By Blood Written (40 page)

“Ms. Hooper, tell us please your place of employment,”

Collier instructed.

“I’m employed at the Nashville Crime Laboratory of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation.”

“And what is your job description there?”

“My job title is special agent, forensic science supervisor. Basically, I’m a biotechnician attached to the Serology/

DNA Unit.”

“And what does the Serology/DNA Unit of the TBI do?”

“Our job is to perform identification and characterization of blood and other bodily fluids like semen or saliva. We also perform DNA profiling to determine if the DNA of a person suspected of committing a crime is present at a crime scene.”

“And, Ms. Hooper, what are your educational qualifica-tions as a forensic science supervisor?”

“I hold a bachelor of arts degree from Vanderbilt University with honors in chemistry, and a master’s degree in bio-chemistry from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.”

“How long have you been employed with the TBI?”

“Four years.”

Taylor felt her backside going numb as she sat there listening to this dry testimony. The woman’s voice was monotone, professional, and profoundly boring. The courtroom was quiet, still, almost stifling. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly and wished that this was all over.

“Ms. Hooper,” Collier continued, “can you explain to us, in layperson’s terms, what forensic DNA analysis is, how it works, and what it means in the process of investigating a homicide.”

“Certainly. In its simplest terms, DNA is material in our bodies that governs inheritance of eye color, hair color, stat-ure, bone density, and a long list of other human traits. DNA is a long but narrow stringlike object so tiny that a one-foot-long string of DNA is packed into a space roughly equal to a cube that measures one-millionth of an inch on its side …”

Taylor listened as the woman droned on for another ten minutes. She described the way DNA strands were named and characterized in strange combinations of letters and terms that seemed complicated beyond comprehension.

“… the locus on chromosome four, GYPA, is particularly useful for forensic DNA testing because it’s polymorphic, which means it takes different forms in different chromosomes. Each of the forms is called an allele …”

Even the jury was starting to glaze over. Taylor looked over at the defense table. Michael sat there, expressionless, staring. Not much color in his face, Taylor thought.

How long can this go on?
She felt her head swim. She looked down at her watch: barely three-thirty. Two more hours of this.

The young woman on the witness stand droned on, mo-notonously, tediously. Taylor found it incomprehensible that something so dry could be so crucial, yet she knew it was.

“Now, Ms. Hooper,” Collier said after the primer on DNA was complete, “tell us what kind of tests you use to identify and characterize the samples you receive.”

“We use the latest technology to profile DNA samples, which is the PCR/STR process. PCR is an acronym for polymerase chain reaction, and STR is an acronym standing for short tandem repeat.”

“Ms. Hooper, without going into too much technical detail here, what does the PCR/STR process allow a forensic investigator to do?”

“The technological advances of PCR/STR give us the ability to identify and profile a sample based on much less material and material that might not be analyzable under older tests because of degradation issues.”

“So it takes much less of a sample to provide an identification.”

“That’s correct. In that sense, it’s much more reliable. And it’s much more discriminating. The FBI has established its accuracy down to one in two hundred and sixty billion.”

“In other words, a match using this test is pretty well absolute.”

Talmadge shot up. “Objection, Your Honor. Calls for a conclusion.”

Collier turned and glared at Talmadge. “Your Honor, the court has already accepted Ms. Hooper as an expert witness.

She’s qualified and entitled to draw these kinds of conclusions.”

“Objection overruled. Continue, Ms. Hooper.”

Patricia Hooper nodded. “Yes, I would characterize a positive identification as absolute.”

“Very well. In February of last year, did you receive a series of forensic evidence packets from the scene of a double homicide at an establishment here in Nashville called Exotica Tans?”

“Yes, I did.”

“In your expert opinion, were proper procedures followed in the protection of this evidence, to avoid contamination and degradation?”

“Well, I wasn’t at the crime scene, but when the evidence was presented to me, it appeared to have been properly preserved.”

“And what did the evidence primarily consist of?”

