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Please see our “Did You Know?” section toward the end of this issue. Volume 52 , September 25, 2007 As you can see, we have given The DNA Informant a new look. The content is still the same: recent news stories, new and ongoing cases involving the use of DNA evidence and our Did You Know section. The new format will give you a brief overview of the stories. For details please follow the link after each story. Source: USA Today California - The state has entered 295,000 DNA samples into its database since July, officials said Monday, eliminating a backlog that once numbered nearly 400,000. Source: San Francisco Chronicle Washington - Gov. Christine Gregoire is recommending changes to how the state tracks convicted sex offenders, including requiring all to have DNA on file with police. The governor's recommendations include requiring DNA from all sex offenders to be filed with police; increasing the electronic monitoring of sex offenders; keeping better track of where sex offenders live, even Level 1 sex offenders, which are considered the least likely to re-offend. Source: The Seattle Times North Carolina - Arthur Eisenberg, director of the DNA Identity Laboratory at the University of North Texas Health Science Center said that more scientists are needed to help solve the “Silent Mass Disaster” of an estimated 40,000 unidentified homicide victims in the United States. He made his comments at Western Carolina University during a lecture about forensic research along with Leonard Klevan, president of the applied markets division for Applied Biosystems of Applera Corp. Both experts encouraged WCU to get into the fast-growing field of DNA science with more programs and research. Source: Asheville Citizen-Times New and Ongoing Stories Involving the Use of DNA Evidence Joseph Barbour, 19, faces charges in connection with two vehicle burglaries, two residential burglaries, grand theft, petit theft, and fraudulent use of a credit card that was stolen during one of the burglaries. Source: Florida Today Maryland - Prosecutors dropped all charges against a Baltimore man who had been held in the rape and assault of a 59-year-old Roland Park woman last month. Charges of rape, armed robbery and conspiracy against Chaz Ricks, 20, were dismissed after prosecutors learned that DNA evidence collected at the crime scene did not match Ricks. Source: Baltimore Sun Texas - A DNA test requested by a man convicted of aggravated sexual assault in 1990 reaffirmed his guilt, the Dallas County district attorney said Friday. Darryl Patrick Goggans filed a motion for post-conviction DNA testing in 2003, which was opposed by the district attorney's office last year. The trial court denied DNA testing, but that decision was overturned by the Dallas Court of Appeals. Source: Houston Chronicle Ohio - A Columbus man has admitted to killing an Ohio State freshman in a slaying that stunned the campus 13 years ago. Jonathan Gravely pleaded guilty to aggravated murder and kidnapping in the death of 18-year-old Stephanie Hummer in 1994. Police found their suspect when Gravely submitted a DNA sample to a crime database in June 2005 because of a 2003 felony conviction for failure to pay child support. Source: The Cincinnati Post Missouri - A convicted serial rapist serving consecutive life sentences for what a judge called “vile and despicable acts” has been linked by DNA to another attack. Jackson County prosecutors announced the new charges Thursday against Kevin L. Hayslett. Source: The Kansas City Star Connecticut - A DNA match has led to the arrest of a suspect in the rape of a mentally retarded woman eight years ago. Stephen White, 43, of Stratford, was arrested after DNA matched him to the 1999 break-in and sexual assault of the woman in her Stratford home. Source: Newsday Massachusetts - Forensic evidence has helped police make an arrest more than one year after a repeat sex offender allegedly assaulted a 6-year-old boy in a local hotel swimming pool's locker room. Police arrested John Cox, 40, of Waltham at his Waltham workplace on a child rape charge after the Massachusetts State Police Crime Lab matched forensic evidence at the Hyannis crime scene to his DNA. Source: Cape Cod Times New York - DNA evidence was used to link parolee Ronald L. Vrooman, 39 to the death of a Rochester woman 14 years ago, police said. He pleaded not guilty in City Court to intentional