Yes. The People call Gregory Matheson to the stand.
Gregory Matheson, called as a witness by the People, was sworn and testified as follows:
Please raise your right hand. You do solemnly swear that the testimony you may give in the cause now pending before this Court, shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God.
Please have a seat on the witness stand and state and spell your first and last names for the record.
I'm employed by the city of Los Angeles working for the Los Angeles Police Department Crime Laboratory. I am currently what is called a Chief Forensic Chemist 1 which is an assistant director of the laboratory.
Okay. And sir, in that capacity or in any other, are you part of any conspiracy in this case to frame the Defendant?
KEY QUOTEWell, that is a civil service class that it was assigned to that position a while back. It exists in two steps; the Chief Forensic Chemist 1, which is an assistant director position, and the Chief Forensic Chemist 2 which is the laboratory director.
All right. And how many Chief Forensic Chemists are there in the crime laboratory?
Okay. I'm going to get into your training and experience in a few moments, but did you perform some of the conventional serological testing on some of the biological evidence in this case?
All right. And also, did you participate in managing the sending of items out for analysis to outside laboratories?
All right. Now, do you have a degree that qualified you to become a criminalist at the Los Angeles Police Department?
Well, I have a degree in criminalistics from California State University at Long Beach.
And I want to ask you about some of the other courses that you took since then. Do you have your curriculum vitae in front of you?
The record should reflect that Mr. Matheson does have before him a ring binder with a number of pages in it.
Sir, since you graduated in 1977, have you taken a fairly large number of courses in furtherance of your training and experience as a criminalist?
At that point it depends on what you mean by "Courses." I have had a handful of what I would call formal training or courses, along with attendance in a number of seminars and meetings and that type of thing.
Okay. I just want to go through some of the courses and seminars that are pertinent to the issue of serology. And let's start with the 1982, two-week FBI class. What was that about?
Well, in 1982 I took a two-week course called buy chemical methods of blood stain analysis that was offered at the FBI academy in Quantico, Virginia. That was mainly about the electrophoretic determination of genetic marker types. It is the steps or the process that is used in what has been called in conventional serology to identify the types of enzymes that are present in the body.
Okay. Just so that we are defining some of these terms, when you say "Conventional serology," that is distinguished from what?
That term came around as DNA analysis in forensics started becoming possible or used within the field. In a way to define the difference, we started calling the systems and techniques that we had used for many years as conventional and the rest as being DNA.
And when you say "Electrophoretic techniques," we will get into this in some more detail further down the line, but can you just give us a simple definition?
Well, electrophoresis is a process or a technique whereby a gel is poured, sample of biological material is placed on the one end of it, an electrical current is passed through it and the end product is a sequence of bands that can be interpreted to tell what you type of blood you are looking at.
And were these techniques, the electrophoretic techniques and ABO type testing, around for a significant period prior to the use of DNA technology?
There was a symposium held that year which involved attendance by a large number of forensic scientists mainly in the California area. I did attend it; however, I was also one of the working groups that met with one of the committees for several months prior to that in preparation of the meeting. The area that I was involved in was standards and training.
The focus of that symposium which was to elicit what was the standard practice or the consensus of practice within the forensic community at that point in time.
Did this deal with any of the collection and preservation aspects or just the testing aspects?
And was there any product that was generated as a result of the symposium, such as a manual or pamphlet or publication?
There was kind of a loose-covered document that I don't know the number of pages. It is about a quarter of an inch thick.
All right. And did that cover the subjects of the collection, preservation and the conventional testing?
All right. Now, was a lot of focus placed at this serology symposium into the mechanics of how you actually collect a stain from a crime scene?
Okay. Has the actual mechanics of how you collect a stain been a controversial issue or a widely discussed issue in the forensic field?
Because it is a fairly basic process. Even in reviewing a number of forensic tests, there--texts, there is very little reference to that step. They talk about locating the stains and eventually then, you know, packaging and preserving them, but the actual collection is not addressed very often.
Now, going back to some of the courses that you took, in 1989 did you take, I guess, two classes at the University of New Haven, Connecticut?
Well, they were held at the university, however, they were--you know, it wasn't like a university course, but it was held at that facility.
Well, one of them dealt with the ABO typing of bone samples and the other one was an overview of DNA.
Well, that is--it is a fairly common what we call genetic marker. As a matter of fact, it is the genetic marker that most people are aware of. You are either a type a, type b, type o or type AB, and that is a system that hospitals usually use when they are cross-matching bloods for transfusions.
So one of these courses dealt with--was it just ABO typing of bones or also--or did it also deal with electrophoresis?
And was this course instructed by a leading advocate of using DNA technology in forensic cases?
Okay. Was the person that taught this course in favor of using DNA technology in a forensic setting?
Well, actually it was taught by several different people. They brought in several different speakers to talk on different subjects, but yes, most of the people that were there were there because they believe in the technology.
And was there any particular individual that is prominent in the forensic field that taught this course?
One of the people that was involved in both setting the course up and presenting it was a Dr. Henry Lee, which is the head of the Connecticut State crime laboratory.
KEY QUOTEWell, did he actually teach some of the courses--one of the courses that you attended?
Now, in January of 1990 did you take a two-week course relating to DNA technology in forensic cases?
That course was held at--in Denver, Colorado, at the Analytical Genetic Testing Center.
Well, it covered two weeks. The first week dealt with the technique I mentioned before, RFLP typing in general, the basic background to it, involved actually performing some of the tests. The second week focused a little bit more on the technique that was used by the FBI.
And then in June of 1990 did you attend some training at the University of New Haven Cetus Corporation?
Your Honor, I object at this point as being irrelevant and beyond this witness' expertise.
That was a course that was offered by the Cetus Corporation which I believe at the time was the manufacturer of the PCR kits that were being used for forensics, and it involved the theory and practice and techniques in PCR analysis, along with some hands-on, getting a chance to run the techniques ourselves.
Now, in addition to these courses that we just mentioned, did you attend seminars of the California association of criminalists?
Well, I became a member of the California association of criminalists in 1979 and attended every seminar I could go to from that time until now. I believe they are held twice a year and I think I have only missed three or four over that time period.
