Opinion ID: 2108549
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: destroyed evidence

Text: The defendant contends that the trial court erred in refusing to suppress testimony regarding physical evidence, particularly certain hairs found on the defendant's clothes, because this evidence was destroyed by the police prior to trial. During trial, the state presented expert testimony which indicated that some of the hairs found on the defendant were like the head hair of the female victim and that, although a positive identification could not be made, the probability of the hairs coming from another person was small. The defendant contends that the destruction of the hair samples violated his right to due process because the evidence was not available for testing by defense experts. The facts concerning the destruction of the evidence are not seriously in dispute. The hair samples and other physical evidence later destroyed [2] were obtained by the police during their investigation on or about May 14, 1977. On July 20, 1977, the trial court granted portions of the defendant's motion for disclosure and production, including that portion which sought copies of any reports of scientific tests related to the case. In response, on August 17, 1977, the state replied that no such reports were contained in the files of the state's attorney. Furthermore, the state responded that the physical evidence in its possession was available for inspection by the defendant upon arrangement with the office of the state's attorney. More than a year later, in October or November, 1978, the evidence was destroyed by the Westport police because of the mistaken belief that the charges against the defendant were no longer pending. [3] On May 21, 1979, the state filed a supplemental disclosure which contained two scientific reports. One report, dated May 18, 1977, was from the state police forensic laboratory to the Westport police. The other report, dated July 18, 1977, was from the F.B.I. laboratory to the state police laboratory and concerned evidence, including the subsequently destroyed hair, which had been forwarded to the F.B.I. The F.B.I. report indicated that some of the hairs found on the defendant's clothes were like the [specimen] from the [female] victim and, accordingly, could have originated from her. [4] Following this disclosure, the defendant unsuccessfully moved for sanctions against the state, but he did not seek to be allowed to have his own tests performed. In fact, as the trial court found in ruling on the defendant's various motions relating to the destroyed evidence, although the defendant was aware of the tests in May, 1979, it was only on the eve of trial in September, after learning that the tested specimens were destroyed, that [the defendant] suggested that he `might' have wanted to perform independent tests.... In considering whether testimony concerning lost or destroyed evidence should be admitted, the trial court has to look to numerous factors including the reason for the unavailability of the evidence, the materiality of the evidence, the likelihood of mistaken interpretation of it by witnesses or the jury, and the prejudice to the defendant caused by the unavailability of the evidence. See State v. Harden, 175 Conn. 315, 327, 398 A.2d 1169 (1978); State v. Burns, 173 Conn. 317, 325, 377 A.2d 1082 (1977). In this case, the trial court properly concluded that the destruction of the evidence was not malicious or in bad faith. Here, unlike State v. Harden, supra, and State v. Burns, supra, the evidence might have materially aided the defense if the defense expert had been able to dispute the state's expert testimony of the similarity of the hairs. Yet, here, as in State v. Harden, supra, and State v. Burns, supra, the defendant failed to seek an independent testing of the evidence while it was available or in a timely fashion, and suggested the possibility of such testing only after he learned that the evidence had been destroyed. Moreover, the trial court's instructions to the jury in this case specifically referred to the destroyed evidence and expressly permitted the jury, if they chose to do so, to draw an adverse inference from the unavailability of the evidence. [5] Under these circumstances, we conclude that the trial court did not err in refusing to exclude testimony concerning the destroyed evidence.