second-degree murder in the slaying of Karen Marie Turtu, 32, who was found dead behind 100 Lake Ave. on Feb. 25, 1993. Source: Rochester Democrat and Chronicle Ohio - Demond D. Anderson is charged with armed bank robbery in connection with the Nov. 29, 2006, robbery of Farmers National Bank in Warren. Police say Anderson was identified as a suspect through DNA samples stored CODIS, which were compared against saliva found in a van police say was used by the men to get away. Source: Tribue Chronicle Virginia - In an ongoing investigation, DNA samples taken from an unsolved rape in Waynesboro 10 years ago have been linked to serial rape suspect Nathan Antonio Washington, according to court records obtained Thursday. Authorities charged Washington, 40, a Charlottesville grocery store clerk, last month with two assaults in a series of area rapes. Source: The News Virginian California — Roger Tillman, 56, has been arrested in a decades-old rape and murder case after a new test of DNA found at the scene connected him to the crime, officials said. He was set to be arraigned Tuesday in the slaying of Mary Drew, 72, who was found dead in her room at a board-and-care home on May 6, 1987 Source: San Jose Mercury News Arizona - Mark Goudeau, a 43-year-old former construction worker and parolee was convicted on 19 charges stemming from an attack on two sisters and still faces trial on 74 other criminal charges, including nine murder counts, from crimes that the police have attributed to the Baseline Killer. Source: The New York Times Illinois - An unlikely mixture of old DNA evidence and new technology led police to Timothy Krajcir, 62. He was arrested for two separate murders. The victims were Susan Schumake and Deborah Sheppard. Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch Massachusetts – Collins Thompkins Jr., 30, who was serving a prison sentence for kidnapping and robbery was charged yesterday with a forcible child rape and armed robbery 9 years ago in Worcester, based on what a prosecutor said was a DNA match linking the suspect to the crime. Source: Worcester Telegram & Gazette News Connecticut - Bridgeport police say DNA has linked Forty-one-year-old Victor Smith, who was awaiting trial on rape charges in Hartford, to a 1990 Bridgeport rape case. Source: WTNH Texas – “DNA testing done by the defense – not the prosecution – links Jose Alberto Felix to the kidnapping and slaying of Dallas restaurateur Oscar Sanchez, according to testimony Tuesday.” Source: The Dallas Morning News Kentucky - Trevor Devon Johnson, 40, of Georgetown, admitted to raping two women in 1993 during a court appearance Friday in Fayette Circuit Court. Prosecutors said Johnson was matched to the attacks after his DNA was entered into a national database after a 2003 sexual abuse conviction in Scott County. Source: Lexington Herald-Leader Illinois - Carlos Martinez Lopez, 24, of Aurora faces aggravated criminal sexual assault, criminal sexual assault, and aggravated criminal sexual-abuse charges in the Dec. 21, 2002, armed attack on a 32-year-old woman in a St. Charles parking lot. A 2005 felony burglary conviction required Lopez to submit a DNA sample. Although investigators had a match last year, police could not find Lopez because he had been deported twice to Mexico. He returned illegally to Aurora to live with his mother, Monaco said. In July, Aurora police pulled over Lopez on a traffic violation, when he gave a fake name and birth date. Police then arrested him for obstruction of justice, leading prosecutors to realize that they had found the person that they suspected in the sexual-assault case, Monaco said. Source: Kane County Chronicle Colorado - Denver's Cold Case Unit has linked DNA from a 35-year-old man to the 1990 murder of a woman, police say. DNA from Corey Bailey, 35, was linked Wednesday to the homicide of Paula Joscsak, who was killed Aug. 6, 1990, said Sonny Jackson, Denver police spokesman. Source: The Denver Post Wisconsin - Milwaukee County Assistant District Attorney Norm Gahn filed charges against an unknown serial rapist in 2000 on the basis of a DNA profile because the statute of limitations was nearing. The cases -- from 1994 and 1995 -- sat cold until June, when a match to Rodney Washington's DNA popped up in an FBI databank. Source: WKBT Maryland - A man convicted five years ago of a 1983 rape in Baltimore has been charged with six rapes in Baltimore County that occurred between 1978 