And do you have notes that actually describe the numbers and sizes of the swatches in this case?
And when you actually cut one of these swatches, do you make any sort of record of what you cut?
Yeah. Occasionally and in this case, I do a score mark over the swatch that I cut to--in the drawing.
Okay. Your Honor, I would like to have marked as exhibit 279 one of Mr. Yamauchi's notes in this case.
Mr. Yamauchi, I'd like to show you exhibit 278 for identification and see if you--is this the--
Are these the notes that you made with respect to documenting the sampling of the items in this case?
And just to go back to that again, giving us the evidence item numbers, could you tell us which evidence items you processed in the manner that you've just demonstrated to the jury for the first set of tests that you'll be discussing?
Could you give us the numbers of the evidence items that you processed on the morning of June 14th?
Okay. Again referring to my notes, the evidence item no. 52, 49, 50, 48, 47, and according to my notes, sampled between 10:00 and 11:00 approximately on the 14th of June, 1994.
Okay. Mr. Yamauchi, let's just--let's look at item 49 if you will. Could you just assist the jury in interpreting all the information that's in that horizontal row there starting with 114?
Well, 114 was--and it's in quotes because that's the way it was written on the coin envelope. The 49 above it was written in once I knew which item number it corresponded to, and then coin envelope and then in quotes 114, describing the coin envelope, and paper bindle and one of the paper opinions with, in quotes, no. 114, describing what was written on the paper bindle, and then there are six swatches drawn out; and then in the next column over, it says five and a half swatches, ample.
And does that horizontal row, does that also show where you tried to show how much you cut, which item you cut and how much you cut?
Okay. And looking at what appears to be 114C, the substrate control, what's the wording that you have to the right of that? What's that reflect?
Okay. Would you jump up one column and look at what's 117C or 52, the substrate control. What observation did you make about the color of that substrate control?
And so did you do that with each and every one of the stains and substrate controls that you sampled on June 14th? In other words, make that kind of documentation?
Yes. In my casework, I often times take general, very general color descriptions of what's there.
Okay. And how near to the actual size and shape of the swatches are your little sketches of those swatches?
Okay. How long did it take to complete the sampling process of these coin envelopes, 41--items 41, 42, 47, 48, 49 and 52?
Well, I listed in my notes that they were sampled between 10:00 and 11:00. So sometime within then.
And what did you do with each of these coin envelopes after you finished processing it in the way that you demonstrated for the jury?
Okay. Now, in terms of who had responsibility for those items at that point in time, who was responsible for them now that you had completed your sampling of them?
They'd be in I guess the custody of the person that was collecting them. That would be Dennis.
The person that collects the items, yes, generally speaking, is the person that's going to book the items.
So at this point in time, can you describe--you've mentioned something--you showed the jury how you unscrew and screw the cap on these microcentrifuge tubes. What were you putting them in?
It varies. Usually there's 16 to a row. I think these had--I would say approximately 32 for that particular rack.
And are those tubes--do they provide a safeguard against contamination if the seal is on them?
And did you have more than one tube open at a time in any of the processing of the evidence in this case?
After you processed the coin envelopes in the manner that you described, did you then turn your attention to the glove that Mr. Fung had talked to you about?
Umm, sometime in the morning or maybe the early afternoon. I'm not sure specifically.
Well, taking a look at it, I knew I was going to have to sample it in some way. So I had somebody come by and photograph it. As far as the handling specifically of the gloves, I put a clean piece of paper out and examined the gloves on top of the clean paper. Excuse me. The glove. Talking about no. 9.
No. 9? Now, where were the tubes, the centrifuge--the microcentrifuge tubes in the racks? Where were they when you began processing the glove?
The coin envelopes would have been in that same area that they were given to me at.
I seem to recollect working on the--the hard bench countertop that's just--it would be right to the side of the table that all the evidence was on.
When you say "Right to the side," can you give us a little better description of the relationship?
Well, it's kind of hard to without a picture. But let's say it would be on the same countertop that the clean paper is by.
Well, again, that's standard lab procedure to make sure you have--treat evidence in such a way that it won't contaminate with anything.
Okay. Will you describe--you mentioned you brought somebody over to photograph the glove?
I believe I tried to get John Taggard and might have been Mike Wilson that photographed it, one or the other.
Okay. The glove was laid out on the paper. And it really wasn't super obvious that it was--could have been soaked in blood or could have had a lot of blood. So I did what's called a phenolphthalein test. It's a presumptive test for the presence of blood.
Well, that's done by taking a clean cotton swab, moistening it with deionized water and allowing some of the stain that would be on the glove to transfer to this swab. From that point, chemicals are added to that swab, and these chemicals upon reacting positively with something that's most likely blood, will turn a pink color.
In each spot that I tested on that particular glove, there was a positive result.