“There were approximately eighty separate packets of evidence, the bulk of which were blood and tissue samples.

There were also some hair samples found as well. And some skin tissue.”

“Were you able to type these samples, to determine from whom they came?”

“Yes, we were.”

“And what were your conclusions?”

“Virtually all the samples contained DNA resident in the bodies of the two victims, Ms. Burnham and Ms. Matthews.”

“Were you able to identify any other DNA that was ex-cluded from that belonging to the two victims?”

“Well,” she said, hesitating, “you have to consider the circumstances of the crime scene. The homicides were committed at an establishment where, to put it delicately, one was likely to find traces of other bodily fluids. We were provided with hair samples and semen samples that we were able to profile, but not to match with anyone else.”

“On or about April thirtieth of last year,” Collier asked,

“were you provided a sample of hair and saliva that were obtained from the defendant as a result of a search warrant?”

“Yes, I was.”

“Were you able to type and identify those samples?”

“I was.”

“And were you able to match any of the samples at the Exotica Tans crime scene with the sample derived from the defendant?”

“No, sir, none of the samples matched.”

“So you have no samples from the Exotica Tans homicide scene that positively place the defendant there?”

“That’s correct,” Ms. Hooper said.

Taylor thought it odd that Collier would bring up a point in favor of the defense. Then, after a moment, she was hit with how smart that was. Of course, when you’ve got a weakness and you admit to it, somehow it’s less weak than when someone else points it out.

“With your permission, Your Honor,” Collier said, turning to the judge, “we’d like to bring into the courtroom a portable bulletin board with a series of photographs and graphs that we’ll be introducing into evidence.”

Forsythe turned. “Any objections, Mr. Talmadge?”

“None at this time, Your Honor.” Talmadge’s voice sounded firm, unshaken.

Jane Sparks stood up as the door in the back of the courtroom opened and a large portable bulletin board was wheeled into the room. She took the board, wheeled it past the prosecution table and into the center of the courtroom in front of the judge and jury. The logistics were a little tough to negotiate, but she managed to get the board where everyone who had to be able to see it could.

Taylor craned her neck. There was a line of blown-up photographs that seemed filled with dark, blurry vertical lines and several charts.

“Ms. Hooper,” Collier instructed, “if you need to leave the stand in order to indicate which of these exhibits you’re referring to, I think that’ll be okay.”

Forsythe nodded.

“Now first, Ms. Hooper, tell us in its simplest terms how PCR works.”

“As I said earlier, PCR is an acronym for polymerase chain reaction. And in and of itself, it’s not really an actual identification. PCR is a method by which we can take a sample of DNA too small to profile and cause it to reproduce itself. This gives us a much larger sample. Now when we have enough DNA material to type, we can create a profile. Every DNA strand contains both constant and variable elements.

The constant elements are areas that all human beings share.

Interspersed with these areas are the variable elements, or the elements which are unique to each individual.”

“Very good, Ms. Hooper. Now, in February last year, you were given, as you said, some eighty packets of evidence from the Exotica Tans crime scene. Can you give us the results of this examination of the evidence?”

“Yes, sir,” she said, getting up from the witness stand and walking over to the bulletin board. She pulled a wooden pointer up off the rail and pointed to a photograph on the far left of the board. “As this label indicates, this is the DNA imprint of Allison May Matthews. And this second photograph is a blowup of the microscopic sample of Sarah Burnham. As you can see here, here, and here, on these loci, the samples are different.”

“All right, Ms. Hooper. Now, on or about February tenth of last year, were you provided with evidence that had been obtained by Metro Police from a Dumpster behind a convenience market on Charlotte Avenue?”

“Yes, I was. And we obtained numerous samples from the material and were able to type them.”

“Could you explain your results to us, please.”

Ms. Hooper raised her pointer and tapped several photographs in a row on the board. “These photographs are representative samples of the material we obtained from the Dumpster. As you can see, here, here, and here, the loci match the target sample definitely identified as belonging to Ms. Matthews. And over here, at these six loci, we established that this sample definitely matched the sample derived from Ms. Burnham.”