Normally two and a half days; full day Thursday and Friday and half day on Saturday.
Many times serology is one of the main topics of discussion, both in the papers that are given and outside of them.
Okay. Now, and you said that these seminars by the California association of criminalists are twice yearly?
And as a result of attending these seminars do you learn the practices that are standard within the criminalistics profession?
That is part of it. Like I said, the seminars have a wide range of topics from particular techniques that may be used in the future that are just becoming available to us, to hints and tips on how to do, you know, current techniques better and just generally kind of dealing with the--you know, the topic in general.
Are the forensic scientists who attend these seminars coming only from California or do they come from other places as well?
No, they can come from just about anywhere. As a matter of fact, our last meeting, which was held in the fall, was done in conjunction with the forensic science society from England and we had a number of attendees join us from England.
Okay. Now, is there also an organization known as the American Academy Of Forensic Sciences?
Well, they tend to--the actual papers or technical presentations are basically the same as a CAC meetings, the California Association Of Criminalists, in that they are about two and a half days. The meeting itself can run anywhere from six to eight days because there is an awful lot of ancillary type of activity that goes on.
And is that--are those seminars along the same line as the California association of criminalists or do they differ?
Well, in that they cover a lot of different areas of forensics, they are the same. They are significantly larger, though, because that is a national organization and it is composed of not just criminalists, but forensic pathologists, odontologists and dentists, and a lot of different areas in forensics, and each of these specialties are meetings, you know, at the same time in different areas of the same facility.
So when you attend one of these meetings, do you go to all of the presentations or just the ones that are involved in your area of specialty?
Well, you can't go to all of them because a lot of them are running at the same time. I try and not just stay with what I have spent most of my time with and that is serology. I like to attend all these that seem interesting or appropriate but will get out and get some exposure to some of the other areas.
And as a result of attending these meetings do you also get an idea of the standards and practices that are being used in the forensic community on a nationwide basis?
Now, you mentioned this manual that was generated from the serology symposium, but other than that, have you had the opportunity or have you had time to publish papers yourself while you have been working at the Los Angeles Police Department?
Well, normally an awful lot of the papers that appear in scientific journals and that type of thing deal with research, validating existing systems, bringing new systems on line, that type of thing. My interest has not been in research. I enjoy applying the technology. I have always enjoyed doing case work, and a mere fact of the fact that we are with the Los Angeles Police Department and out criminalistics laboratory has a very high case load, there is unfortunately a lot of crime in this city and it does keep us busy just doing case work. So it is a combination of the two things. I don't have a strong interest to get out there and push and do that and I enjoin doing case work and there is plenty of case work to do.
Anything that comes into the laboratory associated with a crime or incidents within the city of Los Angeles. It could range from--the type of case which the laboratory gets run the gamut from narcotics to serology cases associated with homicides and rapes to blood alcohol analysis, just about anything.
Let's turn a little bit to your professional career. When you were in school getting your degree in criminalistics, did you work for any law enforcement agencies?
My title was a community service aid and then it got changed to community service officer. Basically it was a student position, it was part-time during school and then full-time during vacations and holidays. I worked a couple of different assignments. I was with them for about five and a half years. Initially I was assigned to patrol where I would go out and assist with booking prisoners when they came in and taking burglary reports, simple things. Occasionally I would have to write parking ticket, that type of thing. I eventually, actually as soon as I could, got transferred out of that area into our identification unit because that interested me more, and in that unit I learned how to process a crime scene, fingerprint burglary scenes, photographed scenes, go out and fingerprint and photograph whatever type of crime scene that happened to come up.
Well, normally crime laboratories tend to exist only in the larger cities, the counties, state, you know, federal government, that type of thing. Small municipalities as a rule do not have crime labs. They have called what are called ident sections or identification sections. They focus in on evidence collection, fingerprinting and photography.
When you were working with the identification section at the Culver City Police Department, were the people that you were working with criminalists or did they have some other job classification?
Well, we are talking about a small department. The person that I worked directly with would be another civilian. It happened that the two people that I worked for, they were ident--identification technicians, they were both retired; one from the Los Angeles Police Department as a fingerprint person and another was retired from the L.A. County sheriffs as a fingerprint person.
Did they also do things like collect biological evidence or was it limited to fingerprints and the like?
No. If there was a reason, if there was a crime that involved biological stains or evidence, either they or I would, depending on who handled the particular scene.
So they were collecting biological evidence even though they were not criminalists?
Okay. Is that standard throughout the state in terms of the way law enforcement agencies or many law enforcement agencies collect biological evidence?
Well, sir, are you aware of the standard and practices in a variety of law enforcement agencies as a result of your participation in these various state and national organizations that you have testified to?
I am aware that the personnel that are used to perform different tests varies from agency to agency.
And do some agencies use criminalists, whereas other use technicians, identification technicians?
Yes, that is correct. I mean, in the case of the city of Los Angeles we have criminalists, we do not have I.D. techs or identification technicians. We use criminalists to collect that. As I mentioned, many smaller municipalities that don't have crime labs have their I.D. techs collect the evidence, and actually, there are some cities that have their own crime lab that also hire I.D. techs who are the ones that go out and process mainly the simple scenes, but process scenes.
Okay. Now, when did you first join the Los Angeles Police Department as a criminalist?
Now, when you first joined the Los Angeles Police Department in 1978, what was your first assignment?
Well, I was hired in as a criminalist 1 and I was assigned to the toxicology unit.
I worked toxicology from June of 1978 until I believe it was early January of 1980, so approximately 18 months.
Okay. After working toxicology I was transferred to what we call a special testing unit and in that unit I dealt with maintaining a couple of analytical instruments, running some of the more unique or unidentifiable drugs or narcotics, bomb debris analysis, poisons analysis, variety of different things.
So what does special testing unit do in terms of--I mean, do they just test anything and everything that is unknown or what?
Well, with the way our laboratory is laid out, the special testing unit has some specific assignments, such as any sort of bomb residue case, a poison case, that type of thing would go directly to that unit. Bottom line, that basically the people that work that unit get whatever doesn't fit into any of the other units. It is things that may require some sort of unique or special handling.
