Colin Norris's case to be heard by UK Court of Appeal

[Chris_Halkides]

von Bulow case and more on C peptide/insulin ratio

"According to Dr. George Cahill, a Harvard Medical School professor who is a leading expert on blood sugar, had the Yalow test been performed on blood taken from Martha von Bulow shortly after she lapsed into her second coma on Dec. 21, 1980, her physicians and a subsequent jury would have known ''with 100 percent certainty'' the source of the insulin in her body.

"However, doctors did not perform either the Yalow test or a test to measure the blood level of an amino acid called C-peptide, which is left when insulin breaks down. Medical experts testified that there was ''reasonable medical certainty'' because of the high level of insulin and low level of sugar in Mrs. von Bulow's blood that the insulin had been injected."
NYT

"Because of the differences in half-lives, the molar ratio of circulating insulin to C-peptide is usually <1, despite equimolar secretion." link

 

[Rolfe]

Well, gimme a break, I haven't thought about this for years if not a decade or two and I got the terminology wrong (I didn't look anything up, probably should have done), but even I remembered that there's an excellent test to distinguish between endogenous and exogenous insulin, and why and how. Please tell me why nobody seems to have thought of that?

 

[Chris_Halkides]

hardly an open and shut case

At first I thought Mr. Norris sounded like an uncaring individual at best, thereby forgetting my own rule that the prosecution can make almost anyone look bad. The Knox/Sollecito case is not the only example of this, but it is a good one.

With respect to the science, the discussion in this thread is pushing me toward saying that the evidence against him is not a slam dunk. If this case were being decided using preponderance of evidence (50.1%) as the standard, I might vote one way. Using BARD, I might vote the other.
EDT
I found a link to an article in the American Biology Teacher that goes through some of these issues using a laboratory exercise with simulated data from immunoassays. There are a few references.

 

[Chris_Halkides]

access and inventory

Would Mr. Norris have had access to insulin? Was the insulin inventoried, and if so, was some missing? I don't know enough about typical hospital operations, to know whether or not these are realistic questions to be asking.