STORY: "Appeals court reverses Adams County attempted murder conviction due to experts' improper testimony," by Reporter Michael, published by 'Colorado Politics', on August 5, 2024.
SUB-HEADING: "The prosecution GIST: "Colorado's second-highest court last month overturned a man's attempted murder conviction because prosecutors failed to establish a chain of custody for the defendant's DNA and fingerprint evidence that allegedly tied him to the crime.
Jurors heard from two forensic analysts who matched Julian Vigil to the gun that was used to shoot the victim in August 2019. Although the victim identified Vigil as the assailant at trial, he previously told police he did not know the shooter's identity.
A three-judge panel for the Court of Appeals concluded the forensic evidence likely affected the jury's verdict, which was problematic because the trial judge should have barred the experts' testimony.
Crucially, wrote Judge Elizabeth L. Harris, the DNA sample and fingerprint on file for Vigil were not accounted for prior to testing at the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.
"No witness testified that they collected the buccal (cheek) swabs from Vigil or packaged them or sent them to the analyst for testing. In other words, there were no links in the chain of custody until the buccal swabs appeared at CBI," she wrote in the July 11 opinion.
The DNA analyst who testified at Vigil's 2020 trial was Yvonne "Missy" Woods, who improperly manipulated data and recently triggered an investigation of her work with thousands of DNA samples. Vigil's appeal did not hinge on the discovery of Woods' misconduct, as the appellate panel concluded the lack of evidence about what happened with Vigil's DNA swabs prior to Woods' analysis was the problem.
A spokesperson for District Attorney Brian Mason declined to comment on whether prosecutors would seek to retry Vigil, or whether the revelations of Woods' DNA tampering would render her work unusable should there be another trial.
Mary Claire Mulligan, a criminal defense attorney, said it was relatively unusual for prosecutors to introduce testimony that suffered from a chain-of-custody defect and for a trial judge to allow it.
"I think what most judges would have done is admit the evidence 'provisionally' on the anticipation that the chain of custody witness (whoever took the samples) would testify eventually. I have seen that happen when there’s a scheduling issue with witnesses," she said. "And if this was the extent of the government’s evidence ... then I don’t see them being able to prove their case."
Police responded to the victim's apartment and found him shot through the arm. Officers located Vigil sitting in a car in the company of two other people. There was a gun concealed in the center console, which matched the shell casing at the apartment. The victim later testified Vigil had shot him in a dispute over Vigil's "baby mama" — the mother of Vigil's child who was now dating the victim.
Law enforcement obtained DNA swabs from Vigil and sent them to the CBI. Woods received the samples, with a sheet identifying them as Vigil's, plus the gun. She tested both and found a match, although two other people's DNA was also present on the gun.
At trial, the defense objected to Woods' testimony on the grounds that it was hearsay because she did not know anything about the origin of Vigil's swabs before they arrived at the CBI. Then-District Court Judge Tomee Crespin allowed Woods to testify.
"We expect the law enforcement agency who is doing the submitting to have given that — supplied us with the correct information," Woods elaborated.
Fingerprint analyst Kailee Henson also testified to obtaining a fingerprint from the firearm and comparing it to an entry in the fingerprint database purportedly for Vigil. The defense raised the same objection and Crespin overruled it. Henson testified the fingerprints were a match.
On appeal, Vigil argued the victim's changing story about the shooter made it more likely jurors relied upon the forensic evidence to convict him. The DNA and fingerprint results allegedly suffered from the same problem: the witnesses who testified had no knowledge of where the evidence came from before conducting their analysis.
The Court of Appeals agreed.
"To establish a chain of custody, the prosecution must introduce evidence showing where the object has been from the time the police took custody of it until it is offered at trial," wrote Harris. "The tested swabs were not accounted for at any time before the DNA analyst received them."
Similarly, the fingerprint analyst had no firsthand knowledge the fingerprint in the database labeled as Vigil's was actually his.
"In light of the significance juries place on forensic evidence," Harris concluded, "and the victim’s inconsistent statements about the shooting, we conclude that, cumulatively, the errors in admitting the expert testimony prejudiced Vigil’s substantial rights."
Defense attorney Matthew A. Haltzman said that in his experience, chain-of-custody issues can arise with forensic evidence. But in Vigil's case, it was still unclear who collected the DNA samples at the outset.
"Typically, prosecutors would not leave such significant chain-of-custody gaps in their presentation of cases to juries," he said, "but there are occasions where this comes up and the trial courts have clear guidance that such evidence cannot come in without all of the witnesses necessary to establish the chain of custody and veracity of a particular piece of forensic evidence."
The case is People v. Vigil."
The entire story can be read at:
https://www.coloradopolitics.com/courts/appeals-court-reverses-adams-county-attempted-murder-conviction-for-improper-testimony/article_ba93958e-5353-11ef-a572-53ba38361490.htmlPUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue/resource. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith. Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at: http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog.
- SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL:
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985
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FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
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FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
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