Thank you, your Honor. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
THE JURY: Good morning.
CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR. BLASIER
Miss Lewis, you have been referring to a report that you wrote at the time that you processed these items?
I've basically been referring to two lists; one is the property report and the other one were just my rough notes that I was making when I was booking the item.
So those rough notes were made at the time that you were doing what you've testified to?
Is it accurate that neither your rough notes or your property report contain descriptions of taking things out of bags, putting butcher paper on the table and all the details that you've described to us yesterday and today?
Now, you prepared a separate report that does describe a lot of those things, correct?
It was prepared in January when I found out I was requesting to be involved with the case.
Do your procedures at LAPD require that when you write a report you make it part of a file somewhere?
If it is a formal report, yes, they are, such as the property report that I have. As for personal notes, no.
You are not required to have your personal notes put in a file somewhere where your supervisors, for instance, can review them or they can be provided in discovery in a criminal case?
And where does it say there is an exception for Coroner's evidence in terms of making your report available to the Defense, for instance?
These reports were available if they--they were given--supplied to the Prosecution, if they were needed. It was--it is not that they are not available.
The paper listing my rough notes that I took at the time of--when I was doing the evidence, processing the evidence, that was supplied, I believe it was in January, when I first found out that I was going to be involved in the case, and the notes--the typed notes of basically the order that I did things, that was supplied just yesterday.
Since you worked on this case has anybody from the Prosecutor's office requested that you turn over any notes or reports that you wrote?
When I spoke to Miss Clark in January she asked for the information that I had, any notes that I had, and it was supplied at that time. This was done after my meeting with her.
When you typed it up, did you call her and say, "Here is a report, here is my report of what I did"?
Is it your habit and custom, when you write a report of something that you do like that, to keep it to yourself?
I have my own files. This is the first time I have--I have made a report such as this. It is the only case that I have gone to court on, so it is the only time I have completed this type of procedure.
Now, when Miss Clark asked you for your notes in January, did you--did you understand that she wanted everything that you might have written about what you did?
When she asked me for my notes I gave her the notes that I had completed at that time. These were--it was for my recollection, it was after the meeting when she asked me for everything. I wasn't--I didn't know if this was going to be necessary or what was going to happen. It was just to try to refresh my recollection as to the order I did things.
How many times have you testified in court in your capacity as an employee at SID?
You are familiar with the procedures at SID has about writing reports and putting them in files?
And there is some--is there some exception, is it either written or oral, that says you don't have to turn over some reports?
Is that your understanding, is that the habit and custom of other people at SID, to write reports that they keep as part of their own personal papers and don't make a part of the file?
And there is a lot of detail in that report about putting butcher paper down, changing gloves. It is a very detailed report, is it not?
Now, did you prepare that report based on the notes that I have here now, the rough notes, and your typed property report?
Now, the rough notes that you have and the property report don't have details about the specific steps you went through for each particular item, do they?
Did you--in writing your report did do you that from a specific recollection that you had done those things or that is just your common practice?
What has been your assignment--well, let me rephrase that. At the time when you processed the items in this case, had you been--were you assigned full-time to working that area?
And trace evidence includes fibers, soil, other types of items like that, small items?
Now, your responsibilities, did they involve going to crime scenes or just processing evidence back at the lab?
Going to crime scenes. I'm actually part of the field unit, which is part of the trace unit; it is sort of a dual unit.
Incidentally, when you turned over your typed report to Miss Clark, did you tell her that you had done it way back in January?
How long had you been assigned to the hair and trace unit as of June of last year?
Now, you indicated on direct yesterday that when you started to examine these items you used opaque lighting. Do you mean oblique lighting?
Oblique lighting is where you shine a light from the side on something to see if you can see something, hair or trace, that sort of thing, correct?
Yes. Did I say I looked--when I'm in field in I'm looking for trace evidence, yes, I use the lighting. On this case I did not because that is not my purpose with booking Coroner's evidence.
Okay. So your specific purpose was not really to identify what hair and trace evidence was on those items?
