September 29, 2010 | 3:51 PM |

Superior Court Judge On Shaken Baby Syndrome

FILED UNDER: Medicine/Science, babies, pediatrics, shaken baby syndrome

Informed, impassioned comments continue to pour in at the bottom of this post: The Real Consensus On Shaken Baby Syndrome?

Judge Charles Gill speaking recently at The Gilbert School in Connecticut

Today, we heard, among others, from Connecticut Superior Court Judge Charles Gill, who is known as a longtime children’s advocate. He writes:

Law Professor Deborah Tuerkheimer’s Op-Ed 9/20/10 in the New York Times on The Shaken Baby Syndrome is a criminal defense lawyers dream, but a reality nightmare.

I have lectured at dozens of law and medical schools on child abuse. Her real inexperience in this area shows.

It is disconcerting, if not frightening, when a law professor professes factual, technical, and legal misleading statements in public and professional publications.

Her over-extension of the highly questionable medical minority view on the subject into the legal
world makes me wince. Her beliefs are not medically, scientifically or legally correct. They suggest a legal tilting at her new “innocence project”. We liberals love such pursuits. But her project is guilty of existing pretty much in her own mind. Her sources are scant and wrong.

Let us hope that her efforts do not result in the freeing of people who murder our infants in the most despicable way.

Connecticut Superior Court Judge Charles D. Gill

As we posted here, Professor Tuerkheimer has declined to comment directly on the outpouring of comments on CommonHealth. Most of the comments are critical of her New York Times op-ed piece saying that experts are questioning the science behind shaken baby syndrome. Might Judge Gill’s comment be enough to prompt a more direct response?

  • Michael Innis

    Professor Tuerkheimer is the one that is right on target and both Chadwick and Gill display an ignorance of the pathophysiology of Haemostasis and Osteogenesis. They should read my articles in the Jour Amer Phys and Surg 2006;11:p 17-19 and Jour Orthomol Med 2008:23; 15-20 to get the most upto date information on the subject.
    Michael Innis

  • Rwblock

    Professor Tuerkheimer will not comment because she is most likely recognizing the terrible error she made while considering only a small minority distortion of science when she wrote her biased and erroneous paper. It is sad when the public, and many lawyers can be influenced with such an obvious distortion of facts.

  • David Chadwick

    Judge Gill is right on target. Tuerkheimer’s Innocence Project lacks Innocence