Case foul up - Cops admit
DNA,
Claims cannot use in case
Matter of VIRGINIA LARZELERE
Revision: 2 Monday, March 05, 2001
FDLE = Florida Department of Law Enforcement
EDGEWATER POLICE REPORT
CASE NO: 91-03-0353
HOMICIDE OF NORMAN LARZELERE
Transcripts of taped interview taken March 8, 1991 (day of the murder), by
Det. Dave Gamell and Det Cheryl Osborne.
Begins, page 24
Virginia: Why didn't you take the fingernail today and check the skin scrapings?
Gamell: Take whose fingernail?
Virginia: Mine. After I repeatedly said I broke it. Why?
Gamell: You realize I have to ask to be able to do that.
Osborne: I did too.
Gamell: Well, I would have taken it. I mean I asked FDLE. They said it was not necessary. They gave some reason. FDLE is an entity within itself.
Virginia: But I brought blood. How is that not necessary? You've got blood type.
Gamell: I don't know.
Transcripts of taped interview taken April 5, 1991, by
Detective Bucky McEver and Detective Sergeant Bill Bennett.
Begins, page 57
VIRGINIA: I don't understand why when I kept asking before, you know, when I had the fingernails and the blood and the skin samples, I don't understand why they wouldn't take them to the lab.
BENNETT: I need to answer that. When you mentioned that to me down there at the scene, or somebody told one of the detectives or something like that, I talked to the FDLE guy, Leroy Parker, and I asked him, I said, you know, how about this nail business with the blood, or I ask something to the effect that you or didn't Mrs. Larzelere ask you or tell you that there were nails or blood and he told me, he said, "We can't use those anyway". That's what he told me and he's an expert.
END
Staff Remarks...
Conclusion: Special Agent Leroy Parker and the Edgewater Police Department refused to take samples of DNA (skin tissue, blood) from under Virginia's broken fingernails, claiming it would be of no use.
We have to ask, "How would you feel being on death row because police did not do their job?"
Note, Virginia had a struggle with Norm's assailant and in the process she clawed the assailant's arm in an upward motion taking his skin and blood under her nails. DNA, which are found in every human cell. Samples are commonly collected from hair, skin, blood, or semen.
DNA forensic analysis relies on one key characteristic of DNA: the configuration is the same in all cells of an individual. Altogether each person carries around 200,000 genes in each cell, comprising three billion “base pairs” -the chemical building blocks of DNA. Analyzing all these base pairs and genes in order to identify an individual would be impossible, with current technology. Instead, forensic scientists focus on certain genetic sequences called “markers”. Here, the arrangement of genetic information is highly variable and particular to each person.
Criminal
Identification and Forensics
DNA isolated
from blood, hair, skin cells, or other genetic evidence left at the scene of a
crime can be compared, through VNTR patterns, with the DNA of a criminal
suspect to determine guilt or innocence. VNTR patterns are also useful in
establishing the identity of a homocide victim, either from DNA found as
evidence or from the body itself.
Personal
Identification
The notion of using DNA fingerprints as a sort of
genetic bar code to identify individuals has been discussed, but this is not
likely to happen anytime in the foreseeable future. The technology required to
isolate, keep on file, and then analyze millions of very specified VNTR
patterns is both expensive and impractical. Social security numbers, picture
ID, and other more mundane methods are much more likely to remain the
prevalent ways to establish personal identification.
Suggested
Reading:
Proof DNA can be used a evidence prior to
Norm's murder.
Wambaugh, Joseph. The blooding. New York: Morrow, 1989. (Novel about the first use of DNA fingerprinting in a court case)
Ballantyne, John, George Sensabaugh, and Jan Witkowski. DNA technology and forensic science. Cold Spring Harbor, NY: Cold Spring Harbor Lab, 1989.