It was merely taking it from the Coroner's system and putting it into the LAPD system?
Now, would you agree, given your experience with hair and trace evidence, that it is difficult, if not impossible, to actually see hair and trace evidence with the naked eye on clothing or other evidentiary items?
It is not difficult. There are some items that are smaller, and yes, it is, but for the most part you can see it if you look carefully enough.
But if you are not looking carefully for it, it is not the sort of things that jump out at you as soon as you look at an evidence item is it?
When you are processing items when you actually try to identify hair and trace, you do far more than just look at it?
You use lighting, you use microscopes, you use other things to allow you to visualize whatever evidence might be on there that you can't see with the naked eye?
Now, I think you described the evidence coming from the Coroner's office as how many bags total?
They are closed. I don't recall in this case if it was sealed with tape. Sometimes they are. Sometimes they are just closed, they are tied up with twine.
Okay. Inside the mesh package was there then also another package that contained all the items for each bag?
Could you take a look at the report that you typed in January in the first paragraph. Don't you indicate in that that those packages were unsealed?
With the two unsealed packages I was referring to the manila envelopes that contained the physical evidence. They are sealed only in the sense they've got the clasp that is folded out, otherwise they are not sealed. I wouldn't consider it as sealed.
Well, you indicated in your report that the evidence was transported from the Coroner's office in two unsealed packages, one for each case, and a tied white mesh bundle for each victim.
Now, are you saying now that what that means is that there were two white mesh bundle packages as well as two additional packages?
Okay. And the packages that had the hair samples and other swatches, those were unsealed?
Now, you took those items and put them in freezer bags or frozen evidence storage bags, correct?
To your knowledge had those items of evidence, which you felt should be kept in a frozen storage bag, been kept in frozen storage at the Coroner's office?
Were they in any kind of a container that indicated that they had been kept frozen?
Did those packages, were they accompanied by any kind of a log or record that showed who collected them, when they were collected, who might have had access to them, that sort of thing?
And this was on June 27th, which would have been almost two weeks after the murders?
More than two weeks. Did you have any way of telling, from looking at those bags, who at the Coroner's office had put them in the bags?
Did you have any way of knowing who in the Coroner's office or elsewhere might have had access to the bags before you got them?
No. Excuse me. The only thing--there is a name that is listed on the physical evidence anyway. The items are signed off by someone from the Coroner's office. Whether it is an investigator or the Coroner, I do not know, but that is the only record that I know of.
On the envelopes there is a place for the Coroner's--someone from the Coroner's office to sign the envelopes.
Right. The envelopes that are not sealed is just the way the Coroner's office gives it to our evidence control officer to transport it. Everything inside the envelopes is sealed.
Now, the ones that the envelopes that are sealed, do they have a record on them of who might have opened those bindles at any particular time and examined them and closed them back up again?
It has a name on it that refers to who sealed it. I don't know if it has been opened again.
Okay. So you have no way of knowing whether someone, from the time it was put in those bindles until the time you got it, opened it and looked at it?
They were in a brown paper bag, and once again, it just had Coroner's red seal paper over the bags where it was folded over.
There are possibly some initials, but I can't--usually there will be initials and sometimes a date. I don't know specifically on this case what those initials were or for sure if there were some.
Okay. Did you make this part of your notes about what information was on the bags from the Coroner's office?
Now, the bags with the clothing, did--was there any way to tell on those bags how many people might have opened them up and looked at them before they got to you?
When items come from the Coroner's typically, is one of your duties to process those kind of items?
Is it standard practice for the Coroner's office to provide the clothing in the manner in which it was provided in this case?
Now, when you examine these items, you described in considerable detail how--what kind of precautions you take to avoid contamination or having trace evidence moved from one place to another, correct?
To protect myself and also to protect the items, so I don't transfer any items from myself or from the evidence that I'm handling to each other.
And is the reason for that because on our clothing and things that we wear, and maybe in our hair, we can be transporters of hair and trace evidence from one place to another without even knowing it?