Okay. What did you do after you got those seven presumptive positive results from the glove?
Well, I knew I needed to pick a spot to sample the glove. And one of the things we have problems with in PCR is, when you use leather in the testing, it's been documented that leather causes inhibition of the test. So it's often hard to get results when you use leather samples. So what I did was, I collected from a number of different areas, and two of them I took actual cuttings of the leather to--to see if I could get results, and to back myself up because I knew that leather doesn't always produce results, I also took a cutting from an area that was not made of leather, and that would be the lining area, as well as, I took one sample from an area by swatching in the same manner that was described to you out at the crime scenes where we use the cotton swatches to transfer the stain to the swatch and then analyze that swatch.
KEY QUOTEWell, in the process of trying to find an area that was free of any blood, I decided that, well, in this case, this glove seems to be covered with blood to a certain extent and I wasn't going to mess around and test all over the place to try to locate an area that may or may not have blood. I didn't want to manipulate that item any further at that point. So I chose at that time not to collect a control on this particular item.
Okay. And did you make notes in a drawing that reflected the areas that you sampled on the glove?
Now, Mr. Yamauchi, is this the sketch that you made at the same time you were conducting the sampling on the glove?
Okay. And in the lower left-hand corner, looks like there's a notched area and something that says initial "CY." Can you tell us what that is, what that represents?
Okay. And if we could move over to the right sketch a little bit, can you describe to the jury what's shown in the right-hand search of 280 for identification?
That would indicate the area where I spot-checked for a control as well as an area that I ended up sampling for testing.
Okay. If you would, you've got an "X" with an arrow to it that says "Spot check for control." That's one of the phenol areas?
And then I see a letter--is that a letter "D" where it says phenol and then sample cutting taken?
Okay. And then looks like the thumb area. Could you describe to the jury what that shows?
And the one, looks like it's inside the rear or inside the wrist on the back of the hand, that's area C?
And then can we go up to the next sketch there? You've got that described as backside of the glove. Can you describe to the jury what your notes mean in that?
Okay. On--on A, I took a cutting, and that also is phenol positive. And on D, that area down towards the right lower--lower right corner of the glove, that was the area that I sampled the stain by use of a cotton cloth swatch.
And I believe that's--you did that to try to avoid the inhibition problem that's well known?
I'm sorry. That's--yeah, I guess because I knew that that could potentially cause a problem. So I decided to sample in different ways, and that was why.
Okay. So--and you've labeled them A, B, C and D. Did those lettering follow the samples that you cut out or that you took from the glove when you did your processing in this case or your typing?
Okay. Now, up to this point, Mr. Yamauchi, you've described making a fitzco card processing the coin envelopes and the glove. At some point, did you come back to the fitzco card?
I left out a little bit here, Mr. Yamauchi. I'm sorry. When you made these cuttings from the glove, what did you do with them?
Okay. And how did you process them when you're doing all this sampling of the glove? Could you describe the sequence that you did them in, the samples?
Well, I'm not sure. But judging by my notes, I would have done it in the A, B, C, D order.
Okay. And each time--or would you describe what you did each time, how you put it in the tube?
Okay. For each particular area sampled, if, say, I used a cutting, I would have went through that process like I was cutting up the swatch. I would have used a sterile scalpel blade for that particular area and then manipulated the tube with that hand and used a scalpel blade to put the sample into the tube, just in the same way as I did with the cloth swatches a little earlier. And with collection of the cloth swatch, I--I would have done that by taking sterile water and a cloth swatch, moistening the cloth swatch with the water and rubbing it on the area of the glove that I wanted--intended to get a transfer and transfer some of this biological fluid on to that, and then I would have taken that swatch and put it into a microcentrifuge tube in the same manner, not allowing any of the tubes to be opened simultaneously.
Now, where was the processing of the glove done with respect to the fitzco card that's drying somewhere?
So you've got the fitzco card drying, everything in tubes and I believe you said you sampled the fitzco card last?
Could you tell us what you're looking at there and why you're so sure that you sampled it last?
In the same fashion as if it were an evidence item, all the same precautions being taken. It would be cut out with a sterile scalpel blade.
Okay. Now, I believe in some of your earlier discussions, was it impressed on you that there was a hurry to do this testing?
Based on what you knew, did you have an expectation what the outcome of these tests would be?
Sure. Based on the information that was made available to you, what did you expect the outcome would be?
I thought it would be an exclusion.
In this case, this glove seems to be covered with blood to a certain extent and I wasn't going to mess around and test all over the place to try to locate an area that may or may not have blood. I didn't want to manipulate that item any further at that point. So I chose at that time not to collect a control on this particular item.
Well, I knew I needed to pick a spot to sample the glove. And one of the things we have problems with in PCR is, when you use leather in the testing, it's been documented that leather causes inhibition of the test.
Leading, but let's go.