15701: Raber: Re: 15691: (Hermantin) Sun-Sentinel-Dental test showed Haitian refugee to be adult (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: P&M Raber <raber@valkyrie.net>

It would be interesting to find out what kind of dental forensic analysis
was performed.  Were the test results compared to similar results from
people of African descent? Working with over 2000 school age (Kindergarten
to 13th grade) children in the dental field in Haiti for 6 years I found
that there are plenty of 15 year olds with dental development similar to
Caucasians ages 18 to 21 year olds.  When examining kindergarteners entering
school at age 4, there were number of children with fully erupted 6 year
molars which often do not come in until age 7 for many caucasians.  By the
way, all the children had valid birth certificates so I knew their exact
chronological ages. Since I was there for 6 years, I knew exactly when some
of the 4 year olds were born and could not question the validity of their
birth certificates.  I find it hard to believe that they can be so precise
as to narrow Joseph's age to being 19 rather than 18.  If anyone has details
on the type of forensic testing that was done, please post.  I think that
Ernesto Joseph's lawyer should be able to find plenty of dentists to
challenge the forensic findings.  This is not CSI Miami.

M Raber