By Bill Mears, CNN Supreme Court Producer

updated 3:15 PM EDT, Mon July 30, 2012

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

Washington (CNN) -- The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday allowed a controversial state DNA testing law to remain in effect until the justices have time to consider the broader constitutional questions.

Maryland's DNA Collection Act permits police to collect genetic material from those who have been arrested, but not yet convicted.

Chief Justice John Roberts issued the three-page in-chambers opinion, putting a state court's ruling favoring a criminal defendant on hold.

"Collecting DNA from individuals arrested for violent felonies provides a valuable tool for investigating unsolved crimes and thereby helping to remove violent offenders from the general population," Roberts wrote. "Crimes for which DNA evidence is implicated tend to be serious, and serious crimes cause serious injuries. That Maryland may not employ a duly enacted statute to help prevent these injuries constitutes irreparable harm."

The chief justice said there is a "fair prospect" the Supreme Court would ultimately find in favor of the state on the search and seizure questions.

After more legal briefs are filed, the high court in coming weeks will decide whether to hear the case and issue a definitive, binding ruling. Oral arguments would likely not be held until early next year.

A 1994 federal law created a national database in which local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies can compare and share information on DNA matches from convicted felons, but courts have been at odds on just when such samples can be collected and the information distributed.

Original post:
Controversial criminal DNA collection law stays in place for now

Police in Maryland can resume collecting DNA from suspects charged but not yet convicted in violent crimes, and the U.S. Supreme Court might be inclined to let them do so permanently.

U.S. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. issued an opinion Monday saying there is a fair prospect the court will overturn the Maryland Court of Appeals controversial Alonzo Jay King Jr. v State of Maryland decision, which prohibited DNA collection from suspects charged but not yet convicted in violent crimes and burglaries. And until the nations highest court can more thoroughly consider the issue, Roberts put the King decision on hold meaning police in Maryland can resume collecting DNA.

This stay will allow Maryland the uninterrupted use of this critical modern law enforcement tool that helps police and prosecutors solve some of Marylands most serious violent crimes, Maryland Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler said in a statement.

The Supreme Courts opinion is the latest development in an ongoing debate over whether and when it is legal to collect DNA from criminal suspects. Federal and state courts across the country have issued mixed opinions. The governors office says 26 states have legislation similar to Marylands.

It is precisely because of that debate that the Supreme Court intervened. In his opinion, Roberts wrote that the Maryland Court of Appeals decision conflicts with decisions by two other federal appellate courts, as well as a decision by Virginias Supreme Court. Roberts wrote that given the considered analysis of the courts on the other side of the split, there is a fair prospect that this Court will reverse the King decision.

Stephen Mercer, the chief attorney for the Maryland Office of the Public Defenders Forensics Division, said the opinion is merely a preliminary round in an ongoing legal fight.

We continue to believe the court, in the end, will vindicate the Fourth Amendment rights of Mr. King and all Marylanders in their right to genetic privacy, Mercer said.

The case centers on a Maryland law, which, starting in 2009, allowed police to collect DNA from suspects after they were charged with violent crimes or burglaries. Before then, police had been able to collect DNA only from convicted criminals.

Alonzo Jay King Jr. challenged the law after he was arrested in April 2009 on assault charges. Prosecutors used a DNA swab from that case to connect him to a 2003 rape. He was eventually convicted and sentenced to life in prison for the rape.

The Maryland Court of Appeals sent Kings case back to the circuit court and threw out the DNA evidence, saying investigators violated his Fourth Amendment rights in taking his genetic material and comparing it with old crime scene samples. The ruling was condemned by prosecutors and police chiefs, who said it would hamper detectives ability to solve cold cases and jeopardize the convictions of 34 robbers, burglars and rapists whose genetic samples were taken after they were charged in separate cases.

Read more here:
For now, Md. police can take DNA from charged criminals, Supreme Court says

AURORA, Colo., July 29 (UPI) -- Roofers and road workers who use asphalt are exposed to high levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, which may up their cancer risk, U.S. researchers say.

Dr. Berrin Serdar of the Colorado Cancer Center and the Colorado School of Public Health said roofers have higher PAH blood-levels after a shift than before and that these high levels of PAHs are linked with increased rates of DNA damage, and potentially with higher cancer risk.

