Opinion ID: 2570814
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: issue 3. population statistics related to dna testing

Text: Next, Appleby contends the trial court erred by admitting into evidence a computer-generated report regarding population statistics as they relate to DNA testing. Specifically, he argues his confrontation rights under the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution were violated as those rights were defined in Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 68, 124 S.Ct. 1354, 158 L.Ed.2d 177 (2004). The trial court admitted the testimony of Dana Soderholm, formerly a forensic scientist for the Johnson County Crime Laboratory  now with the Kansas Bureau of Investigation (KBI) Kansas City Regional Laboratory  who used the Polymerase Chain Reaction-Short Tandem Repeat (PCR-STR) DNA analysis to test various items containing mixtures of blood, and Lisa Dowler, a Kansas City Crime Laboratory forensic chemist, who ran DNA tests on A.K.'s sports bra. These experts were permitted to testify regarding the DNA statistical population data that was generated when they compared, via a computer software program, their tested DNA profiles with databases of DNA profiles. Dowler and the Kansas City laboratory where she is employed use a regional database. Soderholm and the Johnson County laboratory where she was employed use the Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) national DNA database known as the Combined DNA Indexing System (CODIS); the Johnson County laboratory is certified by the FBI to use the database. As Soderholm explained, when a DNA profile from a crime matches the DNA profile from a suspect, a statistical analysis is performed to determine how rare or common that particular DNA profile is in the general population. Soderholm testified: There is a software called Pop-Stats that is given to the labs by the CODIS group, and that is the information that we use. It is software that is already built in, and you do not get into the frequencies. You don't change any of that. You type in your alleles and the information is then calculated within the computer, and then you print it out. .... ... The normal procedure is if you have an inclusion, that you use Pop-Stats to generate your statistics. For example, with regard to the blood on the ointment tube, Soderholm testified that it was consistent with Appleby's and the probability of selecting an unrelated individual at random from the population whose DNA would match that DNA profile from the tube was 1 in 14.44 billion. And with regard to one of the blood stains from the sports bra, Dowler's testimony indicated that the chances of randomly selecting someone else in the population other than Appleby whose DNA would match the male DNA profile from the bra was 1 in 2 quadrillion. Appleby filed a motion to exclude the State's DNA evidence, arguing, inter alia, that evidence of the application and use of population frequency databases by any witness who is not an expert in that field would violate his right of confrontation. After conducting a hearing, the trial court found that the use of DNA population databases did not present a Crawford issue because those databases are not, in and of themselves, testimonial in nature. The trial court relied on State v. Lackey, 280 Kan. 190, Syl. ¶ 5, 120 P.3d 332 (2005), cert. denied 547 U.S. 1056, 126 S.Ct. 1653, 164 L.Ed.2d 399 (2006), overruled on other grounds State v. Davis, 283 Kan. 569, 158 P.3d 317 (2006), where this court concluded that [f]actual, routine, descriptive, and nonanalytical findings made in an autopsy report are nontestimonial and, therefore, may be admitted without the testimony of the medical examiner who performed the autopsy. The trial court found: The CODIS database simply represents a compilation of DNA information obtained over an extended time period from a large population sample, along with the ability to easily compare any sample with those already compiled. The CODIS database provides routine, descriptive information that, under Crawford, is nontestimonial, at least when presented through the testimony of a qualified DNA expert. Disputing this conclusion, Appleby takes issue with the fact that Soderholm admitted during recross-examination that she did not know who provided the samples for the frequencies or how the databases were made. And although Soderholm had undergone some training regarding CODIS and population genetics, she was admittedly not a statistician. Appleby, therefore, contends that he had the right to confront a statistician to explain the statistical principles used in the calculations. And he argues that he was denied any opportunity to cross-examine the FBI's random match probability estimates because the witnesses presented at trial did not prepare the database and had no personal knowledge of the methods and procedures the FBI used to compute the statistical estimates or the set of data upon which the calculations were based.