Actually it was a little longer. I believe it was from January of 1980 until I think it was August of `81, so that would be about 20 months.
All right. And where did you go after you were finished with your assignment in special testing?
Well, as a criminalist 2 or doing bench work would have been until I believe it was May of 1988 when I was promoted to what was called a crime 3 then which is our supervisor position.
Okay. Now, you used another term, you said "Bench work." is that the same as case work or different?
That is a term that is used for the person that is actually sitting working on the evidence doing the analysis is called bench work.
Okay. How long have you been a supervisor at the Los Angeles Police Department and the crime laboratory? How many years?
Actually I probably should have referred to my notes before. It was May of `89 when I was promoted, so it would be from May of `89 until October of `94 that I was a supervisor.
So when you were first a supervisor, were you supervising anything other than serology at first?
Well, my unit was rolling. I was also a member of one of our special field response teams that goes by the name of the forensic accident investigation team. That was formed while I was a Crim 2. Myself and two other criminalists were assigned to this. It was a special assignment to go out and collect evidence from specialized crime scenes, mainly those that were vehicular-related homicides, hit and runs, that type of thing. When I became a supervisor in May of `89, I was a supervisor then of serology plus of this team that I was on.
And when you initially became a supervisor and you were supervising this team in serology, did you still play an active role in the bench work that was going on in the unit?
All right. And in addition to that, did you also have any function in terms of reviewing reports and confirming results and the like?
Yes. As supervisor of the unit, one of your goals is to or jobs is to review the analytical notes that come out of the criminalists or the analysts that work in the units. Before a report can be submitted out, we want to have it reviewed by a supervisor and either signed as being complete and accurate or returned to the analyst for either correction or updating, whatever it would require.
Were you performing any function in terms of actually reading other people's electrophoresis plates or photographs of the plates?
Actually for the first, oh, three plus years of being supervisor of the unit, I was still doing case work. Obviously it wasn't at the same level as I was before, but I was still an analyst within the laboratory. In addition to that, these electrophoresis plates that I previously described with the band on it, they were always co-read, either the original person that did the run, plus somebody else that was following up on it. It didn't have to be a supervisor, it could be a co-worker. I continue, as a matter of fact to this date, still continue to occasionally co-read plates.
Okay. Now, approximately six months ago did your position within the crime laboratory change?
Well, in October of 1994 I was promoted to my current position of Chief Forensic Chemist 1 and I currently manage what's called the forensic analysis section of the crime laboratory, which includes not only serology, but other units, such as our trace analysis unit, chemical possessing unit, which does fingerprints in-house, our firearms unit, the vali unit and questioned documents.
Are you still performing work in terms of looking at other people's electrophoresis plates and co-reading them?
Occasionally. It is not near as often as it used to be obviously, but if somebody has some work that has been completed and they want it reviewed and there isn't anybody else available in the unit, for whatever reason, then they have come and asked if I would go back and do a co-reading on it.
Are there any plates that only you are qualified to read or that you are--or that you have to read in the laboratory?
There is one system that--called haptoglobin that I tend to read more than anything else.
Well, everybody has their own interest when it comes to a particular system or something within the unit. One of the criminalists that works the unit now is the one that runs them the most and she and I have worked together with it on the past, so I tend to read them for her when she has one of these come available. I haven't done it in I think it has probably been a month or month and a half, so either she is not running that system as often or somebody else now in the unit is training to co-read.
Now, with respect to some of the professional organizations that we asked about, is there also an organization called the American Board Of Criminalists?
That is an organization whose function--actually, sole function, is the certification of criminalists on a national basis.
I was involved in forming it. I believe it was in 1987 or `88, a group of people was called together and I was one of those that was invited to attend as a guest because I had some experience in certification, program a meeting held back in Chicago, and out of that meeting is eventually born the American Board Of Criminalistics, an incorporated nonprofit organization. And as I said, I was part of that original planning group of it, and then for the first two years of its existence, which I believe it was from February of `90 of `92, I sat as the vice-president of that organization.
When you say that this was involved in certifying criminalists, what does that involve?
Well, the process of certifying somebody is that you want to know or have some sort of indication that they possess the basic skills, you know, minimum skills and knowledge to be able to perform their job. And in criminalistics, there was a lacking of a system like this, particularly on a national basis, so what we did is in establishing this organization, gave the profession of criminalists throughout the country a body with which they could apply to, take a test, do proficiency testing, these types of things, to be able to demonstrate that they have the minimum criteria necessary to do this type of work.
And what type of showing does a person have to make or criminalist have to make in order to get this certification?
Well, there is actually a couple different levels of this certification process. To be in the American Board Of Criminalistics, to be what is called a diplomate, you have to have two years experience in forensic science. You have to pass a written examination that is on general criminalistics, not in any one particular field, and be working in the field, actively working in it.
Now, is there also an organization known as the California association--well, we talked about the California association of criminalists. You said you joined in 1979?
Did you hold any sort of positions within that organization, other than just being a member?
Well, in 1987 I was--I was made the chair of the certification committee. At that time the California association of criminalists was interested in starting the certification program, actually before the national effort began, and the first step toward doing that is putting together a committee. I was the first chair of that committee when it was formed, I believe it was either in January or February of 1987, and I held that position until the program was actually up and running and we were testing people and organizing certificates.
All right. And did your status in that organization change in approximately May of 1990?
Yes. In May of 1990 I was appointed to the position--a board of directors position called the regional director south. Our association is basically divided into north and south and I sat on that position on the board of directors for one year.
Yes, I did. Actually it is--you run for president elect. It is a three-year committee. The first year you are president elect you sit on the board, it is a board position, kind of learn the job. The second year is as president of the association. The third year then is the immediate past president where you still stay on the board, have an active position in it, but it gives you a chance to wind down and assist the current president.
Do you continue to serve on any committees or any organization within the California association of criminalists today?
At the moment I currently belong to two committees. One of then is the publication committee that is involved with putting together our newsletter, and the other is a financial review committee. I would have liked to have been more active on it, but I have been a little busy lately, so though I belong to them, I haven't been as active as I would like to be.
