IAFTC Newsletter. Volume 2. Issue 1. January 5, 2026.
Darcy Richardson1
1Vermont Forensic Services, 146 River Street, Milton, VT 05468. Darcy.Richardson@vtforensicservices.com
This is an open-access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license.
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A Different Scientific Upbringing
My scientific upbringing was in an environmental laboratory, but not just any environmental lab, and not just at any time. It was 1999, and the lab had been bought out after the infamous and massive Intertek fraud of the late 80s and 1990s had come to light [1]. The criminal trials and thus the public eye on laboratory fraud were contemporaneous with the start of my scientific career. To say that my lab was serious about quality control is putting it lightly.
The warnings from supervisors were clear: follow proper laboratory practice or go to prison. The people from the Intertek Texas Lab were a stark warning of what happens when laboratory staff don’t take their roles seriously.
Our Standard Operating Procedures were uniform, established, and found throughout the country. Audits were monthly, sometimes even more frequently, due to the various organizations, states, and federal entities involved. We were used to being evaluated and critiqued, and while we would sometimes roll our eyes at the quality control department insisting that something be rerun because it was out by 0.01%, we did it anyway.
From Uniform Standards to the “Wild West”
Imagine my surprise when I moved into forensics in late 2002.
Ask a forensic scientist about the state of things, and you’d hear the term “The Wild West.” Gone were my uniform SOPs; the entire country followed. Accreditation? Never heard of it. Audits? Yeah, pretty sure clinical did that kind of thing.
Early Lessons in Risk and Responsibility
Forensic Labs were flying blind and making it up as they went along. I’ll never forget being in a classroom when an attendee admitted they were using urine for DUI cases, and the entire room turned around to stare in disbelief.
Urine, of course, is a perfectly reasonable matrix to analyze to demonstrate exposure or past use, but it is not appropriate to determine a concentration in effect at a certain point in time or to support impairment, as one needs to do in a DUI case.
My upbringing in environmental testing meant that in my new forensics lab, I insisted on quality control, following Good Laboratory Practice [2], erring on the side of caution. It was a position that often led to head-butting and ultimately being called a “whistleblower” [3,4].
Over the twenty-plus years I’ve been involved in forensics, the conversations have happened about the need to tame the Wild West. The need for standards and uniformity, proficiency testing, and accreditation. To bring forensics in line with other scientific areas, and to demand that science used in the courts meet the requirements mandated everywhere else.
And while things are improving, we’re not quite there yet.
Why Accreditation Alone Is Not Enough
Accreditation now exists, but it’s still overbroad, mandating only minimal best practices. When it began, it was taken from manufacturing standards and is still largely based on ISO. States still have varied requirements from practically none at all to more specific rules regarding instrumentation, accuracy, or precision. From there, programs and laboratories vary in what is required. Some are seeking to be in line with the published literature and going above and beyond, and others are falling far short of Good Laboratory Practice. Accreditation can’t go as far as it needs to without uniform standards.
The Role of the American Standards Board
Enter the American Standards Board (ASB) under the American Academy of Forensic Sciences [5].
The ASB consists of multiple Consensus Bodies covering all areas of forensics from Anthropology to Wildlife, which work in conjunction with OSAC to draft standards, guidelines, and best practices for forensic work. It seeks to establish that uniformity that is already so standard in environmental testing and to improve the quality of forensic work performed nationwide.
Quality Assurance may be a weird thing to be passionate about, but when a colleague recommended I apply to the ASB Toxicology Subcommittee that was looking for new members, I jumped at the opportunity.
I’ve been honored to work with the Toxicology Consensus Body and various working groups over the years to help adjudicate comments and finalize documents for approval. This work is all volunteer, and I’ve had the pleasure of working with dedicated individuals from manufacturing, independent and public labs, and private practice in an attempt to bring forensics to where it should be. The end goal is that throughout the country, we can be assured that the science entering the courtroom meets the level of performance and acceptability in other areas of laboratory work.
Changing the Culture Is the Hardest Part
It is not only a long process, standardizing an entire discipline, but it also requires a change in culture [6]. Not everyone grew up in an environmental lab with the threat of prison held over their heads, after all.
For each new standard, a slew of questions must be answered, and education on why “but we’ve always done it this way” is not a reason to skip out on following good quality assurance. There is always some resistance. Always some argument that the work is good enough. Some of that comes from always being a cowboy in that Wild West and chaffing at authority. Part of it comes from being entrenched with police departments so that the focus is not on science, it’s on being a partner for prosecution.
Independence, Bias, and the Courtroom
This issue of independence has long been discussed in the forensic world [7]. My own forensic lab was maintained in the Health Department in some attempt to stay separate. However, regardless of knowing about cognitive bias, when you see police officers or attorneys on a regular basis in your job, you can’t help but view them as your colleagues. And that can be okay as long as the science always comes first.
If science is to be used in the courtroom, it must meet scientific standards. That is paramount. Being accredited isn’t a free pass.
When the Science Speaks for Itself
A question that often comes up when discussing standards is “What will an attorney do with this document?” I have never found that to be a compelling concern.
Why?
Because you don’t have to worry about being confronted in court if the work stands for itself, it’s easy to explain that science is constantly changing and improving, and we are always striving to meet that standard.
One day, while I was still working for the state lab and testifying mostly for the prosecution, a defense attorney told me that I was the only one in the room telling the truth. “The cops are lying, I’m lying, my clients are lying, but not you.” I took that as the highest compliment. I still work to that standard.
Where Forensics Still Needs to Go
Is forensics where it needs to be? No, but there are people working to get it there. It will take time, effort, and a change in culture, but eventually it will get there.
Conflicts of Interest
Darcy Richardson, MS, is a forensic toxicology consultant and provides expert testimony in civil and criminal cases. She is a member of the American Standards Board Toxicology Consensus Body, where her participation is voluntary and unpaid. She has no financial interest in the topics discussed in this paper.
References
[1]Texas lab techs allegedly altered data. UPI 2000. https://www.upi.com/Archives/2000/09/21/Texas-lab-techs-allegedly-altered-data/4774969508800/ (accessed December 29, 2025).
[2]Jena GB, Chavan S. Implementation of Good Laboratory Practices (GLP) in basic scientific research: Translating the concept beyond regulatory compliance. Regul Toxicol Pharmacol 2017;89:20–5. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.yrtph.2017.07.010.
[3]Bromage A. DUI Chemists Blow the Whistle on Vermont’s Breath-Testing Program. Seven Days: Vermont’s Independent Voice 2011. https://www.sevendaysvt.com/news/dui-chemists-blow-the-whistle-on-vermonts-breath-testing-program-2143006 (accessed November 19, 2023).
[4]Olson A, Ramsay C. Errors in toxicology testing and the need for full discovery. Forensic Sci Int Synerg 2025;11:100629. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fsisyn.2025.100629.
[5]Academy Standards Board. American Academy of Forensic Sciences 2025. https://www.aafs.org/academy-standards-board (accessed December 29, 2025).
[6]Mnookin JL, Cole SA, Dror IE, Fisher BAJ, Houck MM. The need for a research culture in the forensic sciences. UCLA L Rev 2010.
[7]Olson A. Truth, power, and the crisis of forensic independence. Forensic Sci Int Synerg 2025;11:100647. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fsisyn.2025.100647.