"We've known for some time that roofers and road workers have higher cancer rates than the general population, but we also know roofers have a higher rates of smoking, alcohol use and higher ultraviolet radiation exposure than the general population, and so it's been difficult to pinpoint the cause of higher cancer rates -- was it due to higher PAHs or is it due to lifestyle and other risk factors?" Serdar asked.

Serdar and colleagues at the University of Miami, studied 19 roofers from four work sites in Miami-Dade County and tested their urine -- before and after a 6-hour shift.

After acute exposure to hot asphalt, PAH biomarkers were elevated and were highest among workers who didn't use protective gloves and workers who reported burns.

"We can't say with certainty that exposure to hot asphalt causes roofers' increased cancer rate," Serdar said in a statement, "but that possibility is becoming increasingly likely. Hot asphalt leads to PAH exposure, leads to higher PAH leads to higher PAH biomarkers, leads to increased DNA damage."

The study was published in the British Medical Journal Open.

Link:
DNA damage in roofers possible cancer link

MANATEE -- DNA of Delmer Smith, whose murder trial begins with jury selection at 9 a.m. today, was not found in the Terra Ceia home of Kathleen Briles who was allegedly bludgeoned to death Aug. 3, 2009 with an antique sewing machine.

His DNA was, however, found in four Sarasota homes he allegedly robbed, attacking the women who lived there, prior to Briles' death.

The only problem was police could not identify the person behind the attacks because the DNA was not logged in the FBI's database.

Smith's DNA was taken in March 2008 while he was serving time in federal prison for a bank robbery. It was placed with thousands of other DNA samples waiting to be processed by the FBI.

When the Sarasota County Sheriff's Office sent off the DNA found at crime scenes on Feb. 22, March 7, March 14 and May 22, no matches were found.

Smith was first identified as the suspect in more than 10 home invasion robberies in Manatee and Sarasota counties after he got into a bar fight in Venice. Because he was on probation police searched his belongings, finding several items allegedly stolen in the previous home invasions.

Smith's DNA was fast-tracked into the system and matched the samples found at the Sarasota crime scenes.

DNA does not play a role in the Briles' case, but local law enforcement agencies rely on it in many instances.

"We send DNA from crime scenes off for analysis all the time. It makes cases," said Manatee County Sher

iff Brad Steube.

Originally posted here:
Federal DNA backlog remains clear since September 2010

MERIDEN (AP) -- New DNA testing has solved the mysteries of a skull found in Waterbury in 1981 and a man fatally struck on Interstate 91 in Meriden in 2008, State Police said Friday.

State police and other officials announced the new findings at the state crime lab in Meriden, saying they identified the two men as people reported missing by their families.

Both men's identities were confirmed by DNA testing done over the past few weeks, said Lt. J. Paul Vance, a state police spokesman.

Authorities said the skull belonged to Kenneth LaManna, of Waterbury, who was 30 when he went missing in 1980. The state's chief medical examiner, Dr. H. Wayne Carver II, said LaManna shot himself to death.

The new information in LaManna's case was developed after a detective in the state police Missing Persons Unit and a Waterbury police detective noticed similarities between the skull being found in 1981 and the missing person case of LaManna from 1980.

Forensic scientists then obtained DNA samples from the home of LaManna's mother, and they matched samples from the skull, state police said.

Police identified the man struck on the highway in 2008 as Phat Quy Mai, who was 50. Authorities have said he was struck while lying motionless on the roadway, and what exactly happened remains unclear.

Detectives couldn't identify Mai's body immediately after the accident, but sent information to the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System.

State police received new information from the system in April and began investigating.

A detective met with Mai's family in Massachusetts and obtained DNA samples that matched samples from the man killed on the highway.

Continued here:
DNA testing solves two cold cases

The Delhi High Court today made public the DNA test results of veteran Congress leader N D Tiwari, confirming that he is the biological father of Rohit Shekhar, the youth who filed a paternity suit against him four years ago.

On a day of protracted drama in the court, a division bench first rejected Tiwaris plea to keep the report a secret and then remitted the case to Justice Reva Khetrapal, the judge who had earlier decided to open Tiwaris DNA test report and declare the result in open court. After their appeal was dismissed, Tiwaris counsel failed to appear in court.

