Analyst’s alleged mistakes span years
Personnel file shows extent of problem
When the Orange-Osceola State Attorney’s Office sent a letter to defense attorneys in February warning them that their clients’ cases might have been affected by Orange County Sheriff’s Office employee Marco Palacio’s alleged mistakes, it described the errors as “performance issues … clerical errors, failure to identify prints of value and the mislabeling of print cards.”
The personnel file of the latent print examiner reveals that errors had been made for years before prosecutors were made aware — potentially affecting more than 2,500 cases.
In his role, Palacio acted as an expert examiner of crime scene fingerprints and handprints to determine whether they matched those of suspects.
The Orange-Osceola Public Defender’s Office is reviewing more than 1,675 criminal cases in which Palacio was involved to ensure no clients were harmed by his errors.
The remaining cases may be reviewed by private practice attorneys.
Prints aren’t necessary evidence in every case, though. Of the roughly 130 Palacio-involved cases still open when the State Attorney’s Office was notified of his performance problems, prosecutors had asked for the defendants’ fingerprints to be put into the case files as evidence in at least 23 cases.
Palacio was listed as a possible expert witness in seven active murder cases, including that of Sanel Saint Simon, accused in the murder of his girlfriend’s 16-year-old daughter Alexandria Chery — but the State Attorney’s Office has said it will no longer use his testimony.
Documented performance problems date back to 2015, but the State Attorney’s Office did not discover them until February, after Assistant State Attorney Linda Drane Burdick asked Palacio to fingerprint a suspect and he said he was no longer allowed to do that.
He’d been reassigned in October 2016 to another job as the Sheriff’s Office conducted an internal investigation of his work.
Palacio received his first below standards rating in 2015. That same year, he got a new supervisor, Tonia D’Angelo, said Sheriff ’s Office spokesman Capt. Angelo Nieves. D’Angelo could not be reached for comment Friday.
On Palacio’s most recent annual review in October 2016, D’Angelo rated his job knowledge and work quality “below standards.”
She said Palacio was too reliant on an automated fingerprint identification tool and often missed useful prints and identifications that could have led to convictions.
“These misses could result in a suspect remaining at large and reoffending,” she wrote.
In other cases, she said he seemed to ignore or not see discrepancies in fingerprints he was comparing to force them to match. D’Angelo said that could “result in the wrong person being identified or excluded” in a crime.
Palacio indicated on the review documents that he agreed with the ratings. He did not respond to a request for comment.
D’Angelo put Palacio on a performance improvement plan after the 2015 review, a requirement for those with substandard ratings. Over the next year, documents show he attended a 40-hour training class on print analysis and supervisors reviewed all of his casework.
“Despite that daily review, Marco has continued to show unsatisfactory latent print development and repeats mistakes again and again,” D’Angelo wrote in his October 2016 review.
The Sheriff ’s Office has not said why prosecutors were not notified of Palacio’s reported performance issues earlier.
Before 2012, he earned the highest ratings possible each year on his annual reviews since he was first hired as a fingerprint technician in 1998.
English language and pronunciation classes were suggested several times for the native-Spanish speaker, but he rose through the ranks and received accolades throughout his career, according to his personnel file.
In 2000, Palacio was lauded for identifying a suspect that the FBI wanted — who was in the Orange County Jail — by print “search and classification.”
“Due to your unique knowledge and expertise, another dangerous criminal was removed from our community,” then-Sheriff Kevin Beary wrote to Palacio.
The next year, he was promoted to assistant squad leader of the records and identification unit, taking on supervisory responsibilities such as training new employees.
He was promoted again in 2008 to latent print examiner, then made assistant squad leader of the unit in 2010.
But changes came in 2013 and 2014, when Palacio — then reviewed by Mary Gouvellis, who supervised D’Angelo in Palacio’s 2015 and 2016 evaluations — was rated only “meets standards” in the Sheriff’s Office’s threetiered rating system.
Palacio was asked to improve his communication, teamwork, accountability and decision making.
He was formally disciplined for some clerical errors in 2013 and was demoted from a leadership position in the unit to the role in which he is accused of making the identification mistakes.
Gouvellis recommended in several reviews that Palacio obtain his bachelor’s degree, though he’d taken some classes. A Sheriff’s Office job listing for a latent print examiner posted March 7 includes a bachelor’s degree as a qualification.
As of this month, Palacio is making $27.67 an hour — up from $9.24 when he started with the Sheriff ’s Office in 1998.
Palacio was moved to the evidence section, where he is doing clerical work as the Sheriff’s Office continues its internal investigation.
Nieves did not respond to a question about how long the investigation may take.
Documented performance problems date back to 2015, but the State Attorney’s Office did not discover them until February.