Taylor stared hard at the board, craning her neck to see the photographs as well as possible. She felt a tightening in her chest, as if she needed to loosen her clothes. Her face felt flushed. Patricia Hooper had been on the stand for well over an hour now.

“So in your expert opinion,” Collier said, his voice rising just a bit. “The blood found on the clothing in the Dumpster on Charlotte Avenue definitely came from Allison May Matthews and Sarah Denise Burnham.”

Ms. Hooper nodded. “Yes, that’s correct.”

“And on or about March twenty-fourth of last year, were you provided with a sample of carpet removed from the trunk of a 2004 Lincoln Town Car?”

“Yes, it was delivered to me directly at the Nashville Crime Lab.”

“And were you able to perform a PCR/STR analysis of this sample?”

“Yes, sir, I was.”

“Would you tell us the results, please?”

Ms. Hooper stepped to the side of the board and pointed to a series of photographs and charts. “As this graph explains, we look for certain pointers, or loci, which are areas on the actual DNA string that are unique to each individual. As you can see here, the material we obtained from the carpet matches both the samples discovered at the Charlotte Avenue Dumpster site and at the crime scene itself. The pointers match here—”

She tapped on the board.

“—and here—”

Again. The tapping echoed throughout the silent courtroom.

“—here and here and here.”

“So,” Collier said, his voice rising even higher, “in your expert opinion, the samples obtained at the crime scene, at the Dumpster, and on the defendant’s rental car all share the same DNA and therefore could only have come from Sarah Denise Burnham and Allison May Matthews!”

“Yes,” Ms. Hooper said, nodding her head. “That’s correct.”

My God
, Taylor thought.
Merciful God in heaven! He did
it!

Thursday afternoon, Nashville

The bubble that had been slowly growing somewhere deep in Taylor’s subconscious had suddenly burst through to the surface. It was no longer something she could hide from or run away from. It was, she knew, inescapable. The defense lawyers would throw up every argument imaginable to convince the jury that the police had framed Michael, had set him up to vindicate their own incompetence.

Taylor knew better, though. He had done it.

Michael Schiftmann was a murderer.

How she knew this, beyond the evidence she’d seen earlier in the courtroom, she wasn’t sure. But over the past eight or nine months, ever since the first rumors of the indictment had leaked out of the DA’s office, she had begun to look at him in a different way. There had always been something in Michael’s makeup of artifice, or if not exactly artifice, at least masking. She had known him for years, had slipped into being in love with him almost without knowing it, had been swept along by her own loneliness and the passion within her that he had tapped into and found in a way no one else ever had.

But all along, Taylor realized that she never really knew him. Never really knew him deep inside, in his core.

In his heart.

And now she knew why.

Judge Forsythe had recessed court for the evening after the TBI crime lab agent had testified for more than two hours. Tomorrow morning, Wes Talmadge would go after her, tooth and nail. Taylor felt sorry for the young woman.

Michael looked ashen, almost gray as they all waded out of the courthouse through the crowd, past the cameras, and to Talmadge’s car. For the first time, Taylor saw what almost looked like fear on his face. The shouted questions from the reporters echoed in her ears like the background noise in a riot.

As they walked out of the courthouse and down the steps in the fading twilight, the January wind sharp and bitter around them, Taylor tried to keep her head down, to avoid eye contact with any of them. But someone jammed a microphone out of the mass of bodies directly in front of her, almost hitting her in the face. She jerked her head up, dodged to her right, and through a break in the crowd, saw him.

The FBI agent … Powell, that was his name. He was staring right through her. She had seen him several times before at the trial, had noticed him sitting in the back of the courtroom spectator gallery, but she had avoided really seeing him.

Now she couldn’t help it. They stared directly at each other for what seemed like several moments, then the crowd shifted and Taylor was shoved forward.

Everyone was silent in the car as they maneuvered through the thick, nearly impenetrable Nashville rush-hour traffic.