That is association that--I don't know what their current membership is, I think it is probably in the eighty to ninety range--that is made up of managers and supervisors of crime laboratories mainly in California, but we also have members from other states.
And while you were working in the serology section of the Los Angeles Police Department can you give us an estimation of approximately how many ABO types--ABO tests you performed during that period of time?
I would like to--I didn't memorize those numbers. I did make myself up a review chart of the type of tests and the quantities that I did. During the course of my--my career in serology--
Okay. In the area of ABO typing I estimated that I have done approximately 6500 of those type of tests.
KEY QUOTEOkay. And approximately how many electrophoresis tests have you performed on something called PGM subtype?
Now, I would like to ask you a little bit about crime scenes. Have you had any experience in actually going out to crime scenes during your professional career at the Los Angeles Police Department in processing crime scenes yourself?
My best guess is about 150. I didn't have real good statistics on that, but I think that is my best estimate. I think it is conservative.
All right. And when you attend these seminars at the California association of criminalists and the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, do they cover to some extent--do they cover crime scene investigation as some of the topics in those seminars?
Have you trained any people within the Los Angeles Police Department in terms of crime scene investigation?
Have you trained any people outside of the SID section in crime scene investigation techniques?
Well, I have been one of the instructors in a couple of our detective training courses that we offer. One of them is the sexual assault detective school. They obviously focus more on scenes and evidence collection relating to sexual assault. I also have taught for a couple of years in our homicide detective school, teaching them open the division's capabilities, SID's capability when it came to crime scene and simple evidence collection techniques. I also teach at a detective supervisor school and we touch lightly on field techniques.
When you say "Evidence collection technique," have you ever taught detectives how to collect a stain using LAPD's procedures?
Well, I--we want the detective to be able to have the capability of collecting biological stains, blood drops, that type of thing, if a criminalist isn't available. Though we do have an on-call system where a criminalist is available to be called out anytime of the day or night to assist with evidence collection, we are not always called. Sometimes the--the scene may only have one or two drops or one or two items. You don't feel it is necessary to call us, but that is still evidence that we want to have captured for later analysis, so we have been for I believe it is the last at least six or eight years, training homicide detectives mainly on the proper techniques for collecting biological evidence. We supply them with a blood collection kit, which is simply a file box with the tools that are necessary in it to collect those samples.
And are they taught how to, you know, take a control and use the distilled water and use the tweezers and the whole nine yards?
Yes. They are both shown in a demonstration form. We talk to them about it. It is demonstrated to them, and if time permits, we have them practice it within the class.
And are detectives in fact collecting biological evidence in the Los Angeles Police Department and submitting it to your laboratory for analysis?
Right now the unit is--they have a lead criminalist or what we call a criminalist 3 that is in charge of that unit. That person also works in another unit. Our trace supervisor is the immediate supervisor of them and then I manage it.
Now, why wasn't the field unit assigned to processing the evidence or collecting the evidence in this case?
The--deciding who ends up processing a scene is mainly a function of what time the call comes in. Like I mentioned a few minutes ago, we have people that are on call, criminalists that are on call 24 hours a day seven days a week. However, if a call comes in during working hours, normal working hours, which for our field unit is 7:30 to 4:00 Monday through Friday, rather than send the off watch person who may be up the night before or may be going out the following night, we send somebody from this field unit to do the evidence collection.
Is the field unit--are the people assigned to the field unit necessarily more experienced in crime scene processing than the individuals that are criminalists who are on rotation?
No, not necessarily. They can be. Our field unit consists only of Crim 2 individuals or those people that are advised to the point where they could handle a crime scene by themselves if they had to; however, they--we rotate people through that unit just like we rotate people through our off-watch on-call situation.
So if in this case the evidence shows that there was a Bronco search that occurred on the 14th during the daylight hours, why would the field unit not respond to that, as opposed to Mr. Fung and Andrea Mazzola?
Well, what we try and do is maintain some consistency throughout a particular case. If it is possible, the person that handled the scene, say, the night before or week before, if some sort of follow-up occurrence occurs, like a car search or an additional scene, we want the same people handling it that handled the original scene, so in that case that is why we do not send out somebody from the field unit.
KEY QUOTEWould you always have to--if you had two criminalists that responded to the first scene on day no. 1, will you always send the same two criminalists to the second scene or can just one or the other go?
We can--it depends on the circumstances. We can just send one of the team, or if neither one of them is available, we will go and send somebody from another part of the laboratory.
But is there any rule that if you use two on day one, you have to use the same two on day two?
All right. And typically within the Los Angeles Police Department Crime Laboratory do you always send two criminalists to investigate a crime scene?
Well, we make an evaluation as to the complexity of the scene. If it appears that it is going to be something very simple, maybe a simple car search or something that involves going to a tow yard and doing examination, there are times where we will send only one, but we believe two people can do a better job.
And was there ever any management decision that was made not to send Andrea Mazzola out to subsequent--certain subsequent scenes after the 14th?
As far as--I mean, there are obviously decisions made when somebody is sent or not sent, so in that case it was. There has never been a decision made that said she will not handle any more scenes, no.
So if on a subsequent scene, because of the complexity, you only needed one person, you would only send one person out?
Now, in this particular case, before testifying, have you watched some of the proceedings or heard some of the proceedings on television or on the radio?
And have you heard some of the testimony and seen some of the testimony related to the crime scene processing?
Mainly it was--it was a two-way thing. I was in--preparing you for what I was going to be testifying to, just as you would talk and tell me some of the areas that we were going to discuss. Normally it is just acquainting each of us with styles and with general topic areas that are going to be brought up during direct examination.
Did you also provide me with some instruction in terms of how ABO typing and electrophoresis is performed and certain technical topics such as that?
Yes. That was part of my comment about preparing you for it. There has been kind of a training process going on to a quaint both or to acquaint you with the techniques and the procedures that we use.
Have you also talked to any Defense lawyers and given--provided them information about the case as we have progressed?
And is there any rule within the LAPD crime laboratory with respect to talking to Defense lawyers? I mean how does that work?
The only rule that we have deals with discovery materials and that is, is that if items are going to be released to the Defense, that the Prosecution--Prosecutor's office is aware of it and that if it isn't your own, that the original criminalist is aware that this information is being provided. Beyond that there is no specific rules about who you can or cannot talk to with regards to a case.
