A scientist says he can scan prisoners' brains for signs of evil. Did his disputed science put a man on death row?

[erronis]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2026/jun/23/scientist-us-legal-system-violence-brain
Sarah Hopkins

Kent Kiehl convinced the US legal system he can find violence in prisoners' brains. His theories have been since used by defense lawyers - with grave consequences for prisoners



Too much information to easily excerpt in four paragraphs. Please read the article if you are interested.

. . .

Dugan's trial, 17 years ago, was one of the first US court cases to admit brain research as evidence. The case made national news. But Kiehl's evidence didn't convince jurors to be lenient. They sentenced Dugan to death. His sentence was later commuted to life in prison, only after the state of Illinois imposed a moratorium on the death penalty.

But what happened in the aftermath was seismic. In the years that followed Kiehl's testimony, the science of biological criminality, though shaky, was invoked in thousands of cases. Defense attorneys, in particular, used biological evidence like brain scans to argue that their clients should receive lighter sentences.

From 2005 to 2015, the use of brain evidence in criminal defenses appeared in more than 2,800 judicial opinions, according to a 2019 study. The researchers estimated that neurological arguments for reduced criminal responsibility appeared in roughly 10-12% of US murder trials, about 25% of death-penalty trials. Overall, 40% of serious felony cases referred to brain-based evidence.

. . .

The stakes are profound. A body of science that many researchers describe as unreliable has now become routine in capital cases. In US courts, this illusion of scientific certainty has led to some defendants being sentenced to death.

. . .

[eppur_se_muova]

1. The new phrenology ? More seriously, how many are reminded of the "expert witness", "Doctor Death" ...

... associated with the "Thin Blue Line" case, whose testimony helped bring death sentences for over 100 people? Self-appointed "experts" have a way of conning prosecutors into accepting their opinions because the prosecutors are so anxious to get any kind of evidence when they "know" the accused is guilty ...

[WhiskeyGrinder]

2. Man sounds like a real peach.

Kiehl likes to talk about the many occasions on which he has sat across from a prisoner and identified them as a psychopath. “They’re so utterly and totally different than the rest of us,” he says, gleefully. “It’s totally shocking … I just love it.”

He boasts about his bravery around those with criminal pasts. Most other psychopathy researchers “are never going to go into a maximum-security prison. They never could, they just wouldn’t,” he said. “It’s because it’s scary.”

Kiehl, 56, speaks in a high nasal pitch and delivers his thoughts in a rapid-fire narrative style.

During three lengthy phone interviews between November 2023 and February 2024, Kiehl described himself as an iconoclastic researcher who hoped that scientists can one day find a cure for criminal violence. He even invited me to his lab to scan my brain and experience his methodology for myself. (A week before I was due to travel to New Mexico, he rescinded the invitation and has since refused my requests for further interviews and the opportunity to comment on this story.)

Fortunately, we generally know what causes criminal violence. Some people may be more sensitive to those stimuli, but they aren't born with something to "cure."

[Mad_Machine76]

4. Is HE a psychopath?

"he says, gleefully"

[Matthew28]

3. We're probably at least 50 years

before we'll even have the proof that this has the accuracy to even start to use it in such cases. Maybe we should consider rather it is trustworthy and rather it is ready for such before throwing people in prison because of it?

[Mad_Machine76]

5. Next

they'll be doing routine "soul smears" to detect the presence of pure evil! IYKYK #TheSimpsons

[WhiskeyGrinder]

6. yeah no fuck this guy ETA: The headline really undersells just what an absolute grasping quack fraud this guy is,

and what an insult to science, justice and law it is that he's anywhere near a courtroom. Absolutely fuck this guy.

Kiehl, for his part, accepts that the criminal justice system is biased, but said that he believes it is biased toward people of low socioeconomic status, not race.

“Because if you go to rural Ohio, it’s all Caucasians who are low [socioeconomic status] that are there, but if you go to a city where there’s low [socioeconomic status] dominated by other minorities, then you’re going to get that in the [prison] system, and it is just so biased in that way,” he said.

In fact, data shows that Black people are more than five times more likely to be incarcerated in Ohio than white people. For almost a century, people of color have been disproportionately incarcerated in the US when compared with white people, and racial disparities have amplified since incarceration rates began rising in the 1970s.

Kiehl also told me there could be “a lot of benefit” to scanning the brains of everyone incarcerated in Chicago’s Cook county jail – America’s largest jail system – to see who is most predisposed to violence, which would inform “who should get out and who should stay”. But he acknowledged that local officials would face opposition from people who he had identified as “high risk” for committing new crimes.

[Disaffected]

7. Sounds about as crackpot as lie detectors, blood spatter, bite and fiber "analysis". nt