NO JURY TODAY.....just attorneys....?
Attorneys, Judge Craft Jury Instructions
Final Testimony Expected Tuesday
Updated: 7:59 a.m. PDT July 29, 2002
Westerfield, 50, is charged with murder, kidnapping and special circumstance allegations that could lead to the death penalty if he's convicted of killing 7-year-old Danielle van Dam. He is also charged with misdemeanor possession of child pornography.
Prosecutors are expected to wrap up their rebuttal case Tuesday with testimony from M. Lee Goff, a professor of forensic sciences from Hawaii.
After that, Westerfield's attorneys will have a chance to rebut the prosecution's rebuttal evidence. Then, closing arguments will begin.
In testimony Thursday, Dr. William Rodriguez (pictured, right), a forensic anthropologist, told the jury that the victim had been dead between four and six weeks when her body was discovered Feb. 27.
The prosecution expert's estimate caused some consternation in the courtroom because the time period would go back before Feb. 2, the day the second-grader was discovered missing.
However, Rodriguez earlier said it was impossible to set a precise "post-mortem interval," or the time between when a person dies and when the body is found, because there are too many variables.
The body was mummified and in an advanced state of decomposition when it was found alongside a road in the East County community of Dehesa.
"The conditions were ideal for mummification," Rodriguez said. "It was apparent it was a rapid mummification."
Rodriguez explained that mummification would inhibit insect activity. Insect activity was used by defense expert Neal Haskell to determine the body had been at the Dehesa site from Feb. 14 on.
Haskell testified three days earlier that he based his conclusion on the blow flies found in the body.
The defense contends Westerfield could not have dropped the body where it was discovered because he was under intense surveillance by the police beginning Feb. 5.
Rodriguez said Haskell left out an important factor in warm and dry climates: ants.
"They (ants) will literally carry away blow-fly eggs and larvae and feed on them," Rodriguez told the jurors. "You might look at that body and say there's no blow-fly larvae, no eggs, this body was not here a long time."
But Rodriguez testified that the quick mummification of the young girl's body would be a barrier to blow flies because tissue would be too hard. However, with mummification creating a "hard case" around her body, internal organs would retain moisture, he said.