How Easy Is It For Forensic Science To Tell Which Twin Did It?

DNA testing revolutionized forensic science.  It brought resolution to cold cases and exonerated wrongfully convicted people who had previously had nothing to support their claims besides their own certainty that they were telling the truth.  Video recordings have also enabled prosecutors to make more accurate claims.  There is much more room for doubt about whether the person described by an eyewitness is you as to whether the person photographed by an eyewitness was you.  You may well be a Caucasian male about six feet tall with short, brown hair, and you might own jeans and a navy-blue T-shirt, but that description also applies to so many other people that it hardly removes reasonable doubt.  With a photograph, however, the jury can look at the photo and then look at you enough times until they are sure whether they are seeing the same face.  Jurors might say to each other, “Unless he has a twin, I’m sure it’s him.”  What if you have a twin, though?  How do you prove that the person pictured in the prosecution’s exhibits is your twin and not you?  In most cases, evidence that exculpates one twin also exculpates the other.  If you and your twin sibling are being accused of illegal possession of drugs, contact a West Palm Beach drug offenses lawyer.

Florida Identical Twins Face Nearly Identical Criminal Charges

DNA evidence can include or exclude a person’s DNA from being present at a crime scene with near perfect accuracy.  The ambiguity in DNA test results relates not to whose DNA it is, but rather, whether the owner of the DNA was present at the crime scene in the flesh or whether skin cells that the person naturally shed had made it to the crime scene because the owner of the DNA had been in close contact with someone who was at the crime scene.  Identical twins are so called because their DNA is identical, or at least, it starts out as identical.  From the time an embryo splits into identical twins until the time the twins are born, tiny mutations take place that usually do not manifest themselves as differences in the twins’ appearance; many identical twins look so similar that only their close relatives can easily tell them apart by their facial features.  Modern DNA tests can pick up on those differences though.

This does not matter for a recent case in Ocala, where identical twin brothers are being accused of illegal sale of marijuana.  In this case, the strongest evidence is a video one of the twins posted on Instagram, and police know which twin is pictured in the video, because the twins have different tattoos, some of which are visible in the video.

Contact a West Palm Beach Criminal Defense Lawyer Today

Attorney William Wallshein has more than 38 years of experience, including five years as a prosecutor in Palm Beach County.  Contact William Wallshein P.A. in West Palm Beach, Florida to discuss your case.

Sources:

eurofins.com/media/2448/twin-dna-test-why-identical-criminals-may-no-longer-be-safe.pdf

cbs12.com/news/nation-world/instagram-video-family-felon-twins-brothers-siblings-florida-criminal-record-repeat-offender-ocala-elijah-lee-hanks-joelle-davon-elisha-emmanual-firearms-guns-ammunition-bullets-drugs-marijuana-possession-convicted-rap-song-detective-identify-recognize