So the lab coat that you wear is designed to make sure that there is no transfer of trace evidence from you to the evidence?
Okay. But it is also because when you process some evidence with a lab coat on, there is a possibility that evidence from--hair and trace evidence from what you are processing can get on that lab coat and then possibly contaminate the next case?
So having a disposable lab coat allows you to prevent that from happening as well?
Are those designed particularly so that they don't shed anything, to your knowledge?
And again is the purpose for that a further precaution to prevent you from transferring trace evidence to the evidence?
And those being disposable, that also affects the next scene that might be processed because you are going to throw those sleeves away that might have gotten trace evidence on them that you don't see?
And I think you indicated that one of the reasons you wear those sleeves is because you can inadvertently perhaps brush something in the evidence and pick up something on your sleeve without knowing it?
And would you agree that the nature of hair and trace evidence is such that it doesn't necessarily or it can be removed from a surface fairly easily and it can be blown off by the wind?
When you were examining these items, you--as I understand it, you had moved to the evidence processing room?
And that is the same room where Dennis Fung and Andrea Mazzola had processed evidence that you had--I think you said you watched Mr. Yamauchi process some evidence?
--container. Now, when you go--went in to process this evidence, was there anybody else in there with you?
Do you try and avoid having other people wandering around while you are doing this to also prevent the same thing, that currents from people just walking, flapping their coats or whatever might cause some sort of disturbance in the trace evidence?
Some more than others. I mean, people lose approximately a hundred hairs a day, don't they?
So without even knowing it, your hair may be coming off at various times at places where you frequent?
One reason for wearing a hairnet might be to prevent your own hair from contaminating the evidence, correct?
If you don't wear some kind of protective gear over your head, then the possibility exists that hair might get on the evidence that you didn't intend it to and you may not even see it?
And what you've described in terms of the precautions you take, that is your common practice in every case that you work on, isn't it?
And that is very important when you are considering--when you are processing items for hair and trace evidence?
In all cases. Do you--did you take the same training that Dennis Fung and Andrea Mazzola took in terms of how to process evidence?
So it is part of your training program that when you are processing evidence for hair trace, and perhaps for any other type of evidence that you might be looking for, you wear lab coats, possibly disposable sleeves, gloves, you avoid a lot of people in the room, all those of precautions that you are trained to take?
And does that hold also for changing the butcher paper each time you look at an item? When you are done with it, you throw the paper--you look at the paper for trace evidence?
And if there is trace evidence, you take it and you pour it into the bag that has that piece of evidence, correct?
That is so if something falls off a piece of evidence, you want to make sure it doesn't get separated from that item?
It is also very common that things fall off of items, hair and trace evidence can fall off of items fairly easily?
It is not unusual at all when you take a clothing out to look at it that you are going to wind up with something on that paper that needs to be preserved?
Actually it is not as common as you are making it sound. If you are careful, you can keep things from falling down.
Okay. But there were--in many of the items that you examined here, there were extra bindles that had been put in the bags because items had come off of the evidence and someone had put them in a bindle to make sure they stayed with the evidence?
And that was true--I mean, how many bindles were there like that in just this case?
So in this case, is that an unusual--well, let me rephrase. When you ordinarily process Coroner's cases, do they, to your knowledge, save evidence that falls off of items?
Now, it is not usual at all that you get items from the Coroner's office that have bindles like--like in this case, is it?
So you have no way of knowing whether the Coroner's office routinely saves items--trace evidence that might fall off of evidence items?
On several other cases I have also received items such as the hair. They will put in physical evidence packets and they will state that the hair or blood scrapings was removed from the victim's shirt, jacket, under the sleeves, whatever.
Okay. Those are items that they specifically take off of--of a body or off of evidence, correct?
In terms of items that might fall off that they weren't intending to take off just by virtue of them inspecting an item, they don't routinely put those in bindles so that they are preserved, do they?
In your experience do you ever see bindles that are--that have written on them or indicated that this--this is debris that fell off an item when it was inspected?