And is it common for criminalists to speak with the person that is going to be calling them as a witness prior to getting on the witness stand and testifying?
Yes. It is not only common, it is preferred. We want to make sure that everybody understands what is going on, that you have a chance to discuss the issues.
Let's get a little bit into the issue of collecting evidence. First of all, what does it mean, from a criminalistics standpoint, to collect evidence at a crime scene?
Well, collection involves everything from documenting where the evidence is, describing the item of evidence that is being collected, the actual process of picking the evidence up off of the ground or off of whatever item it might happen to be, eventually packaging and describing it for a property report and then what is called booking it in or placing it into our property facility.
And when evidence is collected at the--by a criminalist at the Los Angeles Police Department Scientific Investigations Division, do you use some sort of form in the field for the purposes of doing that?
We have actually a couple Dennis Fung sets of forms, one of them that I believe is called a crime scene checklist and the other is a vehicle search checklist.
I wanted to show you Defense 1107 for identification and ask you some questions about that form.
I can see it. I can't read it, but I can see what it is and I recognize what it is.
And is this page typically filled out contemporaneously with the evidence collection or with certain phases of the evidence collection?
Well, in terms of the numbers and measures, are those done at the time that the measurements are actually done or shortly thereafter?
Yes, I would expect it to. The item number, along with a kind of brief description of what it is, such as red stain, coat, whatever it happens to be, along with the location of where it was found, the--you know, if it was on the street or on a bed, and then measurements in the room or location, if that is appropriate.
Now, are there any strict rules in the Los Angeles Police Department laboratory with respect to how this form is to be filled out?
And do you have a function now, in reviewing these forms, after they come back from the field?
Now, with respect to the photo i.d. Number column or i.d. Photo number, actually, excuse me, it just says, "I.d. Photo," what is that to be used for, generally?
For me I have always considered that a check box as to whether or not a photograph was taken of a particular item out at the scene. Sometimes it doesn't happen, either a photographer is not available or whatever, and that has been the place where I see, yes, a photo was taken, check it off.
I believe that there have been a couple people that use that as an indication of maybe an alternate location if there was a different number used or something. I am aware that people have different interpretations of what that column means.
And is there any requirement that you have to check off everything in that column?
My understanding of that, is that is a spot where you put your initials, the person that was involved in collecting the evidence.
Well, in the same way. If a--you have a couple of people out there and for some reason it may be important at some point to know who picked it up, it would be nice to have the initials of the person who was involved in it, but it is not necessarily required.
And if you are working in a team and both people saw a particular piece of evidence collected, is there any standard practice with respect to whether you say the person that physically picked it up, his initials should go in there, or both people's or how is that handled?
Okay. And what about the "Time" column? How do you use the "Time" column personally?
Normally you use the "Time" column to bracket things. If I am going to be--many times in the situation of picking up evidence, you go through and you locate the evidence, have it photographed. You put your numbers down and have it photographed with the numbers, do your measurements. You kind of work in groups of items and say a particular vicinity or locale at a scene. What I would do is record the time of the first item in a group that I pick up, rough guess as to what time it is, you know, look at my watch or something like that, and then I record the time of the last item in that group and just run a line between them. Sometimes I don't even record that information on this form. I have also been known to write it on the packaging or the envelope and then come back and fill that information in later.
So if you had ten items, you would know--in that particular group you would know when the first and the tenth were collected with some specificity?
Well, there are some people that record the time for each and every time that they pick up.
Okay. Now, from a serology standpoint, if you are talking about a stain that was collected at, let's say, eleven o'clock and then a second stain that was collected at 11:15, is there any forensic significance to knowing that one was at a 11:00 and the other one was at 11:15, generally?
Well, is there any significance from a serology standpoint to the time difference?
Okay. Now, within the forensic community, based upon your membership in these various organizations that you have discussed, are you aware of any consistent practice with respect to when you are working in a team investigating crime scenes whether you should signify who physically collected a particular piece of evidence, whether you should separate it out?
What about with respect to the portion of the list that says "Time" or notating the time? Does that appear to be a controversial or hot topic within the forensics community as to how you should fill that kind of information out?
What is the goal that is--the criminalist is trying to achieve in generating this paperwork? I mean, why do you even have to bother with it?
Well, the main reason is to be able to locate where the items came from. The most important piece of information that is on there or the sequence of information that exists on that form is the item number, the location where the item came from and a description of the item itself. That way you can track that item through the system. Many of the other items that are on there are nice to have, but the most important thing are those three items; the number, the location and a brief description of what it is.
So do those three items help you to place a particular piece of evidence back in the crime scene? In other words, figure out where it came from specifically?
Yes. Well, it relates back to the photo that was taken of it, so you can see a picture of how it was at the scene and gives you a location of, you know, in general where it was.
But if you have a photograph, is it absolutely necessary to even have this kind of information? I mean, isn't it duplicative to a certain extent?
Well, to a certain extent, but not completely. Photographs are not perfect in their depth or their perception as to where they are. It is still nice to have, you know, measurements to generally locate where it is in relation to other items in relation to a room or in relation to a victim, something like that.
Okay. Now, is there any rule within the Los Angeles Police Department as to whether this form can be filled out in pencil or pen or any other writing instrument?
If the form is a mess to the point that it is difficult to read, can the criminalist rewrite it?
There is no rule that says they can't rewrite or clarify certain areas of the document.
For instance, on this document, if you wanted to clean it up to mays it in numerical order and because some--some of the items appear to have been erased and written over, is there any rule that would prohibit you from doing that?
But we have gone through it, we have discussed it. You can get his perspective as a manager, but I think we have about covered it.
Just one question on this and we spent about an hour on it during the Defense case.
With respect to this type of form, if the criminalist wanted to clean this up because there are erasures or just to put things back in numerical order, would there be any rule against that?
There would be no rule with them rewriting it from an administrative point of view. I would like to have the original still thrown in with the notes, but if it made things clearer to rewrite things or reorder them, that would be fine.
But is there any written policy or oral policy on that one way or another, that you are aware of?