The counsel for the 32-year-old Shekhar and his mother Ujjwala Sharma accompanied the judge into her chamber where the DNA report was desealed. They emerged smiling. The judge then declared the result in open court, saying: Tiwari is found to be the biological father of Rohit Shekhar and Ujjwala Sharma is found to be the biological mother.

Tiwari, who was not present in court, had his lawyer read out a statement in which he said that no one has the right to look into my private life. I have been a freedom fighter. I have the right to live according to my own wishes, the statement read.

The 87-year-old veteran Congress leader also said he bore no grudge against Shekhar.

Due to my simplicity, at this point of my age, my trusted people hatched a conspiracy against me in a planned way. I have no remorse against them. My sympathy is with Rohit Shekhar.

... contd.

Continued here:
DNA results out, Tiwari fathered Rohit

Your Diet Affects Your Grandchildren's DNA, Scientists Say

By: Christopher Wanjek, LiveScience Bad Medicine Columnist

Published: 07/27/2012 10:00 AM EDT on LiveScience

You are what you eat, the saying goes. And, according to two new genetic studies, you are what your mother, father, grandparents and great-grandparents ate, too.

Diet, be it poor or healthy, can so alter the nature of one's DNA that those changes can be passed on to the progeny. While this much has been speculated for years, researchers in two independent studies have found ways in which this likely is happening.

The findings, which involve epigenetics, may help explain the increased genetic risk that children face compared to their parents for diseases such as obesity and diabetes.

The punch line is that your poor dietary habits may be dooming your progeny, despite how healthy they will try to eat. [10 Worst Hereditary Conditions]

Epigenetics

Epigenetics refers to changes in gene expression from outside forces. Different from a mutation, epigenetic changes lie not in the DNA itself but rather in its surroundings -- the enzymes and other chemicals that orchestrate how a DNA molecule unwinds its various sections to make proteins or even new cells.

See the original post:
Your diet affects your grandchildren's DNA, studies say

27-07-2012 03:27 The Delhi High Court has rejected ND Tiwari's plea to keep his DNA report confidential. The results of the DNA test will be announced at 2:30 pm today. The former Governor of Andhra Pradesh and veteran Congress leader was taken to court by a 32-year-old man, Rohit Shekhar, who claims that Mr Tiwari is his biological father. Mr Tiwari says he is not. The DNA test was ordered by the court to settle the matter. Yesterday, Mr Tiwari, who is 87 years old, moved both the High Court and the Supreme Court seeking to keep his DNA test report confidential till the conclusion of hearing in the paternity suit against him. He was appealing against a July 20 High Court order which said the DNA test results would be made public today. For more log on to

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HC rejects ND Tiwari's plea to keep DNA results secret - NewsX - Video

The human family tree just got another mysterious branch, an African "sister species" to the heavy-browed Neanderthals that once roamed Europe.

While no fossilized bones have been found from these enigmatic people, they did leave a calling card in present-day Africans: snippets of foreign DNA.

There's only one way that genetic material could have made it into modern human populations.

"Geneticists like euphemisms, but we're talking about sex," said Joshua Akey of the University of Washington, whose lab identified the foreign DNA in three groups of modern Africans.

These genetic leftovers do not resemble DNA from any modern humans. The foreign DNA also does not resemble Neanderthal DNA, which shows up in the DNA of some modern Europeans, Akey said. That means the newly identified DNA came from an unknown group.

"We're calling this a Neanderthal sibling species in Africa," Akey said. He added that the interbreeding likely occurred 20,000 to 50,000 years ago, long after some modern humans had walked out of Africa to colonize Asia and Europe, and about the same time Neanderthals were waning in Europe.

Akey said that present-day Europeans show no evidence of the foreign DNA, meaning the mystery people were likely confined to Africa.

The find offers more evidence that for thousands of years, modern-looking humans shared the Earth with evolutionary cousins that later died out. And whenever the groups met, they did what came naturally: They bred.

The once controversial idea that humans mated with other species is now widely accepted among scientists. In fact, hominid hanky-panky seems to have occurred wherever humans met others who looked kind of like them.

In 2010, researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany announced finding Neanderthal DNA in the genomes of modern Europeans.

