DNA analyst testifies in rape trial

By SYLVIA LIM

MANATEE - A jury today will hear closing arguments and then begin considering the fate of a man on trial on charges that he raped a 60-year-old woman two years ago.

Though a lab analyst testified that a DNA test connected Darrell L. Shafer to the victim, his attorney told a jury on Wednesday that the evidence may not be enough to convict him.

Prosecutors and Shafer's attorney questioned seven witnesses Wednesday, including the victim and a Florida Department of Law Enforcement crime lab analyst.

Shafer, 26, is on trial on charges of sexual battery, aggravated battery and home invasion. If he is convicted of sexual battery, he faces life in prison, according to court records.

While Assistant State Attorney Angel Colonneso painted a gruesome scene of a masked man entering the victim's home and raping her, Shafer's attorney, Mark Maynard, told jurors that investigators did not test other collected items for forensic evidence.

"The only evidence that ties Shafer to this case is DNA," Maynard said during his opening statement.

The victim told the jury that on the night of July 7, 2003, a man entered her home in the Saddle Creek Apartment complex, 5400 26th St. W., jumped on her bed and smothered her face with a pillow.

The man tied the woman's hands with an electrical cord cut from a grill before raping her, according to Shafer's arrest warrant.

After the rape, the man fetched a wet piece of clothing to clean her, the victim said. During the ordeal, she told the court she feared for her life.

"I didn't look at him," she said. "I thought if I were disagreeable, he could do something."

Her grandson, who was 16 years old at the time, told jurors he arrived home as the man was exiting through the apartment's front door. Because the apartment was dark, he said he did not get a good look at the man's face.

The victim was treated at Manatee Memorial Hospital.

Shafer, sometimes donning a pair of dark-rimmed reading glasses, scribbled notes on a yellow pad as the victim and her grandson recounted the night of the attack.

FDLE analyst Diane Hanson testified that DNA evidence collected from the victim as part of a rape kit linked Shafer to the rape.

Shafer's attorney emphasized the DNA results since detectives in the case could not find the defendant's fingerprints in the victim's home. The victim told jurors that the man who raped her wore "something rough" over his hands.

During his cross-examination, Maynard drilled Hanson on her credentials, testing methods and FDLE procedures in DNA testing. The attorney asked Hanson why the agency did not gather other DNA evidence from pillowcases, bedsheets and clothing from the victim's home.

If a DNA test done on the rape kit reveals a positive match to a suspect's, the agency does not test other evidence, Hanson said. The test was also not repeated.

"Normally, we would examine the (rape) kits first," Hanson said. "It's not a hard-and-fast rule. If there are no other circumstances, we generally stop there."

Shafer was charged with three other rapes between 2002 and 2003, including the rape of a pregnant woman who knew him, court records show.

Prosecutors declined to say Wednesday whether they will take those cases to trial.