All right. Back on the record in the Simpson matter. Mr. Simpson is again present before the Court with his counsel, Mr. Shapiro, Mr. Cochran, Mr. Douglas, Mr. Bailey, Mr. Blasier. The People are represented by Miss Clark and Mr. Kelberg. The jury is not present. Counsel, anything we need to take up before we take up the next witness?
Yes, your Honor. I am down here not as a result of anyone else's efforts, but of my own accord, because I couldn't help on Friday but review the Court's ruling with respect to Mr. MacDonell's testimony and then to review Dr. Rieders' report, my understanding being that Dr. Rieders will be the next witness called by the Defense. And it struck me as ironic, if nothing else, that in the Court's ruling regarding Mr. MacDonell, the Court, on page 2 of its ruling, noted near the end, just before the section dealing with discovery violations, the previous evidence code section 352 objection by the Defense: "The phenolphthalein based presumptive tests for human blood is still well taken for all the reasons previously advanced." And what struck me from that in the Court's order is Dr. Rieders' report concerning his analysis of the test results of Mr. Martz from the FBI because on page 2 in the concluding paragraph of Dr. Rieders' report he says: "Thus the finding of EDTA in a micro blood specimen, such as in the present ones, is consistent with, indicative of and presumptive for the blood having originated from a specimen which has been placed into a usually lavender top blood collection" and handwritten in is "EDTA tube such as is commonly used to draw blood from a living person and keep it from coagulating." What I believe the evidence would show, your Honor, with respect to the analysis by Dr. Rieders, is there can be, among the eleven preliminary organic compounds known in the universe, hundreds perhaps that would give a reading, a pattern, to use a shorthand version, of findings consistent with what Dr. Rieders in his report is only willing to say is a pattern which is consistent with, indicative of and presumptive for EDTA. It seems to me that for all the reasons expressed by the Defense to keep out phenolphthalein testing, because it is misleading, confusing to the jury of the real issues, and so forth, the same applies with respect to Dr. Rieders' testimony, proposed testimony, with respect to the EDTA testing of the two bloodstains. This is not evidence that in fact shows there is EDTA, according to Dr. Rieders' own report. It only reflects that the result is presumptive of EDTA, and we can go into the technicalities about basically the full spectrum that you need to see in order to say I identify EDTA is absent, that it is not a full spectrum, and only what is present can be used to say in the opinion of Dr. Rieders it is indicative of, consistent with, presumptive for. What is good for the goose, your Honor, I submit is good for the gander. Now, why is this important? Because if there is only one other compound in the universe which besides EDTA could give the pattern which is the pattern found in the stains from the gate and the socks and from--I will get into that, Miss Clark, in just a moment--if there is only one other compound that could give that pattern, then the evidence may have far more probative value than if hundreds of other compounds could provide that result. But we don't know which hundreds could provide it because as the evidence would show, Dr. Rieders, no. 1, has never done this test for EDTA using this equipment. His laboratory does not have this equipment. And the laboratory that he has to go to when he wants to use this kind of equipment does not have electrospray which is in fact the process used by the FBI, but it is the FBI's report and analysis which Dr. Rieders is going to come in here and talk about supposedly. Now, I find it most curious that a man who has never been testing for EDTA using this equipment who doesn't have the equipment in his laboratory and who has to go to a lab to do this kind of laboratory test but can't do it on that equipment because it is not previously the same kind is going to come in here and start talking about is this EDTA or is this not EDTA. And what is important, all he is going to say is about his own admission in his own report is it is presumptive of. Let me give the Court a further understanding of why I think it is so potentially misleading and it is an example from Dr. Rieders' past, recent past. A very well-known case in the southern California area, the sconce, s-c-o-n-c-e, case, oleander poisoning. The history, a gentleman was found dead in 1985, death attributed to cardiac arrest, a young man, a very overweight man and a man in the funeral business, a competitor of Mr. Sconce's. There was an informant who in about 1990 suggested that Mr. Sconce or that the victim, had been poisoned by oleander poisoning. As a result of which the Ventura County District Attorney's office retained the services of Dr. Rieders to perform an analysis of various substances preserved from autopsy to determine the presence of something called oleandrin which is part and parcel of the oleander plant and is a toxin. Let me read the Court just very briefly Dr. Rieders' testimony at the preliminary hearing in 1990, October 4th, regarding his findings. "In this case three independent tests were done; thin layer chromatography, fluorescent spectrophotometry and radioimmunoassay. These are physiochemically different things. The chances that a substance has all the properties in all three tests in common and is in actuality another substance," and his opinion was that these tests showed it was oleandrin, "From experience are so extremely remote that one then has a very high degree of scientific certainty that if one says that this is oleandrin, in fact it is. A hundred percent, never. For a hundred percent you go to the seminary because that depends on faith. Science is never a hundred percent, it is statistical, and