and 1989. Alphonso W. Hill, 55, who is serving a 15-year prison sentence for the 1983 rape, was charged Tuesday with six counts of first-degree rape and several other sex-offense charges, according to county police. He is also being investigated in at least 20 other unsolved rapes, police said. Source: The Baltimore Sun Missouri - Jackson County prosecutors today charged a man in connection with the 1999 rape of an 81-year-old woman who was attacked after she left Christmas cookies at a neighbor’s door. Police said DNA linked Terry U. Birmingham, 41, to the Christmas Eve crime in the 4700 block of Jarboe Street. Prosecutors charged Birmingham with burglary, assault, robbery and three counts of rape. Court documents list Birmingham’s address as the Farmington Correctional Center. Source: The Kansas City Star Illinois - A DNA match has lead St. Charles police to charge an Aurora man with a 2002 criminal sexual assault. Carlos Lopez, 24, of the 300 block of South Fourth Street, Aurora, was charged with felony aggravated criminal sexual assault, criminal sexual assault and aggravated criminal sexual assault Monday, police said. Source: Chicago Sun Times North Carolina - A North Carolina man falsely jailed for 18 years in a child rape case was released from prison Tuesday after a judge accepted newly tested DNA evidence that cleared him of the crime. Dwayne Allen Dail, now 39, threw back his head and hugged his attorney when his conviction was set aside by Wayne County Superior Court Judge Jack Hooks Jr. DNA testing results released Monday excluded Dail as the man who raped a 12-year-old girl in 1987 and implicated another man already in prison. Source: Winston-Salem Journal California - Nearly 22 years after a woman was raped and stabbed to death in her Potrero Hill home, a San Francisco man who lived near the victim was convicted Monday of first-degree murder. The only evidence against John Davis was the DNA left behind during the rape of Barbara Martz, 28. But that was enough for the jury of seven women and five men to convict Davis, 40, of murder in the commission of rape and burglary in connection with the slaying Dec. 4, 1985, in Martz's home on 25th Street. The panel deliberated more than four days before coming back with its verdict. Source: San Francisco Chronicle Events and conferences for 2007 that may be of interest to you include: Website: www.promega.com/geneticsymp18/ Did you know? JILA scientists have found a flaw in the most common model for DNA elasticity, a discovery that will improve the accuracy of single-molecule research and perhaps pave the way for DNA to become an official standard for measuring picoscale forces, a notoriously difficult challenge. JILA is a joint venture of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Colorado at Boulder.The JILA experiments, described in a new paper,* reveal that a classic model for measuring the elasticity of double-stranded DNA leads to errors when the molecules are short. For instance, measurements are off by up to 18 percent for molecules 632 nanometers long, and by 10 percent for molecules about twice that length. (By contrast, the DNA in a single human cell, if linked together and stretched out, would be about 2 meters long.) * Y. Seol, J. Li, P.C. Nelson, T.T. Perkins and M.D. Betterton. Elasticity of short DNA molecules: theory and experiment for contour lengths of 0.6--7 µm. Biophysical Journal. Published on-line in BioFAST, Aug. 31, 2007. For more, please go to: The DNA Informant is a free bi-weekly email newsletter, published by DNA Labs International. DNA Labs International is a private, ISO 17025 Accredited, Forensic Serology and DNA Identity Testing Laboratory, founded in 2004 by a Board Certified Fellow in Molecular Biology with over two decades of experience in Forensic Serology and DNA Analysis in United States Crime Labs. Our primary mission is to help our clients identify criminals within their jurisdiction by providing timely, accurate and cost effective DNA testing results. To do this we created an organization based on industry best practices from over 20 State Crime Labs around the United States. We are located in Deerfield Beach, Florida, just minutes from the Fort Lauderdale airport. DNA Labs International’s services are now available for individual cases and outsourcing contracts. Please keep us in mind as you start to consider your outsourcing needs, regular and rush cases and DNA case review. |