Now, you said that part of your function is to--currently as a supervisor is to review--thank you--crime scene identification checklists when they come back. Did you do that in this particular case? Did you review these?
Well, as the--when I was a supervisor of the trace and--or serology unit, I also at one point was given the trace unit. One of my duties did involve the review of field notes as it related to crime scenes. These were not reviewed prior to their photo identifying and distribution.
It was mainly a function of the hecticness at the time. We were involved both in this case and along with many other ones that go on constantly within the city. Mr. Fung does not work directly in our facility, he is in one of our satellite locations, and he had the notes with him for a period of time, and it was just a matter of circumstances that by the time we got copies of the original ones for distribution, they had not been reviewed at that point.
And who was supposed to actually review those while you were the trace supervisor? Was it supposed to be you personally or did you have someone under you?
The normal process would be the notes would be left in a box in our trace unit. They would be initially reviewed by our lead or the Crime 3 of the field unit and then he would give them to me with a recommendations of either filing them because they are complete or suggested things to advise the criminalist on when it came to maybe making them more complete prior to filing.
Did you have a Crime 3 of the trace unit at the time that this case was--at the time that Mr. Fung and Miss Mazzola went out and investigated the crime scenes?
It was--we were both doing it. He was--he was reviewing the majority of them, but I was also involved in that.
Well, it is kind of a two-fold purpose. One of them we are looking to see if they are complete or as complete as possible, that they have recorded things like field tests that were performed, that--mainly that they were as complete as if there were areas that were left undone, we would send them back to the criminalist, and if he had that information available, we would ask them to make them complete. If they didn't have it or they would have to just make guesses on the information, we didn't want that. At that point it becomes a training process in that we point out to them maybe you should put a little more detail here, you should make sure your measurements are all included, whatever it happened to be, so that the next time they went out in the field their notes would be more complete than they are currently are.
So on occasion you will ask someone to actually add something to the crime scene identification checklist, to add some additional information?
I will if I'm sure that they know that information, that they are absolutely positive, that they are not just putting something in there to fill it in.
Now, on the crime scene identification checklist in this case, there has been some testimony that Andrea Mazzola was placed on as the officer in charge on the Bundy list, her name.
Well, the OIC or officer in charge, just normally by habit it is the person who is on call. Officially that weekend Miss Mazzola was the criminalist on call. When Detective Headquarters Division, which is the section of our department that dispatches us, has a homicide scene where a criminalist is requested, they go to a sheet that we supply them on every Monday and Friday, and refer to the name of the criminalist that is available, and the name appearing on that sheet was ms. Mazzola. She then, because of the fact that she was a Crime 1, would call the Crime 3 that was responding to her, the supervisor, in this case, Mr. Fung. So it merely was an indication of the fact that it was her weekend on call and her name was placed on top.
Now, with respect to collecting evidence again, do you have a practice that when you are talking about biological evidence, of collecting representative samples?
To me a representative sample is--well, probably the best way to do it is by an example. If you have a blood trail that leads away from a scene or into a scene, whatever, if you have a blood trail that consists of thirty or forty drops that goes on for a block or two, it would be unnecessary and inappropriate to pick up every single drop of blood along that trail, because you can tell by looking at it that it is a continuous trail being dropped by the same person. What we would like to see, rather than picking up all forty of them and spending the time doing that, is to pick up what we call a representative sample of that trail, a blood sample from the beginning, maybe one or two in the middle, depending on how long it is, or more, and one from the end. I would also expect somebody that is doing a trail like that to collect any sample that appeared out of place or not consistent with the trail. That is my definition of what a representative sample from a crime scene is.
And what about in a situation as in a car like the Bronco in this case? Do you have to collect every last stain in there or do you take a sample of them? How do you do it?
Well, it depends on the quantity of blood that is present. If there are a couple of stains that are grouped together, then I would say, no, you probably are not going to collect every single one of them. I would expect that in doing a car search you would pick up samples from different areas within the vehicle that represent the possibility of different blood samples coming from different individuals.
And what is the purpose of taking representative samples in situations like the ones you have talked about, as opposed to just collecting every last stain that is there?
Well, we deal with reality when it comes to resources. We have only a certain number of people that are available to collect evidence and a certain number of people to analyze evidence and at some point you have to be practical, you have to decide that you are spending too much time picking up every one of these 20 samples where that time could be better spent evaluating other parts of the scene, getting the samples packaged and ready to go. And then ultimately, when it comes to the serology unit, they are not going to analyze all of those items as a rule anyway, they are going to have relied on the person at the scene to pick up the best samples, the ones that are most representative of the crime and the people that were involved and it is the best utilization of the resources so that we can get as much provided for the people of Los Angeles as we can with the resources that we have.
Can you Judge how well a criminalist has done in terms of processing or investigating a crime scene with biological evidence by figuring out the quantity of stains that he or she collected?
No. We have had some people that collect very few but always seem to find the most probative sample, and we have had people in the past that collect many, many samples, but don't always give us the best information.
Ones that answer the questions, ones that if there is multiple people bleeding at a scene, that we are getting blood from multiple people and not just from one. Whatever is necessary to get the most appropriate or the best information out of the evidence that is there left at the scene.
Now, is this idea of using selectivity in collecting evidence one that is discussed in some forensic science literature?
And specifically, did you look at the discussion of this idea in Henry Lee's book on crime scene identification, the one that I always refer to as Henry Lee child's edition?
I have seen that information in his book, yes, that you need to be selective in the samples that you collect.
And I would like to just show you one portion of this book and see whether you have taken a look at it. It just has big print. That is the big print book. You recognize it?
Referring to the size of the print, big print. It was my idea of a joke, but anyway.
And directing your attention to page 79, the first full paragraph, maybe you could just--have you considered that paragraph? Have you read that before?
Maybe you could just read what Dr. Lee says about collecting evidence where it starts "Recognition" and--well, maybe just starting there through the rest of the paragraph.
"Recognition of evidence involves selectivity and a general understanding of logic of crime scene. If all objects at the scene are collected and submitted to a forensic laboratory for further analysis, the forensic facility will be overwhelmed. If critical evidence is omitted or improperly preserved, the use of sophisticated equipment cannot salvage the investigation, hence correct crime scene search and collection methods are of paramount importance."
