered on Aileen’s body were “microscopically alike” to Sledge’s. The jury found Joseph Sledge guilty and he was sentenced to life in prison.
Thirty-seven years later, however, Sledge was exonerated.
So how did these hairs, which were “scientifically proven” to be a close match to Sledge, end up having no relation to him at all?
The answer lies in the “science” of hair microscopy itself, or rather, the lack thereof.
While hair microscopy has been used in crime scene investigation since the 1930s, this discipline has been assessed to be “scientifically meaningless”. Hair microscopy, the visual comparison from hair from a crime scene and a suspect’s hair, relies on the assumptions that hair is unique to each individual, does not vary throughout the body, and is visually distinguishable across different people. However, these false assumptions and lack of standards make hair microscopy an incredibly subjective discipline, presenting endless opportunities for mistakes.
Not only are different examiners bound to make different conclusions about a single piece of evidence, studies have shown that a single examiner’s opinion may vary from day to day.
Dozens and dozens of exonerations from faulty hair microscopy in the last few decades clearly indicate that this discipline does not belong in the courtroom. Rather, with the development of the much more reliable DNA analysis in 1986, DNA found within the hair should be the only way hair is used as evidence in criminal investigations.