By Mark Esposito, Weekend Contributor
Bespectacled Juan Maeso led a fairly mundane life as an anesthetist in the Spanish coastal town of Valencia. All that changed in 2007 when Maeso was convicted of serial murder. A morphine addict, Maeso had been skimming the painkiller meant for his patients and then using the same compromised needle to inject them. Over a decade, 275 patients contracted hepatitis-c (HCV) and four of them died from complications from the disease. A Spanish court sentenced Maeso to 1,933 years in prison but the sentence pales in interest to how the murderous soporifist was finally caught.
A fascinating article in the journal Nature details the laboratory hunt for the killer with all the twists and turns of an Arthur Conan Doyle story. Led by researchers at the University of Valencia, the work involved analyzing and categorizing 4200 viral sequences to backtrack to Maeso’s particular strain of hepatitis-c. The process known as phylogenetic forensics has been successfully used to track down the origins of such infamous cases as the 2009 anthrax-laced heroine scare in Europe and the case of Bruce Ivins, a microbiologist at the US Army Medical Research Institute, strongly suspected of sending anthrax tainted letters to Senators in 2001. Ivins committed suicide before charges were placed.
Phylogenetic forensics involves concepts taken from traditional evolutionary-biology augmented with modern sequencing technology. Basically the process works this way, scientist look at rapidly mutating viruses like hepatitis-c in various individuals noting small differences in the genomes. The comparison of genome differences leads to the creation of a series of predecessor and successor genetic markers which comprises a family tree of the virus.“What we are doing is a virus genealogy,” says Oliver Pybus, who studies evolution and infectious diseases at the University of Oxford, UK.
Graphically, the process works this way:
The process allows scientists to determine if two or more infections are closely related and what their relationship is to one another – either parent or off-spring. The results paint a path back to the originating virus. The results of the hunt are not definitive due to the myriad of mutations and the very small differences being compared. As Anne-Mieke Vandamme, an evolutionary geneticist at the University of Leuven in Belgium, warns “You can never prove guilt.”
But you can link various individuals to an outbreak and from that information determine the likely origin. Such was the case of Dr. Richard Schmidt, who, in 1998, was convicted by a Louisiana court of attempted second-degree murder. Schmidt was charged with injecting his former girlfriend with HIV- and hepatitis-c carrier (HCV)-tainted blood, and allaying her concerns by telling her that he was giving her a vitamin B12 shot. Scouring hospital records, detectives determined that Schmidt has taken a blood sample from a patient but had not turned it over to the hospital lab on the night in question. When police interviewed the patient they determined that he was an HIV as well as a HCV carrier. Virus DNA collected from Schmidt’s patient and the victim matched almost perfectly despite the proclivity of the virus to mutate rapidly in each host body. Schmidt got 50 years in prison in this first use of phylogenetics in U.S. courts.
The method does have its limitations, however. Phylogenetic analyses can offer supporting evidence — that a virus found in person A is very likely to have come from person B, say — but can never prove direct transmission on their own. It is unlike DNA analysis which provides a very high likelihood of determining the donor.
Still phylogenetics was crucial in tracing the path of infection back to Maeso. The crime first came to light when a Spanish utility company began noticing a very high incidence of HCV among its workers. Charged with getting to the bottom of this outbreak, Dr. Manuel Beltran poured over their medical records and found that all had been in the same hospital for minor surgery procedures. Beltran contacted the local public health authority which embarked on a massive study of 66,000 patients to find the cause. Maeso name was linked almost immediately but police needed more to prove a crime had occurred.
Dr. Fernando González-Candelas, who led the scientific investigation at the University of Valencia,and his colleagues analyzed patterns of changes in a highly variable region of the HCV genome to sort the viruses into branches of a genetic tree known as clades. The clades illustrated the evolutionary relationships of the genome changes. González-Candelas analysed, on average, “11 such viral sequences per person from 321 people believed to have been infected by Maeso and 42 controls — local HCV-infected patients with no known connection to the case. When printed out, the tree that the researchers developed was 11 metres long.”