it is reasonably certain that chances are remote. And if you want to go over into the area of, in that area, the hand of all mighty God can make anything happen, so possibilities of course are there, but it is a high degree of reasonable scientific certainty and the operative word is `reasonable' a scientist goes by reason and not by feeling." Well, the Defense attorney for Mr. Sconce didn't think going by feeling was a very good way to go either, so he proposed having additional and more sophisticated tests performed. And guess what? The Prosecution, which included Mr. Giss of our office as a specially designated Prosecutor for Ventura County, agreed to split the $20,000 bill to have the sophisticated testing done using LCMS/MS equipment at Cornell University, incidentally, where Mr. MacDonell, I believe, makes his headquarters, Cornell, New York, and that the testing was to be done to determine the presence or absence of oleandrin and another metabolite product. And guess what? Wasn't there. The testing by Dr. Henion demonstrated that what Mr.--Dr. Rieders was willing to say to reasonable scientific certainty, not to a hundred percent because he is not God, it wasn't there. And guess what happened? A man charged with a potential capital offense saw his case dismissed as a result of Dr. Henion's findings.
And guess what further happened, your Honor? Because I'm sure the Court understands that before the Prosecutor is going to dismiss a potential capital murder offense based upon an expert's finding he is going to want to go back to the original expert, Dr. Rieders, and say explain, please, where is Dr. Henion wrong? Tell us. Dr. Rieders--I talked to Mr. Giss in Miss Clark's office on Friday--basically gave a rambling nonresponsive answer, but a newspaper account of the story is succinct and to the point. From the April 4th, 1991 Los Angeles Times. "Henion reported last week that he had found no signs of oleandrin but he said he was still looking for substances created when oleandrin breaks down in the body. After trial recessed, when Henion testified with his results, no evidence of poison. Rieders, reached at his home near Philadelphia, said he could not account for the difference between his finding and Henion's.
"In science' Rieders said, quote, `nothing is unquestionable,' unquote. Now, your Honor, I submit that this is exactly why presumptive test results should not be given to this jury under 352, because they are so misleading. They are not probative. Dr. Rieders cannot say what other compounds could produce the findings that the lab reports from Mr. Marks indicate, and to allow Dr. Rieders to give presumptive testing when the Court sustained Defense objections to presumptive testing is not to be fair to both sides in this case using basically the same rule of law applied to the same general aspect of the case. Now, as the Court will recall when I was last here arguing the admissibility of Mr. Simpson's statement on the exercise video, I argued something on the assumption the Court may not accept my position that the statement was admissible. That is, I wanted the tape played to show the physical movement. I make the same statement now that I made then, your Honor, that I believe this motion should be granted, but I also feel it incumbent on myself to raise additional points in the event the Court feels that the motion is not well taken. No. 1, the oleandrin incident is a clear mistake by Dr. Rieders, which using the rationale of the Defense with respect to Dr. Golden--and of course that is really why I'm done here because I have some familiarity with the evidentiary issues on this issue where the issue is the competency of the expert witness--the Court found that these specific examples of mistakes become admissible. And here, unlike Dr. Golden with gunshot wounds versus knife wounds, here we have the very same process taking place. Are we looking at something which is indicative of, consistent with and presumptive for the chemical or are we identifying the chemical in the substance? Big difference. And that is exactly what is at issue here, because I believe--I submit to the Court the evidence will show that in fact this is not EDTA. Agent Martz' unpreserved blood gave the same result as was found on the stains from the glove and from the gate, not a quantitative result, but showing the same pattern, unpreserved. That is a pretty interesting finding with respect to whether we carry EDTA in our systems, if it is EDTA, or whether there is some other compound that gives the same pattern. So no. 1, the issue of does he get cross-examined if he testifies about his mistake, I submit to the Court using parity of reason he gets cross-examined. No. 2, and I mentioned this to Miss Clark is really why I thought it important that I come down and argue this point, because the Court will recall in cross-examining Dr. Golden Mr. Shapiro wanted to cross-examine Dr.--I'm sorry--cross-examine Dr. Lakshmanan, wanted to cross-examine Dr. Lakshmanan regarding the legal implications from the mistakes in the Gaye Phillips case which Dr. Golden acknowledged making. The Court will recall that area of proposed cross-examination, and I objected to it on, among other grounds, that it is irrelevant and that was because the issue for the mistake went to the competency of Dr. Golden. But I submit to the Court that it is proper cross-examination of Dr. Rieders to show the legal implications from his failure and refusal to acknowledge that he was wrong, because now we are not talking about his competency, we are talking about his bias. Dr. Rieders put his professional standing, his ability to get future business, his ability to retain his position as director of a laboratory, above the liberty rights of Mr. Sconce, rather than acknowledge that Dr. Henion's more sophisticated test proved that in fact there was no oleandrin poisoning. He takes the position in science "Nothing is unquestionable."