Now, the bindles in this case that you saw had writing on it indicating that something occurred while DR Baden was present, correct?
And Gary Siglar, whose name is on those bindles, is a Coroner's employee, is he not?
Now, you indicated that you had seen Collin Yamauchi and perhaps others working on evidence items in this case earlier?
I remember seeing Collin handling the glove. I believe that was very shortly after the homicides.
Now, when he was handling the glove, was he moving it around looking at it--was he looking at it under a microscope?
And handling it and moving it around, turning it over, I assume, and looking everywhere he could.
He was minimally handling it. I remember it being on the table. I don't remember rough handling or bouncing around or anything.
Would it be fair to say that when the evidence started coming in on this particular case, that everybody in the lab knew about it?
Okay. And one of the reasons you were going into the evidence processing room was to see what was going on?
I'm responsible for taking care of the evidence processing room and I don't know at that time if I was going in because I had Coroner's evidence or what the situation was or if I was going in to straighten up.
Okay. Are you aware that there were two other cases with evidence in that room at the same time?
Do you know whether or not there was evidence in other cases from that room at the same time that Mr. Yamauchi was handling the glove?
That wouldn't be unusual, would it, to have evidence from more than one case in that room at the same time?
Now, I think you had indicated that you had also seen some work being done on the knit cap?
Was there--was this around the same time that you saw Mr. Yamauchi handling the glove?
That was at--how much difference in time was there? Was it like a week later or later in the day?
I remember seeing evidence. I can't tell you exactly what it was. It is just a generalization. I remember there was evidence in the room. People were working on various things. I don't remember specifics.
The hair kits that were in each of the envelopes contained several different kind of hair, did they not?
And that procedure involves collecting a substantial--a number of hairs from a person from different areas of the head; is it not?
And the reason for doing that--or is the reason for doing that so that you get a representative sample of hairs from a person's head?
Could we have the photographs that were put in yesterday, specifically exhibit 414?
Now, Miss Lewis, looking at this photograph, I note that there is the no. 75 at the top of it that is crossed off and the no. 83 is written in with your initials?
And that is--that is because you started out with a certain numbering system, and not realizing that you had some other items that you wanted to keep in sequence?
And the proper procedure to do that is cross out the number but not cross it out so badly that you can't read it, right?
And that is what the old number is and that is what the new number is, no doubt about it?
And is that the same procedure that you are taught at LAPD, that Dennis Fung and Andrea Mazzola had the same kind of training?
That is part of your training at LAPD in the SID unit, that that is the way make--if you are going to change something that is already written on an item, you do it that way?
Okay. Now, I want to ask you about the shirt, the bag that came from the Coroner's office. Is it accurate that the only identifying information on that bag was "Shirt"?
Is there anywhere on that bag any identifying information stating what case it is from?
Now, when you preserve evidence in a container like a bag, you write down information that identifies what case it is connected to, don't you?
Is it your understanding that the habit and practice at the Coroner's office is to not write down the identification of what case is involved for a particular container?
In the other Coroner's cases that you have worked on, is that a standard practice, that they will have clothing in a bag and not have any identification as to what case it came from?
On the brown paper bags that the clothing is physically in or initially in, no, it has no identification. On the white mesh bag which contains all the clothing for said--for one victim, yes, it does.
Okay. You would never, though, put a container that is unmarked as to a case inside another container? Isn't it your practice that you want to make sure what case an item goes with so in case it gets separated from the large bag you no where it came from?
When you put butcher paper down on the table to look at an item, what color is that paper?
Do you know what color paper the Coroner's office uses when they collect things or if they use paper?
In this case there was white paper. I don't know what their habit is, if it is always white.
Now, the white paper you are talking about, the bindles that are indicated with DR Baden's name on them?
Now, when you took the shirt out of the bag, it obviously had been stored wet, had it not?
And when--the proper procedure for packaging clothing that may be covered with blood or have a lot of moisture in it is to dry it first, correct?