“Using all the data, the team determined for each infected individual a ‘likelihood ratio’ — that is, the probability that the infection was related to Maeso’s and others whom Maeso had presumably infected, versus the probability that it had come from a source unrelated to the outbreak. Because there were so many samples and a strong phylogenetic signal, the likelihood ratios the scientists got were high. Most were higher than 105, and the highest was 6.6 × 1095, exceptionally strong support for this type of analysis.”
“The Valencia work was also notable in that it attempted to pinpoint when individuals had contracted the virus, using a ‘molecular clock’ technique. To do this, the researchers sampled the genetic diversity of viruses in each person, and then used the mutation rate of HCV in the outbreak to estimate when they had been infected. Almost two-thirds of the estimated dates of infection lined up with when the patients had visited the Valencia hospitals, adding to the evidence that Maeso was the source.”
The science thus lined up almost perfectly with the records review in pointing the finger at Maeso. Maeso denied the charges saying that he had contracted the HCV from a patient and that he was as much a victim as everyone else. However, Maeso’s position in the clades at ground zero refuted that argument.
The technique is not without its critics. Many patient advocates complain that sequencing the genealogy of certain viruses like HIV will stigmatize the victims or lead to disclosure of embarrassing sources of the disease which could provide a disincentive to seeking treatment. Failing to get treatment could enlarge outbreaks and lead to public health problems, they argue.
But it seems unlikely these concerns will hinder the rapid growth of the field or delay its usefulness in both civil and criminal cases where infections serve as the weapon of choice.
Source: Nature, Vol. 506, pp 424-6, Feb. 2014.
~Mark Esposito, Weekend Contributor
Anonymously Yours
Pure tobacco… Addictive sure… But easier to break the habit…. Rather than get chemically addicted…..
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And pure coal and oil … easy to quit … 😉
Pure tobacco… Addictive sure… But easier to break the habit…. Rather than get chemically addicted…..
Mar 2, 2014 7:00:08 PM
As if fuzzy science is not enough to land you in jail, there’s plenty of this:
Unreliable or Improper Forensic Science
Since the late 1980s, DNA analysis has helped identify the guilty and exonerate the innocent nationwide. While DNA testing was developed through extensive scientific research at top academic centers, many other forensic techniques � such as hair microscopy, bite mark comparisons, firearm tool mark analysis and shoe print comparisons � have never been subjected to rigorous scientific evaluation. Meanwhile, forensics techniques that have been properly validated � such as serology, commonly known as blood typing � are sometimes improperly conducted or inaccurately conveyed in trial testimony. In some cases, forensic analysts have fabricated results or engaged in other misconduct.
Forensic Science Misconduct
Because forensic science results can mean the difference between life and death in many cases, fraud and other types of misconduct in the field are particularly troubling. False testimony, exaggerated statistics and laboratory fraud have led to wrongful conviction in several states.
Since forensic evidence is offered by “experts,” jurors routinely give it much more weight than other evidence. But when misconduct occurs, the weight is misplaced. In some instances, labs or their personnel have allied themselves with police and prosecutors, rather than prioritizing the search for truth. Other times, criminalists lacking the requisite knowledge have embellished findings and eluded detection because judges and juries lacked background in the relevant sciences, themselves.
In some cases, critical evidence has been consumed or destroyed, so that re-testing to uncover misconduct has proven impossible. Evidence in these cases can never be tested again, preventing the truth from being revealed.
One weak link
The identification, collection, testing, storage, handling and reporting of any piece of forensic evidence involves a number of people. Evidence can be deliberately or accidentally mishandled at any stage of this process.
