Cordially,
The criminalist did not take pictures of the stain prior to cutting out and testing it.
There is no way for the criminialists to determine how long that may have been there.
The MH floor had 19 stains...1 tested as positive for blood....it was approximately 1/4"...no picture was taken prior to testing and cutting out.
The dogs did not hit on the MH and there is no way for them to determine how long it was there....MH had been in neighborhood since 11/00...unlocked.
There's been a lot of debate and speculation about the jacket. I don't know all the details, but in general, I think:
- The stains were identified as being DNA that is consistent with the DNA that was taken from panties that were found in Danielle's bedroom.
- The DNA is (probably) also consistent with the DNA of Brenda and the boys.
- They appeared to be blood, but could have been something else. Drool, whatever.
- The jacket was supposedly "normally kept" in the motor home. Its precise location during the week(s) prior to being taken to the dry cleaners has never been specified.
- There are questions involving dry-cleaning receipts that show two jackets being brought in on two different dates. The one that was brought in on the receipt dated 1/26 was identified by the clerks as simply a "jacket". The one that was brought in on the receipt dated 2/4 was identified as a "sport jacket". The actual jacket in question is something like a windbreaker.
- The computer that generated the receipts was possibly / probably experiencing problems on 2/4. Times and sequence numbers were apparently among the fields that were affected. Were dates affected also? This is all very muddy. It could be helpful to either side, depending on how it is interpreted by the jury.
- The San Diego Police mis-handled the testing in a way that effectively prevented the defense from doing their own testing. They failed to take proper 35mm photographs of the stains before cutting them out, and then they did proceed to cut them out.
- The testing that was done was not the best, full-blown DNA testing that could -- and should -- have been done.
- There are questions regarding the chain of custody on the jacket. Speculation that the stains could have planted after the SDPD had already decided that DW was their man. This may seem far-fetched at first, but the SDPD has done such things in the past.
- The clerks did not note nor did they recall seeing any blood on the jacket at the time they took it in.
The list goes on. There are many people who think that how the jury interprets these stains versus the bug evidence will be critical to the outcome. I am not among those. I think the two approximately offset each other, so I go on to the other questions.
(Anyone: please feel free to correct me on any of this.)
Feldman stayed well away from it. Other than calling into question the dates on the cleaning receipts, there was nothing he could directly do with it, so he didn't touch it with a ten-foot pole. His response to it was with the bug evidence. (My opinion, anyway.)