Link:
Sex with early mystery species of humans seen in DNA

After decades of digging, paleoanthropologists say modern humans arose in Africa some 200,000 years ago and all archaic species of humans then disappeared, surviving only outside Africa, as did the Neanderthals in Europe.

Geneticists studying DNA now say that, to the contrary, a previously unknown archaic species of human, a cousin of the Neanderthals, may have lingered in Africa until perhaps 25,000 years ago, coexisting with the modern humans and on occasion interbreeding with them.

The geneticists reached this conclusion, reported on Thursday, July 26, in the journal Cell, after decoding the entire genome of three isolated hunter-gatherer peoples in Africa, hoping to cast light on the origins of modern human evolution.

But the finding is regarded skeptically by some paleoanthropologists because of the absence in the fossil record of anything that would support the geneticists' statistical calculations.

The geneticists, led by Joseph Lachance and Sarah Tishkoff of the University of Pennsylvania, decoded the entire genomes of five men each from two Tanzanian tribes and the forest-dwelling pygmies of Cameroon. The genomes of the pygmies and the Tanzanians contained many short stretches of DNA with highly unusual sequences. Through mutation, the genomes of species that once had a common ancestor grow increasingly unlike one another.

Tishkoff's team interprets these divergent DNA sequences as genetic remnants of an interbreeding with an archaic species of

Richard Klein, a paleoanthropologist at Stanford University, said the new claim of archaic and modern human interbreeding "is a further example of the tendency for geneticists to ignore fossil and archaeological evidence, perhaps because they think it can always be molded to fit the genetics after the fact."

Tishkoff said she agreed on the need for caution in making statistical inferences, and that there are other events besides interbreeding that can make a single DNA sequence look ancient. "But when you see it at a genomewide level, it's harder to explain away," she said.

Excerpt from:
DNA and fossils tell differing tales of human origins

by Brian Vastag - Jul. 26, 2012 11:06 PM Washington Post

The human family tree just got another -- mysterious -- branch, an African "sister species" to the heavy-browed Neanderthals who once roamed Europe.

While no fossilized bones have been found from these enigmatic people, they did leave a calling card in present-day Africans: snippets of foreign DNA.

There's only way one that genetic material could have made it into modern human populations.

"Geneticists like euphemisms, but we're talking about sex," said Joshua Akey of the University of Washington in Seattle, whose lab identified the foreign DNA in three groups of modern Africans.

These genetic leftovers do not resemble DNA from any modern-day humans. The foreign DNA also does not resemble Neanderthal DNA, which shows up in the DNA of some modern-day Europeans, Akey said. That means the newly identified DNA came from an unknown group.

"We're calling this a Neanderthal sibling species in Africa," Akey said. He added that the interbreeding likely occurred 20,000 to 50,000 years ago, long after some modern humans had walked out of Africa to colonize Asia and Europe, and around the same time Neanderthals were waning in Europe.

Akey said that present-day Europeans show no evidence of the foreign DNA, meaning the mystery people were likely confined to Africa.

The find offers more evidence that for thousands of years, modern-looking humans shared the Earth with evolutionary cousins who later died out. And when the groups met, they did what came naturally -- they bred.

The once controversial idea that humans mated with other species is now widely accepted among scientists. In fact, hominid hanky-panky seems to have occurred wherever humans met others who looked kind of like them.

Originally posted here:
DNA links humans, mystery species

ScienceDaily (July 26, 2012) Roofers and road construction workers who use hot asphalt are exposed to high levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). A University of Colorado Cancer Center study published this week in the British Medical Journal Open shows that roofers have higher PAH blood-levels after working a shift and that these high levels of PAHs are linked with increased rates of DNA damage, and potentially with higher cancer risk.

"We've known for some time that roofers and road workers have higher cancer rates than the general population, but we also know roofers have a higher rates of smoking, alcohol use and higher UV exposure than the general population. It's been difficult to pinpoint the cause of higher cancer rates -- is it due to higher PAHs or is it due to lifestyle and other risk factors?" says Berrin Serdar, MD, PhD, investigator at the CU Cancer Center and assistant professor of environmental and occupational health at the Colorado School of Public Health.