So basically it is a balancing act between not wanting to overwhelm the laboratory with too much and not wanting to miss the relevant evidence?
Now, with respect to the Bronco--well, I will get into that later. Have you heard some testimony to the effect that in this particular case that there were five stains at Bundy location, all of which were collected, whereas there were three stains at the Rockingham location, a, b and c, that were not collected?
And is there, from a forensic science standpoint, in terms of crime scene identification, based upon your understanding of the evidence in this case, any reason for that?
Well, in the case of the items that were collected from Bundy, that was the crime scene. We had two victims there and there were blood droplets that appeared to be inconsistent with having come from either of the victims, so they would indicate somebody else had been present at that location. At that point it made sense to collect as much as possible of that, keeping in mind what I said before, if it had been extremely long I would have expected them not to collect all of them but to collect a good representative sample of what we have there as far as the blood goes. As far as the other location at Rockingham, that was not a crime scene, it was another location that may or may not have been involved, and they used a little bit more selectivity there, collecting a stain at the beginning, at the end, and leaving some of the ones in between in place.
Your understanding is that there was no body or evidence that a crime actually occurred at that location?
Is it your understanding that there was no body or evidence that a crime was actually committed at that particular location?
Now, did you also hear some evidence to the effect of a--I'm not sure if it was triangular, but a little corner piece of paper that was in the area of the entrance to the caged-off area not having been collected?
The area that we are talking about, as far as this crime scene goes, is fairly limited in size and not like--again, using an example, if the crime had occurred in an alley where there was a lot of debris, a lot of trash around, then some selectivity should have been done. You are not going to collect every bit of paper, every bit of trash that is in an alley. This particular area, though, was smaller, I assume had some maintenance done on it with some regularity, possibly cleaning up. A piece of paper in that location kind of stands out as being potentially involved somehow, and had the criminalist been aware of it existence, should have collected it.
Okay. And could the non--could the failure to collect that item have in any way affected any of the other biological evidence, some of which you tested in this case?
Maybe we can just get a picture. I'm sorry. While they are looking for that, let me go on to another topic and then we will come back to it.
Does the Los Angeles Police Department use plastic baggies or plastic bags for the purposes of putting the wet swatches until they have had an opportunity to dry them?
The plastic baggies are used to transport the evidence, yes, until they can be taken back to the laboratory, opened up and allowed to dry.
Well, that is the one that I learned pushing 17 years ago, so it has been in use at least that long.
And during the 13 or so years that you were involved in the serology, was that--was that right, was it approximately 13?
What affect, if any, did you observe on that collection technique on the evidence that you were actually testing?
Well, considering it was the technique that was used and it was the standard technique in our laboratory, and we would with regularity analyze evidence items that would give us good typeable or identifiable results, I would have to say that the use of that technique was appropriate and effective for bringing samples into the laboratory for analysis.
And during the 13 or so years that you were in serology, did you notice any particular problems in terms of evidence being degraded to the point where you couldn't get results?
Well, there is not an ongoing problem at all with degradation that I can relate back to the bags. Occasionally we would have a piece of evidence come through that had been allowed to stay in the bag, that is very inappropriate, and that would show us problems with that evidence.
If the person forgets to take it out, if they were not properly trained. That would happen sometimes with the detectives. It is just is a situation that would occur, though very rarely.
And in those instances where it was not taken out of the bag to dry for an extended period--well, when you say "Extended" what do you mean?
I mean as far as ultimate packaging, it then gets put on a shelf and is left anywhere from many days to months.
Normally they were degraded. You won't get false results; you would just get no results.
Well, except for a very specific situation, degradation of a sample doesn't change the type to another type; it just makes it so you don't get no information at all.
So when you say "No information," when you do your tests what do you come up with?
So in that particular instance, if the perpetrator's blood has in fact been lifted from a crime scene or a crime location and the results have been degraded to the point where you don't get any information, would that benefit the perpetrator?
Would that cause the perpetrator to be falsely included as a possible donor of the stain?
No, there is no information there at all; it just wouldn't provide any forensic information.
Okay. Now, let me just go back to this photograph. I would like to mark this photograph as People's 205 for identification of what appears to be the little piece of paper. I think it is depicted in some other photographs.
Mr. Matheson, I would like to show you 205. Is this your understanding of the piece of paper that we just questioned you about?
All right. And is this the piece of paper you said that would you have collected if you had been out at the crime scene?
Assuming it hadn't been covered over by a blanket or some other item and you had seen it?
Now, is this the kind of thing where there is a hard and fast rule that you should collect it or is this the kind of thing about which reasonable forensic scientists could differ? I mean, how would you characterize it?
When it comes to what to collect, there are very few hard and fast rules. That is what is acquired with experience, the mental picture of what you collect and what you don't collect. So far as a hard and fast rule whether or not somebody should collect it or--or told to collect it by a manual, no, that doesn't exist.
Okay. And in your estimation, Mr. Matheson, if this particular piece of paper were located in an area where there was a fairly extensive pooling of the victim's blood, would this be the kind of evidence that you would want to test for biological evidence showing the victim's blood type?
I don't believe I would recommend this particular item to be tested for the biological evidence on it, particularly in light of other evidence that was collected.
Why would you not recommend that that be collected--tested for biological evidence?
Why would you recommend that that piece of biological evidence or the biological evidence on it not be tested further for genetic markers?
Like I just mentioned, we have to look at the whole scene and we do have other items of biological evidence that provide information as to what possibly occurred. This particular one being found in close proximity to the victim, being heavily blood-stained, at some point we do have to make some assumptions and the assumption would be that the blood that is present on that is coming from the victim herself. At some point, if it really seemed necessary, or if there was a lot of other evidence in the case, we may want to go after and analyze some of the individual drops, but it would be a low priority when it comes to that.
I just wanted to show one of the overall photographs of the crime scene that has already been marked.
It is 43-d, and I guess this is--it is a bloody photograph, but--so the Court might want to cut the feed.