Goes to bias, the legal ramifications. So I submit to the Court that if Dr. Rieders gets to testify, he gets cross-examined not only about the mistake, but he gets cross-examined regarding his response to that mistake and the legal implications from his failure or refusal to acknowledge it as a mistake because he needed to place his selfish interests above those of Mr. Sconce, the criminally charged Defendant. So again, your Honor, I raise these two points not because I believe our motion to preclude his testimony in its entirety is not well taken; I raise these points because I don't know how the Court is going to rule and I want to give the Court the full picture of what I believe are issues related to Dr. Rieders' proposed testimony.
Let me talk about the second issue first. I think it is just absolutely outrageous that Mr. Kelberg would come in and read from a newspaper and argue that there has been some determination that Dr. Rieders made a mistake in the sconce case. If we want to litigate the sconce case, we can, but it is going to take us about a month. The testing that was done by Mr. Henion was done on a five-year old autopsy, a different autopsy, different tissue than the testing done by Dr. Rieders earlier. Dr. Henion in his reports, my understanding, acknowledges that perhaps what Dr. Rieders saw might have been there when he saw it, but because the second autopsy five years later might not show the same thing. The case was dismissed. There were other reasons for its dismissal. We can litigate that from here to Sunday. And it is absolutely ludicrous to say that they should be able to cross-examine him on that kind of a case where there has been no legal determination that any mistake was made. In fact no mistake was made. These are contrary opinions on scientific evidence which happens all the time. And the notion that Mr. Kelberg would come in and raise his voice because a scientist would say he is not certain about something is outrageous. No scientist is going to get up there and tell you he is absolutely positive about anything if he's a real scientist. So I make a motion that they not be allowed to cross-examine on that issue at all. On 352 grounds, certainly, and a lack of showing that there is any legal basis to cross-examine. As to the first issue, on whether this is a presumptive test or not, first of all, Mr. Kelberg has not read Dr. Rieders' report carefully. His report states that the testing done by the FBI does show the presence of EDTA in the bloodstain from the sock and from the gate. There is no language about "Presumptive for" in that part of his report. The second part of the report where he tries to attribute a source as to where this could have come from is where he uses the term "Presumptive" not in the sense of a phenolphthalein test where the phenolphthalein test we know that there are a lot of common-occurring substances that can give the same response as blood and therefore it is only a test that narrows it down somewhat, could have been something else, so they have to do follow-up tests to confirm it. These are not presumptive tests. I find it fascinating that Mr. Kelberg would use Mr. Henion's LCMS/MS test to go prove that Dr. Rieders made a mistake when he is claiming now that LCMS/MS is just a presumptive test. That is the same testing that was done in this case. They might say that there are hundreds of compounds that could give this pattern. They can't name a single one. I asked Agent Martz. He can't name a single one. They have not looked at all eleven million organic compounds. There may be eleven billion in the universe, we don't know. So you can't absolutely say that there isn't something else out there that we have never seen before that might give this same pattern. That doesn't make it a presumptive test. I'm assuming that the Los Angeles District Attorney's office has been prosecuting people for years based on LCMS tests or GC/MS tests which has less information than the tests run by the FBI in this case. Those tests have been used since the seventies to demonstrate that you have a particular substance in your blood, for instance. They are not presumptive tests. There is no case that says they are a presumptive test. They are determinative tests. They can make arguments that maybe there is some other compound out there somewhere, the name of which we do not know, that might give the same result, and Agent Marks will say that and Dr. Rieders will say that also, but they will say the only compound they know that gives everything we see, the right retention time, the right parent ion and the right daughter ion and the right characteristic you must have before something can even be tested, is EDTA. And Dr. Rieders will say in his opinion this is EDTA because it meets every one of those characteristics. On the electrospray issue, electrospray is a process by which you move from the chromatography stage to the mass spec stage. With liquid chromatography you are working with a liquid that has to be converted to a gas before you can do the mass spec part of it. All electrospray does is change the liquid to the gas. It doesn't change the ions. It doesn't change the compound. It doesn't change the measurement system. You still wind up with chromatograms that you look at and you analyze.