Her study, completed with colleagues at the University of Miami, studied 19 roofers from four work sites in Miami-Dade County. Participants' urine samples, provided before and after a 6-hour shift, showed that after acute exposure to hot asphalt, PAH biomarkers were elevated. Overall, biomarkers of PAH exposure and oxidative DNA damage (8-OHdG) were highest among workers who didn't use protective gloves and workers who also reported work related skin burns, pointing to the role of PAH absorption through skin.

"PAHs are a complex mixture of chemicals some of which are known human carcinogens. They are produced by incomplete combustion of organic materials and exist in tobacco smoke, engine exhaust, or can come from environmental sources like forest fires, but the highest exposure is among occupational groups, for example coke oven workers or workers who use hot asphalt," Serdar says.

"We can't say with certainty that exposure to hot asphalt causes roofers' increased cancer rate," Serdar says, "but that possibility is becoming increasingly likely. Hot asphalt leads to PAH exposure, leads to higher PAH biomarkers, leads to increased DNA damage -- we hope to further explore the final link between DNA damage due to PAH exposure and higher cancer rates in this population."

Serdar and colleagues at the CU Cancer Center have initiated a wider study of roofers in the Denver metropolitan area. This study will simultaneously investigate air, blood, and urine levels of PAHs and their link to DNA damage in samples collected over a workweek.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Colorado Denver. The original article was written by Garth Sundem.

More here:
DNA damage in roofers due to PAH exposure, possible cancer link

26 July 2012 Last updated at 03:59 ET

Police in Mauritius have begun DNA testing of hotel staff working on the day Michaela McAreavey was murdered.

Detectives are at the former Legends hotel to collect samples from 216 employees.

These will be compared with traces left at the scene of the honeymoon suite where the 27-year-old from County Tyrone was killed in January 2011.

A new investigation team was set up after two former hotel workers were acquitted of murder earlier this month.

The BBC's Yasine Mohabuth said detectives were also taking fingerprints "for comparison with those found at the scene of crime".

Hotel director Brice Lunot told independent station Radio Plus: "The hotel management is relieved at the decision to reopen the investigation."

Mauritius foreign affairs minister, Arvin Boolell, has promised that "no stone will be left unturned" until these responsible for Mrs McAreavey's death were found.

Former hotel workers Sandip Moneea and Avinash Treebhoowoon were cleared of Mrs McAreavey's killing by a jury at the Supreme Court in the capital Port Louis.

View post:
DNA tests in new Michaela inquiry

The human family tree just got another mysterious branch, an African sister species to the heavy-browed Neanderthals that once roamed Europe.

While no fossilized bones have been found from these enigmatic people, they did leave a calling card in present-day Africans: snippets of foreign DNA.

Theres only one way that genetic material could have made it into modern human populations.

Geneticists like euphemisms, but were talking about sex, said Joshua Akey of the University of Washington in Seattle, whose lab identified the mystery DNA in three groups of modern Africans.

These genetic leftovers do not resemble DNA from any modern-day humans. The foreign DNA also does not resemble Neanderthal DNA, which shows up in the DNA of some modern-day Europeans, Akey said. That means the newly identified DNA came from an unknown group.

Were calling this a Neanderthal sibling species in Africa, Akey said. He added that the interbreeding probably occurred 20,000 to 50,000 years ago, long after some modern humans had walked out of Africa to colonize Asia and Europe, and around the same time Neanderthals were waning in Europe.

The find offers more evidence that for thousands of years, modern-looking humans shared the Earth with evolutionary cousins who later died out. And whenever the groups met, whether in Africa or Europe, they did what came naturally they bred. In fact, hominid hanky-panky seems to have occurred wherever humans met others who looked kind of like them a controversial idea until recently.

In 2010, researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany announced finding Neanderthal DNA in the genomes of modern Europeans.

Barrel-chested people whose thick double brows, broad noses and flat faces set them apart from modern humans, Neanderthals disappeared around 25,000 to 30,000 years ago.

Another mysterious group of extinct people recently identified from a 30,000-year-old finger bone in Siberia known as the Denisovans also left some of their DNA in modern-day Pacific Islanders.

Read more:
Neanderthal-type species once roamed Africa, DNA shows

A federal appeals court will take a second look at a California law that requires police to collect DNA from people who are arrested on suspicion of felonies, regardless of whether they are convicted.

