was used to identify a murder weapon. the pistol used to kill cliff merck had been sold to a drug dealer by robert and gerald cowan, but for some reason, the cowans fingerprints did not match those found at the crime scene. the person who attempted the comparison was then able to make a match, and he failed to have another examiner verify his conclusions. this was a breach of protocol. the standard operating procedure in all crime labs requires a fingerprint examiner to have someone verify his or her conclusions. so the fingerprints were resubmitted for analysis, and this time, the results were verified by a supervisor. the fingerprints found in the
welcome back to the latest in the boston bombing trial. closing arguments are scheduled for monday. dzhokhar tsarnaev s defense team rested their case yesterday after calling just four witnesses in two days amounting to barely five hours of testimony. the final witness for the defense was an fbi fingerprint examiner who testified that dzhokhar tsarnaev s fingerprints were not found on any of the marathon bomb fragments, only his brother s fingerprints were found. two of dzhokhar s fingerprints were found on an unexploded cupper wear bomb discovered after the shootout in watertown, but had six of tamerlan s too. joining me boston globe mike belos. the defense says that dzhokhar tsarnaev is a guilty man, but we know their strategy is to portray tamerlan as the leader
weapon. the pistol used to kill cliff merck had been sold to a drug dealer by robert and gerald cowan, but for some reason, the cowans fingerprints did not match those found at the crime scene. the person who attempted the comparison was then able to make a match, and he failed to have another examiner verify his conclusions. this was a breach of protocol. the standard operating procedure in all crime labs requires a fingerprint examiner to have someone verify his or her conclusions. so the fingerprints were resubmitted for analysis, and this time, the results were verified by a supervisor. the fingerprints found in the mecks home matched robert cowan. it goes without saying that i was highly irritated and embarrassed for the department.