“SECRET EVIDENCE”

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Patrick Frey, an L.A. Deputy District Attorney, aka the blogger and James O’Keefe supporter Patterico, posted a document produced by one Kent Gibson, who also works with the L.A. courts (presumably an acquaintance, colleague, or friend of Frey’s.) Gibson describes himself as a “Certified Audio & Video Forensic Examiner”.

Based on a test that Gibson refers to as “the gold standard” of voice identification, Gibson determined that:

“Frey Swat [911 tape of caller that perpetrated a crime] and Brynaert Known [a recording from an interview show of Ron Brynaert, former Executive Editor of a political website] cannot be shown to be the same speaker”.

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There were a lot of other words in this document about results of methods that Gibson indicates are not nearly as  reliable or accurate (if at all) as the test Gibson says is the “gold standard”, which he used to conclude the statement above.  There were also lots of words included in the document, which described opinion rather than statements of fact.)

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oh, and i’d like to ask y’all a personal question:

Suppose you log on, and you see that a Deputy District Attorney asked someone (presumably a friend of his) described as a “Certified Audio & Video Forensic Examiner” for the courts, to compare a sample of your voice (found on the internet) to a criminal’s, (in order to try to come up with some basis, that sounds official, to make people think that you ARE the criminal), and this D.A. publishes the resultant document, that his friend wrote up, on his blog.

You see that this posted document says your voice was used in the comparison, because you are “suspected of being the Swat caller re: Frey”. And the “Certified Audio & Video Forensic Examiner” says his opinion is that you are a criminal based on a “totality” of stuff (though we’re not privy to know exactly what that stuff may be.)  He writes this opinion even though the results of the test, that he himself says is the gold standard of testing, indicated that you “cannot be shown to be” the criminal.

The D.A.’s  readers see this document; some of them blog about it, tweet it, and get more people to do the same…, and so on, and so on. And as a result, a lot of your former colleagues, people you correspond with online, friends and acquaintances, and anyone else who happens to search on your name, can see that you are being examined by Los Angeles officials because you are “suspected of being” a criminal.  (And needless to say, you’re not a criminal, you’ve done nothing at all wrong – and you’ve never been convicted of a crime.)

So how would you feel about that?

And what would you think the proper remedy would be?

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