So is it fair to say that when something has been put in a bag and mold grows on it, that it probably has not been preserved properly?
And you have no personal knowledge who took the shirt, who put it in the bag and who might have gotten in and out of the bag at any particular time until it got to you?
KEY QUOTENow, I think you said that you opened those bindles, the white bindles, because they were unusual? Did I hear that correctly?
And they were unusual this sense that you generally don't see items coming from the Coroner's office with bindles in them?
Let me show you People's no. 416. And could we zoom in right below where it says "77." Now, this is the bindle that indicates it came from under the shirt or the jacket?
Now, there is a date 6/22/94, 1430, and I believe that is a G.S., although I'm not sure.
It is an indication of some date. I misspoke. I had forgotten about that date on there.
Okay. And the other bindles have dates and initials on them indicating when DR Baden and Mr. Siglar put them in there?
And when you testified that there were no such dates on those, what had you been using to refresh their memory?
I was using my notes where I had just listed what the bindles said, not everybody who handled the bindles.
KEY QUOTEWhen you looked at them yesterday when you testified, when they were on the elmo and when they were handed to you, did you look at them carefully to see if your testimony was correct?
I looked at them for the question that I was asked to make sure that question was--my answer was correct for that specific question. I don't recall the question in regards to signature--I'm sorry, the date and time on it.
Okay. You don't remember being asked any indication as to when those bindles were made?
Yesterday did you use the phrase at some point you stopped resealing bags that you were preparing because you had gotten one surprise from the Coroner's office and there might have been others, words to this effect?
Are you referring to the fact that some separate evidence items were stored in the same bags?
Is one of the things that was a surprise to you that some items of clothing, separate items of clothing were stored in the same bags?
Objection. Objection. Exceeds the scope of expertise, foundation, and it calls for speculation.
I don't know the Coroner's office procedure for storing bags. I know Los Angeles SID's.
You realize that anytime you put two separate items in the same container you essentially are cross--if you find hair and trace evidence on either of those items, you can no longer say which one they came from, can you?
Yes, but if I've got socks laying on top of a pair of pants at the crime scene, there is also cross-contamination has already occurred between the two items, they could then be gathered and put into the same bag.
So if there is cross-contamination, for instance, from a pant leg touching a sock, you are not concerned about preserving the integrity of that sock and whatever trace evidence might be on it and it is okay to mix that up with the rest of the jeans?
Do you, as part of your routine, when you have shoes that might be evidence, keep them separate so that there is no cross-contamination from one shoe to the other?
Now, the shirt, when you took the shirt out of the bag--let me show you People's 417. Is that what it looked like right after you took it out of the bag?
And in the process of your looking at it, you stretched it out? Look at People's 418.
Have you ever used the technique with an items of clothing like that to put paper on the front and the back before it is rolled up so that items of evidence that might be on the top of the shirt don't get put on the bottom of the shirt or moved around?
Because the bags from the Coroner's office had--I had received them with multiple items in there and so I wanted to keep them in the fresh bags.
And did you ever check the bags from the Coroner's office to see what kind of debris was in those bags?
When I'm--the item gets taken out of the bag and then I have a visual inspection, and if I see anything on the--in the bag, I make sure it goes back into the new bag with the item.
If I see something in the bag, then it will be turned over and shaken or--I don't care for the word "Shaken" because I'm not like a salt and pepper shaker shaking something up, but it will be turned over to allow the item to fall out to remain with the clothing.
Isn't that a common experience, particularly with paper bags that have creases and seams in the bottom of them, for things to get caught there?
Those you might not be able to see and to get them out, you got to shake them out, right?
Do you recall whether you did that with any of the bags from the Coroner's office in this case?
It just stayed in the computer.
This is the only case I've seen that, yes.
It had spots of mold on it, yes.
I was using my notes where I had just listed what the bindles said, not everybody who handled the bindles.
You have no personal knowledge who took the shirt, who put it in the bag and who might have gotten in and out of the bag at any particular time until it got to you?