A majority of judges on the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals voted Wednesday to reconsider a split decision by a three-judge panel that had upheld the program in February.

The court's decision to ask an 11-judge panel to consider the case was a setback for prosecutors, who have defended the DNA collection as a vital crime-fighting tool.

Once a person is swabbed, his or her DNA profile is placed in a criminal database, where it can be compared with DNA profiles obtained from evidence left at crime scenes. Among those challenging the program were three protesters who were arrested but never convicted of a crime. Two of those challengers were released without being charged.

California voters approved collecting DNA from felony arrestees in 2004, passing Proposition 69 by a wide margin. The state began taking DNA from people arrested on suspicion of felonies in 2009 but immediately faced litigation over whether the collection violated the constitutional rights of people to be free of unreasonable searches and seizures.

In his dissent in February, 9th Circuit Judge William A. Fletcher questioned the effectiveness of the program, observing that many DNA "hits" to crime scene evidence involved suspects who were eventually convicted. The state has long obtained DNA from convicted criminals, a practice courts have upheld.

Although people who are not convicted may apply to have their DNA profile removed from the criminal database, "expungement is a lengthy, uncertain, and expensive process," Fletcher wrote.

The California Supreme Court also is examining the legality of collecting genetic evidence from people before conviction, after a lower state court ruled the practice unconstitutional.

Atty. Gen.Kamala D. Harris, whose office is defending the DNA program, has said that the arrestee DNA collection has solved thousands of crimes. Her office said the potential genetic matches to crime scene evidence rose nearly 51% in the year after authorities began compiling arrestee DNA.

Most states take DNA from at least some felony suspects before conviction, but courts have been split over the constitutionality of the practice. TheU.S. Supreme Courtis considering a ruling out of Maryland that struck down that state's collection of DNA from people never convicted of a crime.

The rest is here:
Federal appeals court to reconsider California DNA-collection law

Home News Courts Samuel Williams, 24, views phone records during his death penalty case. He is charged with two counts of aggravated murder and kidnapping and one count of aggravated burglary in the 2011 deaths. THE BLADE/ANDY MORRISON Enlarge Loading

Published: 7/26/2012

BY ERICA BLAKE AND JENNIFER FEEHAN BLADE STAFF WRITERS

Black duct tape wrapped around the necks of Lisa Straub and Johnny Clarke to hold plastic bags in place was so tight, it cut off the blood to their heads, and eventually their air, a deputy Lucas County coroner testified in Common Pleas Court.

Maneesha Pandey was the final state witness in the aggravated murder trial of Samuel Williams, who faces the death penalty if convicted. The 26th witness in the case, Dr. Pandey told a jury of nine women and three men on Wednesday that Ms. Straub and Clarke died of asphyxiation from suffocation and strangulation caused by a bag over their faces and tape around their necks.

Williams, 24, and co-defendant Cameo Pettaway, 23, are both charged with two counts of aggravated murder and kidnapping and one count of aggravated burglary in the Jan. 30, 2011, deaths of Ms. Straub, 20, and Clarke, 21.

The two were found in the home of Ms. Straub's parents with their hands bound behind their backs and plastic bags secured tightly around their necks. Clarke's ankles also were bound withduct tape.

Jurors in Williams' case are expected to hear closing arguments today, then proceed to deliberations. Dr. Pandey is expected to testify today during the trial of Mr. Pettaway, whose case is being heard by a jury of nine women and three men in a different courtroom.

During the third day of testimony at both trials, investigators and analysts spoke of the evidence collected at the Longacre Lane home in Springfield Township where the bodies were found.

Of all the evidence collected, a discarded cigarette butt -- and only that cigarette butt -- contained the DNA of both Williams and Mr. Pettaway, a DNA analyst said Wednesday in both courtrooms.

Continue reading here:
DNA evidence shown in murder trial

Nearly thirty-two years after Mildred McKinney was sexually assaulted, beaten and strangled in her home, authorities in Texas have made an arrest in the elderly woman's murder.

Authorities announced today that Stephen Alan Thomas, 53, is being held at Williamson County Jail on a capital murder charge for the Nov. 4, 1980 murder of McKinney, who was then 73.

Henry Lee Lucas, a convicted serial killer who has since died, had confessed to the crime, but his admission was discounted in the late 1980s after DNA testing, said Sgt. John Foster of the Williamson County Sheriff's Office.