Saying that this should be determinative of whether an expert testifies is like saying that Julia Childs can't tell you anything about cooking because she doesn't use a Cuisinart. It is one technique that is used as one step in the process. It doesn't change anything. You wind up with a chromatogram that is interpreted just like they all are. So I would submit that this is clearly not a presumptive test, and further, that the Prosecution should not be allowed to cross-examine on the sconce case or any other case that they may not have mentioned, unless they present it beforehand, so that we can litigate that as well.
No. 1, just for consistency, it is Dr. Henion; it is not Mr. Henion. No. 2, it is a more sophisticated test than any of the tests that Dr. Rieders used. No. 3, the evidence is clear Dr. Rieders--in fact, we have his article "A quest for oleandrin in decayed human tissue"--noted his findings showed it wasn't there and he doesn't make any reference whatsoever to Dr. Rieders having been possibly correct in the past with respect to his analysis. If that were the case, this case might still have been prosecuted. We are not inclined to lightly dismiss capital murder cases, your Honor. That is dismissed because of the overpowering and overwhelming and compelling nature of Dr. Henion's results. Last thing is, who is the proponent of this evidence? The people at the left side of counsel table to my left. It is their responsibility to show no other compound. It is not our responsibility to say, oh, gee, you know, there is only one or two others or maybe a couple hundred. It is their responsibility when they are talking about it is presumptive of, and that is really what the conclusion is. The issue for this jury is, hey, where does this stuff come from? If it is EDTA, where does it come from? And that is this issue that the jury is being asked to decide when in fact the expert, the best he is going to say is it is presumptive for. If he is using the language, I didn't put words in his mouth, I didn't put the words in this report; he wrote them. He should have to live by them. I submit for all the reasons previously expressed, your Honor, he should be precluded from testifying.
But if the Court feels differently than I on this, that the two areas of inquiry that I have indicated are appropriate, Dr. Henion's--I asked Mr. Hodgman to make sure he is available to clear the air should there be any air need clearing regarding what the test results were and I have every expectation that he would be available.
All right. For the purposes of the record, Mr. Blasier, do we have Dr. Rieders' report marked as an exhibit at this point?
I think we should have--I think for the purpose of the appellate court I think we need to have a copy here.
All right. The 352 objection as to Dr. Rieders' testimony regarding his testing for the presence of EDTA, the objection is overruled. I will allow his testimony. The cross-examination as to other testing in other cases done by Dr. Rieders appears to be a fair game for cross-examination. Legal ramifications, however, of scientific testing, appears to the Court to be a 352 problem because there are many explanations as to why things are done legally. It is an apple and oranges argument. So the objection by the Defense as to legal ramifications is sustained. All right. For the purposes of the record we will mark a copy of Dr. Rieders' report as Court's exhibit 18.
KEY QUOTEWhat is good for the goose, your Honor, I submit is good for the gander.
Saying that this should be determinative of whether an expert testifies is like saying that Julia Childs can't tell you anything about cooking because she doesn't use a Cuisinart.
The notion that Mr. Kelberg would come in and raise his voice because a scientist would say he is not certain about something is outrageous. No scientist is going to get up there and tell you he is absolutely positive about anything if he's a real scientist.
The 352 objection as to Dr. Rieders' testimony regarding his testing for the presence of EDTA, the objection is overruled. I will allow his testimony. The cross-examination as to other testing in other cases done by Dr. Rieders appears to be a fair game for cross-examination. Legal ramifications, however, of scientific testing, appears to the Court to be a 352 problem.