Program Note: For more details on the killing of Annie Le, a Yale medical student, watch AC360° tonight at 10 p.m. ET.

Le, 24, a Yale graduate student was found the day she was scheduled to marry her college sweetheart.

Randi Kaye| BIO
AC360° Correspondent

I covered the brutal murder of Yale medical student Annie Le in September.

She’s the 24-year-old lab student whose body was found stuffed inside the wall at one of Yale’s labs on campus.

They arrested and charged an animal research technician, Raymond Clark III, who is still locked up.

At the time, we all wondered, what the heck happened? Well, today, we know a lot more.

I just got my hands on the arrest warrant affidavit which has some fascinating new details about what led police to arrest Ray Clark and charge him with strangling Le to death.

The affidavit appears to show that Clark was trying to cover his alleged tracks right in front of the officers investigating the murder.

Authorities say they found Le's body in the basement wall of a Yale medical research building.

Police say Clark raised eyebrows immediately when he allegedly tried to move a box of wipes that were splattered with blood out of the direct line of vision of a police officer. The wipes were on a cart in the lab and according to the affidavit the officer says she watched Clark turn the box around in attempt to hide the blood.

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Randi Kaye| BIO
AC360° Correspondent

Program Note: Don't miss Randi Kaye’s full report tonight on AC360° at 10 p.m. ET.

Randi Kaye| BIO
AC360° Correspondent

So let me get this straight!

Schools across the country are lowering standards – actually dumbing down lesson plans – to avoid sanctions under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB).

That act was President George W. Bush’s signature education reform. It mandates that every child in school must be “proficient” in reading and math by 2014 and schools that fall short are subject to sanctions.

Now a new federal study shows that nearly a third of the states lowered academic standards in recent years. Fifteen states in all lowered proficiency standards in fourth and eighth-grade reading or math from 2005 to 2007. Three states – Maine, Oklahoma, and Wyoming – lowered standards in both subjects at both grade levels. Yikes!

On a positive note, though, the study found eight states actually raised their standards even though their funding was threatened.

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Editor’s Note: Watch Randi Kaye’s full report tonight on Anderson Cooper 360 at 10pm ET.

Randi Kaye| BIO
AC360° Correspondent

Is it a classic case of “he said, she said,” or is it a brutal case of racism? Whatever it is, it may land a Missouri woman, a preacher’s daughter who has never been in trouble with the law before, in jail.

It all apparently started at a Walmart store in Kennett, Missouri where according to police, customer Heather Ellis had cut in line to pay for her items. What followed is at the heart of a court case that may send Heather Ellis to jail for as many as 15 years!

Let me first say Ms. Ellis has pleaded not guilty. But here’s how police tell it: officers say they were called to the store after Ellis caused a “disturbance” at the cash register by “yelling and cursing.” Officers say when they tried to get her to leave the store, she turned and yelled at them, “I ain’t going nowhere until I get my (expletive) change back” but that even after she got her change, she continued to be “belligerent.” The lead officer says they tried to get her to remain calm and leave in a peaceful manner and told her they’d arrest her if she refused. That is when the lead officer says Ellis “issued a threat to assault” and said if the officer put their hands on her “she was going to beat my (expletive).” Well, it turned ugly according to police, who say she became “combative and began fighting.” The officers say Ellis “continued to fight, yell and curse” and was “completely out of control.” They say she “resisted arrest” and “stiffened her body” when they tried to put her in the police car. Read the full police report here.

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Randi Kaye | BIO
AC360° Correspondent

Tonight on AC360, at 10pm eastern, I’ll be looking at the online campaign by folks who consider themselves “anti-vaxers.” These people are trying to scare others into not getting the swine flu vaccine. They say it could paralyze you. They say it hasn’t been tested on humans. They say it can cause cancer and autism and kill unborn babies. The swine flu vaccine back in 1976 did cause paralysis in some...and hundreds of families sued back then saying their loved ones died as a result of the vaccine.

What do believe? Are you planning to get vaccinated? What about your kids?

A photograph of Cameron Todd Willingham.

Randi Kaye| BIO
AC360° Correspondent

I have been reporting on Cameron Todd Willingham for a few years now.

He’s the Texas man who was convicted of “arson homicide” and executed on February 17, 2004, after 12 years of claiming innocence on death row.

Texas Governor Rick Perry refused to grant him a stay even though new evidence had come to light in the days before the execution that there was no evidence of arson at Willingham’s Corsicana, Texas home. His three little girls died in the fire. His wife at the time was out shopping for Christmas presents.

Have you ever wondered what a death row inmate thinks while the time ticks away, while he waits to die? Below you will find some of Todd Willingham’s most intimate thoughts about death, about his conviction and about his wife and the daughters lost in the fire.

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Program Note: Watch Randi Kaye's full report – including her interview with David Martin tonight on AC360° at 10 p.m. ET.

A photograph of Cameron Todd Willingham.

Randi Kaye| BIO
AC360° Correspondent

I came to Texas this week to look deeper into a story I’ve been covering for a few years now for AC360°.

It’s the story of Cameron Todd Willingham, a father of three who was executed in February 2004 for setting a fire that killed his three daughters. But what if he didn’t set it? What if he just got a lame defense? Is it possible?

We wanted to know why he was convicted of “arson homicide” even though since the trial nine leading arson experts have said the fire showed no evidence of arson. So why was he executed?

We went straight to one of Willingham’s defense attorneys, David Martin, for some answers. We met at his Waco office, hours away from where the fire took place in the tiny town of Corsicana. Martin’s office was true Texas. It felt more like a ranch than a law office. We sat down in a couple of over-sized chairs (everything is bigger in Texas, you know) and talked about the case.

I asked Martin how it was possible that the prosecution put two experts on the stand who said the fire was arson, and yet Martin didn’t put anyone on the stand to refute their arguments. Why no expert to say the fire wasn’t arson in Willingham’s defense?

Martin told me, “We couldn’t find one that said it wasn’t arson.”

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Randi Kaye| BIO
AC360° Correspondent

The National Academy of Sciences found that U.S. crime labs lack uniform standards, training and oversight.

Just Science Coalition

Unvalidated or improper forensic science is a leading cause of wrongful conviction in the United States.

As a result, forensic analysts sometimes testify in cases without a proper scientific basis for their findings. Testimony based on forensics can therefore lack basic scientific standards. Even within forensic disciplines that are more firmly grounded in science, evidence is often subject to dispute.

In 2006, Congress appropriated funds to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) to thoroughly study the fundamental underpinnings of forensic science and its applications in our criminal justice system.

A NAS panel was formed – including scientists, academics, a retired federal judge, and other notable experts. Over a period of 18 months, the group conducted comprehensive research on forensic disciplines and released a This Committee on Identifying the Needs of the Forensic Sciences Community released its final report, Strengthening Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward, in February 2009.

As outlined in the report, many forensic disciplines have evolved primarily through their use in individual cases and have not been scientifically validated or standardized.

Take a look at the report’s 13 key recommendations.