"We never did know Stephen Alan Thomas until the DNA hit," Foster said. "That just opened a whole direction in the case."

Thomas' DNA was found on a ligature, which was used to tie McKinney's body, Foster said. His fingerprint was also found in her home, according to police.

On June 27, 2012, a lab test showed the DNA was a match.

Williamson County Sheriff?s Office

Authorities traveled to Dallas to interview Thomas and later to Austin, where he had relocated to his parents' home, Foster said.

"The first time I talked to him, he denied everything and ever knowing Mildred McKinney, ever being in her house and any type of sexual contact with her," Foster said. "[If that was the case] his DNA being in that house should have never been in there. He kind of worked himself into a bit of a problem there."

Foster said that because of the pending investigation, he was unable to discuss any theories as to why McKinney was targeted or whether Thomas knew her. But he said he was "thrilled" to see an arrest after several decades.

Read the original here:
Texas Cold Case: Arrest in 1980 Murder After DNA Match

MONTPELIER, Vt.Lawyers for a former New York man in prison for the 1994 murder of his wife say new analysis of DNA evidence points strongly to his innocence.

The state defender general's office and a private Burlington lawyer filed court papers on Tuesday asking that John Grega, 50, be set free or at least be given a new trial.

Defender General Matthew Valerio said the Grega case marks the first time a Vermont court has been asked to overturn a conviction based on DNA evidence under a 2008 state law allowing those convicted of certain serious crimes to petition for DNA testing of biological evidence. It could mark the arrival in Vermont of a national trend in which serious felony convictions have been overturned thanks to newly available DNA evidence.

Grega was convicted in 1995 of aggravated murder and aggravated sexual assault in the rape and killing of his wife, Christine, the previous year. The Gregas were from Lake Grove, N.Y., on Long Island and were vacationing with their then-2-year-old son in West Dover when Christine Grega, 31, was killed.

Grega was the first person convicted and sentenced under a then-new Vermont law setting a penalty of life in prison without parole for aggravated murder.

A motion filed in Windham Superior Court by Valerio's office and Burlington lawyer Ian Carleton said tests conducted recently by the state crime lab on a DNA sample taken from Christine Grega's body showed it was not that of John Grega, but another, unknown male.

"It is difficult to overstate the game-changing nature of this new evidence, especially in a case where, as here, the evidence of Mr. Grega's guilt has at all times been purely circumstantial," the lawyers wrote. The new developments were first reported in Wednesday's Rutland Herald and Barre-Montpelier Times Argus.

"Under the reasonable doubt standard, this new DNA evidence -- which was never presented to the jury and therefore was never considered in deliberations -- would have not just slightly, but vastly, increased the likelihood of an acquittal or a hung jury in the original trial," they added. "Put simply, we now have compelling evidence that John Grega did not commit the crime for which he has served nearly two decades in jail."

Valerio said the Windham County state's attorney's office would have a chance to respond to the motion, and then the court would have several options: It could reject the new filing; it could vacate Grega's conviction and set him free; it could let the conviction stand but reduce the sentence to time served and set Grega free, or it could order a new trial.

The state's attorney, Tracy Shriver, said Wednesday afternoon she did not want to comment until doing so in writing to the court.

Here is the original post:
Questions raised by DNA in Vt. murder conviction

Published: Jul 25, 2012 12:00 AM Modified: Jul 24, 2012 12:15 PM

DNA reveals womans past, houses possible future

Deardra Green-Campbell, left, and William Johnston Hogan. DNA and genealogical evidence indicates that Green-Campbell is a descendant of Hogan's.

Photos courtesy of the Preservation Society of Chapel Hill

Deardra Green-Campbell stands in front of the Hogan-Rogers House on Purefoy Road. Genealogical and DNA data indicate that Green-Campbell's great-great-great grandmother was a slave of Thomas Lloyd Hogan, who built the house in the 1840s.

