📄 Redirect examination of Douglas Deedrick (part 2) — Thursday, September 14, 1995
Address:
C:\DEPT103\CRIMINAL\1995\SEP\14\REDIRECT-EXAMINATION-OF-DOUGLA.DOC
TRIAL
▲ Day 154 of 167

Redirect examination of Douglas Deedrick (part 2)

Witness: Douglas Deedrick
Examiner: Marcia Clark
Called by: Prosecution • Date: Thursday, September 14, 1995 • Utterances: 17
Marcia Clark conducts a brief redirect of FBI hair and fiber expert Douglas Deedrick, focusing on two points raised during cross: the difference between fabric impressions and shoeprints, and the standard practice of comparing bloody fingerprints to inked (not bloody) reference prints. The fingerprint analogy was clearly intended to preempt any defense argument that imprint comparisons require identical substrates.
1 THE COURT:

All right. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Please be seated. All right. Let the record reflect we have been rejoined by all the members of our jury panel. Mr. Deedrick, would you resume the witness stand, please. And good afternoon again, Mr. Deedrick. Miss Clark, you had a couple more questions?

2 MS. CLARK:

Yes. Thank you, your Honor. Very briefly.

3 MS. CLARK:

Mr. Deedrick, we asked you--you were asked a little bit on cross-examination about whether an imprint could have been a shoeprint on the jeans. You recall that question?

4 MR. DEEDRICK:

I do, yes.

5 MS. CLARK:

I take it by some of your answers that you have seen shoeprints before?

6 MR. DEEDRICK:

I have, plenty.

7 MS. CLARK:

In your experience, sir, is there a difference, based on what you have seen in the past, between the nature of a fabric impression and a shoeprint impression?

8 MR. DEEDRICK:

Well, fabric impressions are often a little more hazy, because it is soft, it doesn't leave a very sharp line, sharp indication, like a hard surface would.

KEY QUOTE
9 MS. CLARK:

Okay. Such as a shoe?

10 MR. DEEDRICK:

Shoe imprint, outline of any hard item, but shoes in particular.

11 MS. CLARK:

Now, is the science--you talked a little bit about various kind of imprint analysis, you talked about firearms identification, striations on a bullet and fingerprints. Is the science of imprint analysis an old science, sir?

12 MR. DEEDRICK:

Well, it has been around as long as fingerprinting and that has been a while.

13 MS. CLARK:

Okay. And when you find, for example, a bloody fingerprint at a crime scene, you have a suspect, do you require the suspect to make his fingerprint in blood before you compare those fingerprints?

14 MR. DEEDRICK:

No, they are made in ink. They are inked prints.

KEY QUOTE
15 MS. CLARK:

So even when you have a bloody fingerprint, you compare that fingerprint in blood to a print taken from the suspect?

KEY QUOTE
16 MR. DEEDRICK:

Right. That is standard practice.

17 MS. CLARK:

I have nothing further.

Temperature

procedural

Key Quotes (3)

Douglas Deedrick
fabric impressions are often a little more hazy, because it is soft, it doesn't leave a very sharp line, sharp indication, like a hard surface would.
Distinguishes fabric impressions from shoeprints, addressing cross-examination suggestion that the jeans imprint could have been a shoe.
Douglas Deedrick
No, they are made in ink. They are inked prints.
Establishes that forensic comparison does not require the reference sample to match the crime scene sample's medium — undermining any defense theory that imprint comparisons are invalid without identical conditions.
Marcia Clark
So even when you have a bloody fingerprint, you compare that fingerprint in blood to a print taken from the suspect?
Drives home the analogy to legitimate forensic practice, rehabilitating Deedrick's methodology.

Evidence (1)

Informal
Jeans with possible fabric or shoeprint impression, discussed during prior cross-examination
discussed informally

Notable Exchanges (1)

Marcia ClarkDouglas Deedrick
Clark walks Deedrick through the fingerprint analogy — bloody crime scene prints compared to inked reference prints — to establish that forensic imprint comparison does not require matching substrates.
strategic

Objections

None recorded
Proceeding 7678 • 17 utterances • Prosecution witness
Criminal Trial
Department 103
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📂 SEP 14, 1995 📄 Redirect examination of Dougla
SEP 14, 1995 KRT DvH TD