Sir, showing you what has been previously marked as People's 43-d, in this area of the pooling of the blood, how much, if any, of that blood on the sidewalk--it is not a sidewalk--in this walkway should be tested?
On that particular location very little of that blood--it is--common sense does come into play when you are picking and choosing which items to analyze or which items to collect, and common sense would tell you that by far, if not all of the blood that is visible in that picture is coming from the victim herself. I would want at least one sample or item of that blood to be collected as a standard of the victim, but--
And if the evidence showed that the piece of paper were found in what would be the upper right-hand portion of the photograph, would that location be consistent with the answer that you previously gave about why you would not want to test that necessarily for biological evidence?
Is there anything about the photograph and the placement of the object that would relate to your answer previously given as to testing the piece of paper for biological evidence?
Well, given the location of that piece of paper and the way it is heavily stained, I wouldn't say that we would never test it, but it would be a very low priority.
Now, getting back to the issue of collecting stains, have you looked at the Los Angeles Police Department manual, specifically section 525.2, as to booking of biological evidence?
I--yes, I have. I have looked at a number of manual references. I would like to make sure that the one you are talking about is the one I'm thinking of.
Sir, showing you a section of the Los Angeles Police Department manual, do you recognize that?
And does that state in the second sentence that "Plastic containers or plastic wrap shall not be used as a packaging material"?
Well, the--the operative term there is "Packaging." We teach an inconsistency with the manual at that paint and say that biological evidence should never be stored or packaged for permanent storage in plastic.
When the items are submitted to our property division for storage until such time they are analyzed.
Okay. I will get into that a little bit more later. So in terms of the usage of plastic bags for transporting a stain from the scene to the laboratory when it is dried, within the forensic science community and among serologists, is that one acceptable technique for collecting a stain?
Now, does the Los Angeles Police Department--let me just ask you another question about the manual first. Is this manual, the manual provisions dealing with the booking of evidence, are they up to date?
A perfect example is, is we currently have within part of SID a property room that is called the evidence control unit and we have a courier system which are light-duty officers that travel throughout the city at night collecting evidence from the different stations and bringing them down to our evidence control unit for final storage. Both of these functions have been in existence for at least, well, I believe two to three years, one of them longer than that, and there is no reference to either one of them that I am aware of in the manual.
In other words, there is no reference to this new evidence control unit that you have at SID in the manual?
Okay. And if a piece evidence is collected from a crime scene, biological evidence, in a manner that is forensically accepted, but the manual provisions have not been updated in such a way so as to authorize that particular collection, would it affect the outcome of the test?
Well, first off, I would rather they followed the proper procedure rather than following the manual.
If that is the way that we are doing something, then it is better to use a procedure that is going to give you the best results than a reference in the manual that may be outdated.
Now, with respect to the crime scene truck, is there a refrigerator in the crime scene truck?
Mainly it is chemicals, particularly chemicals that we use for field spot tests.
What about spillage? Is there any issue concerning spillage of these chemicals on to the biological evidence?
Well, ultimately that could be a problem, but we don't have a lot of spillage in them, but we do carry chemicals in there.
Now, is there any rule that you are supposed to use the refrigerator when you are collecting a stain?
What about with respect to the whole blood? When whole blood is collected and a criminalist comes into possession of it, does that whole blood that is taken as a reference sample have some preservative in it?
I would just like to show you what has been previously marked as Defense exhibit 11--1111--excuse me, 1112, and 1124 for identification, two purple-topped tubes. Do you recognize those items?
The color of the top of any tube indicates the preservative or anticoagulant that is present inside of the tube. Purple, that happens to pertain to something that goes by the initials of EDTA.
It--I'm not sure if it is just an anticoagulant or if it is an anticoagulant preservative, but it helps the blood to stay in such a position that it is available or typing.
Is it helpful when you have EDTA to refrigerate that reference sample immediately?
How long can you keep the purple-topped tube out or should you keep it out before you refrigerate it?
I don't know if I know of any particular, you know, specific time frame. I would like--personally I would like it to get into a refrigerator as soon as it is possible. However, I do know that we get legitimate results if it is not placed to a refrigerator as soon as possible, so I can't give a specific time frame on that.
What happens if you get a reference sample from a living victim or a living Defendant--the Defendant has to be living--and the activity from the tube is lost genetic activity?
Well in that situation that creates a little bit more paperwork, I'm sure, but the source of that blood is still available. We can get additional tubes.
And what is the effect therefore if the genetic activity is lost from one of these tubes?
Well, if it is lost, then the information from that particular tube is no longer available to us; however, if we can get an additional sample from that individual, the results would be exactly the same as from the first tube.
And what if you couldn't get an additional sample from the individual? Would you get a false inclusive as a result of the blood vial having degraded?
No. You wouldn't get a result. There would be nothing to compare the information from your evidence items to compare it to.
Well, that is similar to the explanation that you previously gave when we were discussing the stain taken from a crime scene?
That's correct, in that if you lose the information, there isn't anything there to compare it to. You do not make then erroneous comparisons; inclusions or exclusions.
And in this particular case were you able to test and get results from the reference sample that came from the Defendant?
All right. The person whose cellular telephone went off is ordered to immediately surrender that telephone.
If I don't get a response from anybody, everybody is going to be searched in and out of the courtroom for the presence of cellular telephones and pagers. We have had number problems with this. We have disrupted these proceedings six times already.
I don't want to have to order the bailiffs to search each individual person, so the person with the cellular phone--
All right. The bailiffs are ordered to search each individual entering the courtroom. No pagers, cellular telephones, any noise devices may not be allowed in the courtroom from this point hence. All right. We will be in recess, one o'clock.
And sir, in that capacity or in any other, are you part of any conspiracy in this case to frame the Defendant?
No, I am not.
In the area of ABO typing I estimated that I have done approximately 6500 of those type of tests.
One of the people that was involved in both setting the course up and presenting it was a Dr. Henry Lee, which is the head of the Connecticut State crime laboratory.
What we try and do is maintain some consistency throughout a particular case. If it is possible, the person that handled the scene, say, the night before or week before, if some sort of follow-up occurrence occurs, like a car search or an additional scene, we want the same people handling it that handled the original scene.