Photo courtesy of the Preservation Society of Chapel Hill

CHAPEL HILL - Sitting at a table at the Outback Steakhouse in Suwanee, Ga., Ernest Dollar insisted on making a brief speech before presenting the envelope with such a flourish that his wife asked him if he really had to be so dramatic to Deardra Green-Campbell.Ernie made a big production out of it, said Green-Campbell, an economic development consultant in Atlanta. But the truth was, it was a very emotional moment for me.Inside the envelope were the results of a DNA analysis comparing her familys genetic makeup with that of the Hogan family, among the first to settle in Orange County. The conclusion: a strong indication that Green-Campbell was descended from Harriet Hogan a slave of Thomas Lloyd Hogan and William Johnston Hogan, the slave-owners white son. That link filled in a key piece of her familys genealogical puzzle, which Green-Campbell had been tracing for four years.I thought, Here we are sitting in a restaurant in the 21st century, and Im looking at a part of my familys life from well over a century ago, she said. It made me feel an even stronger connection with my ancestors. It almost transported me back to that time.For Green-Campbell, the DNA confirmation opened a window on a previously hidden portion of her familys past.For Dollar, the executive director of the Preservation Society of Chapel Hill, it was a vivid illustration of William Faulkners famous dictum that The past is never dead. Its not even past. It also might play a role in efforts to save a historic house, the Hogan-Rogers House on Purefoy Road in Chapel Hill.The Preservation Society will hold a press conference Wednesday to discuss the DNA project and the status of the Hogan-Rogers House.Thomas Lloyd Hogan built the house in the mid-1840s, and indications are that the familys slaves, including Harriet Green-Campbells great-great-great grandmother lived in its basement.The house is slated for demolition this fall to make way for St. Paul AME Church, which is moving to the site. The Preservation Society and others, including St. Paul, hope to move it intact to a nearby site to serve as a community center for the Rogers Road neighborhood. The DNA link to Green-Campbells family helps bring to life the long history of an important house, Dollar said. The Hogan-Rogers House is a link to a time before the neighborhood became dominated by the nearby Orange County landfill, which was built in the early 1970s. This house has had an iconic role in a community that has been hit so hard by the landfill, Dollar said. You can still find people in the neighborhood who remember sitting with their dates on the front porch, playing in the yard, eating dinner in the basement. Its a reminder that history remains relevant today.It took an impressive bit of sleuthing by Green-Campbell to come up with the connection between her family, which is centered mostly in the Northeast, and the Hogans in Orange County. She knew her extended family included some members with the surname Hogan (sometimes Hogans), and she knew her mother Harriet was named after a distant grandmother. On the Preservation Societys website she found a piece about the Hogan-Rogers House that mentioned a slave of the Hogan family named Harriet. She and Dollar exchanged information and concluded the two Harriets were probably the same person. Further searching turned up records indicating that Harriet and W.J. Hogan had a baby boy in 1845 they named Haywood Hogan.At that point, Id say I was 60-40 convinced I was on the right track, Green-Campbell said. We decided the DNA test could confirm it.In order to determine a genetic match, she needed to find a male relative on her mothers side. More investigation led her to a distant cousin living in Brooklyn, N.Y. His name: Haywood Hogans.I tracked down his number and called him. He was not aware of me or anybody in his family further back than his grandfather, whose name was also Haywood Hogans, Green-Campbell said. So when I got to the point where I said, Oh, by the way, I need a DNA sample, he was a bit shocked.Eventually, he agreed. Green-Campbell and Haywood Hogans plan to attend the press conference at the Horace Williams House.Never in my wildest dreams did I think Id be able to see and touch documents and structures pertaining to my enslaved ancestors, Green-Campbell said. On top of that, to be able to participate in the efforts to preserve the house in which my third great-grandmother was a slave has been an overwhelmingly emotional part of my journey.

Hart: 919-932-8744

Excerpt from:
DNA reveals woman’s past, house’s possible future

Californias practice of taking DNA from people who have been arrested but not yet convicted of a felony is going to get a second look by a federal appeals court.

A majority of judges on the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals voted Wednesday to reconsider a split decision by a three-judge panel that upheld the program in February.

The courts decision to ask a larger panel of judges to consider the case is a setback forstate prosecutors, who have defended the DNA collection as a vital crime tool.

Once a person is swabbed, his or her DNA profile is placed in a criminal database, where it can be compared with DNA profiles compiled from evidence at crime scenes. Among those challenging the program were three protesters who were arrested but never convicted of a crime.

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Taking DNA swabs from arrestees will be reviewed