Hair analysis 'should be abolished,' says wrongly incarcerated man

In "Under the Microscope: The FBI Hair Cases," Fault Lines looks at how, for decades, the FBI used the flawed forensic method of microscopic hair analysis to convict thousands of criminal defendants. The film airs on Monday, August 17, at 10 pm Eastern time/7 pm Pacific on Al Jazeera America. | Click here to find Al Jazeera in your area.

In 1978 Joseph Sledge was sentenced to a North Carolina prison for the murder of two women, Josephine and Ailene Davis, a mother and daughter who were stabbed to death two years earlier. This past January, he was set free when new DNA evidence contradicted FBI hair analysis that pinpointed Sledge as the assailant.

For decades, the FBI relied on matching characteristics of hair under a microscope to connect suspects to crimes, most often violent ones. But the introduction of DNA-based techniques suggest that the science the government labs relied on was inexact, at best, and, at worst, pseudo-science.

In the course of Sledge’s appeal, led by attorney Christine Mumma of the North Carolina Center on Actual Innocence, the testimony connecting Sledge’s hair to one found at the scene of the crime was invalidated. And after 37 years in jail, Sledge became a free man.

Fault Lines sat down with Sledge in his hometown of Savannah, Georgia, to discuss his extraordinary story and the evidence that led to his conviction. An edited version of the conversation follows:

Fault Lines: Do you have a good idea of how you were ever charged with the crime of killing these two women?

Joseph Sledge: My personal opinion is that they made me the scapegoat because they had no one to blame. And being that I had been an escapee from the prison unit when these two ladies were killed, they kind of fixed it in a manner to make me look like the perpetrator.

Is that just some of worst luck in the world that during the very time that you've escaped, there's a gory double murder in the same area at the same time?

That's been said not only by you but by other newspaper folks. I wish I could rewrite history myself but that was the way it happened.

Had you escaped one day later, they wouldn't have even thought of you.

Yes, sir.

Can you tell us what kind of jail you escaped from, why you were in that jail and then why you escaped?

I was in that prison doing misdemeanor time for receiving stolen goods.

What did you receive?

It was some stolen property that I had purchased. And the judges sentenced me to four years in prison. During the Labor Day holiday, you know, I got that freedom bug in me and got to thinking and jumped the fence that day and left a four-year sentence.

[Editors note: Sledge was serving a four-year sentence in minimum custody for larceny and receiving stolen goods, as well as a six-month sentence for a previous escape.]

Did you have a good reason to escape out of there?

Well, I had a confrontation with a guy in there. They bussed him back because he was doing felony time. So after the confrontation with the guy, they put him back on the unit, the same unit. It would've been different had they put him on another unit.

You were scared of that guy?

I didn't want no more confrontations with him, verbally or physically.

How'd you get caught?

I was arrested. I was sighted at a gas station, and the authorities told me to get out, and I did. And that's when they knew that I was the suspect from prison.

And so did you go to a more serious prison after that?

They locked me up in prison for months. Then they took me to court and gave me time in solitary.

You were in solitary?

Yeah because the investigation for the murders had been going on. And I was a suspect.

Did you know you were a suspect?

Well, it was all in the news. It was all in the local news.

The police reportedly found pubic hair, but they also found hair from a man’s head that they said came from the same person. Did you have hair on your head?

No, sir. I did not.

So then this seems kind of open and shut. How did they make a case out of that?

Well, that's the cleverness of the state lawyers.

There was other evidence too, right? There were bloody fingerprints, a bloody palm print ...

Yes, sir. All that was negative to me.

None of those matched you?

No, sir.

There were shoe marks.

Yes, sir.

Did they match you?

No, sir.

But in court, did they say that the hair was yours? An FBI agent testified. What did he say?

It was an FBI agent from the FBI forensic laboratory. He said that he couldn't say conclusive that the hairs belong to me, but he said they were microscopically similar to mine. He gave an elaborate explanation on the hair evidence. He said that hair evidence doesn’t constitute personal positive identification, as do fingerprints. And he gave an elaborate explanation that the hairs that was found were microscopically similar to mine or could've came from somebody of the same origin as myself.

He said that the pubic hair was microscopically similar to mine—microscopically similar. Along with the testimony from the witness and the findings of that hair and saying what he said to the jury, that persuaded them to believe that I was the perpetrator in the case.

What were you actually sentenced to?

Two life sentences running consecutive. You can't do but one. Can't do two. But they gave me life for each body.

And then how long did you end up spending in prison?

I say 37 years exactly.

When did you first ask for someone to review the DNA in your case?

When DNA became law in North Carolina in 2003, that's when I filed a petition through the courts for DNA testing. According to the law, like the judge said, I had a right. He asked the agencies that were involved in investigating these murders to turn in all the evidence for DNA testing. So they played around and played around, and I wrote the court and asked the judge what was the hold up on the case about testing this investigation with this DNA? He wrote me later and said he did all he could, he looked and everything, he wrote all the agencies and requested for them to turn over the evidence.

By 2005, that's when I wrote Ms. Mumma a letter, the North Carolina Center for Actual Innocence. I told them that I was a requesting for DNA testing for a case at the court. And they said have you been appointed a lawyer? And I said no ma'am. So they gave me a lawyer, Ms. Mumma, she appointed a lawyer to the case.

I also wrote North Carolina prison's legal service. The prison legal service, I told them about the case and all this. The legal service says, “We see that your case is being studied by the North Carolina Center for Actual Innocence.” A couple of days later, Ms. Mumma wrote me a letter personally and told me, she said, don't write nobody else. I'm taking your case personally.