Commonwealth v. Chmiel, D., Aplt.

OPINION

JUSTICE WECHT

In 2002, David Chmiel was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of three elderly siblings.1 At Chmiel’s 2002 trial, the Commonwealth relied upon, the testimony of a state police forensic examiner, who opined that hair found at the crime scene was microscopically similar to Chmiel’s hair. On April 20,- 2015, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”) issued a. press release admitting, for the first time, that testimony by FBI analysts regarding microscopic hair analysis in criminal trials, was erroneous. in the yast .majority of cases (hereinafter, “FBI press…