Chapter 24

It was day two of the trial and Roger was ready to produce testimony about the DNA identification of Gilbert Kinneson's remains. He had contacted Senior Technician Fred Simms, the lab supervisor, and hastily explained what he needed. Simms said it would be no problem. Schwartz tried to be as clear about things as possible.

"Now I know that there were a lot of tests done on the DNA from the body," said Roger. "That's not germane to the issue in this trial. All I need is an overview of how DNA is used to identify people, and a statement of how Kinneson's DNA was confirmed."

"Got it," said Simms, who was reading a report that was riddled with spelling errors and marking each one with a red pen. "What time?"

"Be there at nine," said Schwartz. "Courtroom B."

"Got it," said Simms again.

Roger had written his questions carefully. Nobody needed to know that Kinneson's remains were tied to all those other rapes. It wasn't material, and it would be prejudicial to his case.

"I call Fred Simms to the stand," intoned Roger Schwartz.

The door bailiff opened the rear door and called, "Fred Simms!" into the hallway. A woman appeared. She was smiling, and had a clipboard in her hands. She appeared to be in her early twenties, with her blond hair in a pony tail. She was wearing a white lab coat.

There was confusion until she introduced herself as Tiffany Baldridge, the technician who actually did the comparisons in question. Fred had done what he always did. He sent the tech who did the work. He did not pass along Roger's restrictions. All his personnel were professionals, and knew how to testify.

They told the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

When she had been sworn in, Roger asked her to state her qualifications. She calmly listed her degrees, her length of service with the lab, and a count of cases she'd worked on. She threw in that none of her work had ever been successfully challenged in court. She confirmed that she'd received a blood sample from the autopsy of a John Doe and listed the case number and date.

"And what did you do with that sample?" asked Roger.

"I ran the probes on it and established a baseline for later comparison," she said.

"Could you explain what you do when you run probes?"

She did. It went twenty minutes. She had visual aids, printouts of the results on the sample. By the time she was done, even the judge was fidgeting in his chair.

"And whose DNA was it?" asked Roger.

"We didn't get a match in any of our databases," she said. "He remained John Doe, until some new samples were received, to be compared to the original baseline for the deceased."

"These new samples," said Roger. "When you compared them, did they match the DNA of the victim?"

"Yes they did. They established that the victim was Gilbert Kinneson."

"Thank you very much," said Roger, returning to his seat. "No further questions."

McDill got up.

"Miz Baldridge, could you tell me where these new samples you mentioned came from?"

Tiffany went through her report.

"They came from various places," she said. "The ones that identified the victim came from a hairbrush belonging to Gilbert Kinneson, according to the evidence form."

"And the others?"

"Objection!" said the prosecutor. "Irrelevant and immaterial. The victim has already been identified."

"By hairs from a hairbrush," said McDill. "How do we know they were Gilbert Kinneson's hairs? How do we know it was Gilbert Kinesson's brush? There were other samples that were tested. I'd like to know about them."

"Overruled," said the judge. "But let's get past this without any showmanship, counselor."

McDill didn't seem to be affected by the warning.

"Please tell us where the other samples came from, and how they compared to your original," he said.

"They were hair and skin samples," said Tiffany, leafing through the pages on her clipboard. "I had two hair samples from crime scenes, and some skin samples. Here they are. They were from fingernail scrapings." She stopped.

"Crime scenes," mused McDill. "And fingernail scrapings. And how did they compare to the baseline for the deceased?"

"They were a match," said the technician.

"These samples seem to have been related to crimes," said McDill. "What kind of crimes?"

"OBJECTION!" yelled Roger. "Mr. Kinneson is not on trial here. His background is irrelevant!"

"What are you trying to do, counselor?" asked the judge, frowning at McDill.

"I'm trying to establish motive, your honor," said McDill, his face straight.

There were ten seconds of silence.

"You DO know you're the defense attorney in this matter," said Judge Gunderson, his eyebrows raised.

"I do, your honor," said Matthew, ignoring the veiled sarcasm in the judge's voice. "And motive is an important part of any murder trial. The prosecution seems to have ignored that, thus far. Rather than call this witness back during the defense, I thought I'd get the information out now."

Schwartz stood, his face flushed. "Your honor, this is ridiculous. I repeat that Mr. Kinneson is not the one on trial. And the establishment of motive is MY prerogative!" Had he stopped there, things might have been different, but his anger drove him forward. "I think it's quite clear that the accused THOUGHT Mr. Kinneson was her rapist, and that's why she murdered him."

The judge looked back at McDill, who spoke in an even, modulated voice.

"I want the jury to understand my client's motive for her actions."

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