The risk of misconduct starts at the crime scene, where evidence can be planted, destroyed or mishandled. Evidence is later sent to a forensic lab or independent contractor, where it can be contaminated, poorly tested, consumed unnecessarily or mislabeled. Then, in the reporting of test results, technicians and their superiors sometimes have misrepresented their findings. DNA exonerations have even revealed instances of “drylabbing” evidence – reporting results when no test was actually performed.
Fraudulent crime labs all over the map
more at:
http://www.innocenceproject.org/understand/Forensic-Science-Misconduct.php
samantha
I’m wondering what percentage of folks in the judicial system and law enforcement have viewed this documentary. much less know about it? I wouldn’t doubt corrupt officials suppress this film.
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Good question.
Time for the criminal defense bar to take notice.
The prosecutors are not likely going to be the first to contemplate the implications.
Bron
Dredd:
that was interesting.
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Samantha’s link about fingerprint forensics being upended was a show stopper.
A lawyer who had never been to Spain was fingered as one of the bombers who bombed Madrid, Spain killing many innocents.
His fingerprints from his military records matched those found at the bombing site.
Three FBI forensic experts agreed.
He was arrested out of the blue while working in his office, put in jail, and was facing the death penalty.
Then the Spanish Police said they found a guy with the same prints who was actually in the area of the bombin at the time it took place.
Can you imagine the impact on the FBI expert who had done tens of thousands of fingerprint cases over his career, who believed fingerprinting forensics was infallible?
Nigtmares about sending innocent people to their deaths perhaps?
Now we face a similar quandry with DNA forensics because we now know that people have multiple genetic material within them, not just one single unique set to us alone.
In fact, our own DNA from one area of our body often does not match DNA from other areas of our body.
In a significant number of cases.
Yep, interesting for sure.
Hopefully not as interesting as Eugenics.
That was catastrophic.
I’m wondering what percentage of folks in the judicial system and law enforcement have viewed this documentary. much less know about it? I wouldn’t doubt corrupt officials suppress this film.
Dredd:
that was interesting.
samantha,
That Frontline program you linked to is unsettling but instructive.
It reminds me of the smug decades of Eugenics when people were castrated, lobotomized, or put in asylums based on pseudo-science which was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Your link has this:
I don’t think I have to tell the bloggers here about how smug geneticists were during the scientific dark age in the early decades of the 1900’s, regarding Eugenics.
American Eugenics was a pseudo-science that was fully accepted in the U.S. Court System, but was fully wrong.
On the heals of that came the same euphoric exuberance which manifested in the human genome project:
(Weekend Rebel Science Excursion – 26). The results of the human genome project were dumbfounding, emphasizing how wrong our “understanding” of genetics really was.
It has been stated many times that microbes have less “junk DNA”, i.e. less “dark matter”, than humans have.
In humans it is 98% junk DNA, in microbes only 2% junk DNA, and even less in viruses.
Thus, since the “junk” DNA is not junk, now called “dark matter” to emphasize that reality, we should not be so smug about what we think we know (the real “dark matter” is in our smug, exceptionalist attitude).
Especially in light of recent research which shows alarming results in that light:
(The “It’s In Your Genes” Myth – 2). Thus, two of our most cherished forensic techniques, fingerprinting and DNA, may have some problems.
Virus genetic mapping is not likely to be as problematic as human genetic mapping however.
The key is to develop methods and techniques that work with the differences, rather than ignore or deny them.
Dredd:
Thanks.
Bron
Dredd:
I think evolution is about changes in DNA brought about by viral mutations. That stuff about a wolf like creature changing to a whale because it needed to catch fish is bullsh*t.
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Yes, me too.
It smacks of “Teleology” (a word that sorta means intense “scientific imagination”, like “The Selfish Gene”).
A lot of scientists complain about that licentious use of nomenclature which still plagues biology more than some of the other scientific disciplines.
Bron
Dredd:
what do you think about this? It seems reasonable or does virus DNA behave differently? As it goes from host to host does it keep some original DNA or does it just keep modifying based on the host?
What exactly is it the scientist are looking for?
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The virus research is quite hot now, because we now know that viruses outnumber single-celled microbes.
And that most viruses are helpful, not harmful.
The typically have RNA rather than DNA like living cells have.
The molecular machinery behaves the same in principle as DNA in terms of storing, coding, and saving information.
And both have the molecular machinery to do that.
The anthrax case involved cells, the AIDS case involved viruses.
There is a lot of horizantal gene transfer (virus to host) which in most cases helps the host.
It is the rogue parasitic and pathogenic viruses that cause us problems.
The scientists map out the RNA sequences at various points, then work backward or forward, to see patterns of change in the map or blueprint.
Those patterns of change work like footprints or fingerprints which can be followed to a common point, a Y or fork in the road where mutations or gene transfer took place that changed the pattern or blueprint.
In ultimate terms it is called LUCA (Last Universal Common Ancestor, or Last Universal Cellular Ancestor]) as the case may be.
As this new documentary illistrates, lots of folks have been wrongfully convicted because of junk forensics. More so in this case, because the conviction is already eight years old. No lawyer who believes his client is everything, would want to be without this documentary or at the very least reading the transcript (link enclosed).
Frontline
The Real CSI
CORRESPONDENT
Lowell Bergman
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/criminal-justice/real-csi/transcript-18/
Dredd:
I think evolution is about changes in DNA brought about by viral mutations. That stuff about a wolf like creature changing to a whale because it needed to catch fish is bullsh*t.
Dredd:
what do you think about this? It seems reasonable or does virus DNA behave differently? As it goes from host to host does it keep some original DNA or does it just keep modifying based on the host?
What exactly is it the scientist are looking for?
Another thing about the Ivins 9/11 anthrax case is that anthrax is not a virus, it is a single celled microbe, a bacterium.
That raises some issues, for example: whether a virus is alive or instead is a conglomerate of molecular machines, like cells are:
(The Uncertain Gene – 9). The anthrax is alive, in the context of it being a cell, a carbon-based life form, however the lowly virus is not always considered to be alive.
That is big because the more complex the entity’s RNA or DNA genetic material being sequenced is, there tends to be more “junk” genetic material, now being called “dark matter.”
That is a code phrase that means “we don’t have much of a clue about it” (it was considered “junk” after all).
Viruses have less dark matter than cellular microbes have, and humans have far more dark matter than either of those two, and that material is packed with somewhat mysterious molecular machines:
(The Uncertain Gene – 8). In one sense, that makes this forensic technique applied to viruses, which Mark E reports on today, more acceptable to me than even traditional human DNA forensics.
Good stuff Mark. This Maeso character belongs in a jail where he can’t hurt anyone else.
Alain,
Get a life.
You believe that hogwash that Ivins was the culprit and then committed suicide when ALL his colleages said it was totally out of charicter and WTC7 proves that the government used explosives on 911 beyond any shadow of a doubt?
You are not nearly as smart as I have been giving you credit for. That or you are just another MSM lying, stinking traitor continuing to give cover to the biggest act of treason in history. Either way I am done with you. Yesterday you had a video up mocking the Bible and today you are selling the completely debunked government version of 911.
Good Ridence to you. Unsubscribing NOW.
The article linked to says:
Outside the courtroom scientists seem to be confident in their virus geneology work, even looking at it in the context that viruses evolved before cells did:
(The Uncertain Gene – 9). That may bode well for the forensic aspects Mark E reports on today.
As the the Ivins case, it is bunk:
(Mysto Army Anthrax Lab Shut Down – 2). The lab was so loosy goosy they had to shut it down.
Great piece. It is heartening to finally see HIV treated as an epidemic and not as a PC issue. Unfortunately, for the millions who died because of the PC approach, it’s much too later. Interestingly, it took criminal acts to have scientists act as scientists and not as puppets of PC politicians. One always much appreciate irony.