DNA on joint at murder scene matches Hernandez, Lloyd

DNA from former New England Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez and from murder victim Odin L. Lloyd was found on a joint discarded at the scene of the Dorchester mans slaying near Hernandezs North Attleboro home, a crime lab scientist testified yesterday.

Hernandez is on trial for murder in the June 2013 killing of Lloyd.

Diane Fife Biagiotti of the state police crime lab told jurors that she received rolling paper from a 2-inch-long butt end of a joint to test for DNA. She said she found it had the DNA of at least two people on it.

She said she first compared it with Lloyds DNA and discovered he could have been one of the people whose DNA appeared on the butt. She said she then was able to use Lloyds DNA to deduce the second DNA contributor.

I found that the profile from Aaron Hernandez matched the deduced DNA profile, she said.

She then ran a statistical analysis and determined the likelihood it was from someone else is one in more than a quadrillion.

Hernandezs lawyer James Sultan went after other DNA evidence in the case, including some collected from a spent shell casing an Enterprise rental car employee found stuck to some blue bubble gum under the drivers seat of a car Hernandez had rented.

Biagiotti testified she found Hernandez DNA on the shell casing, but she also acknowledged she did not know the gum had been stuck to the shell before she did her test.

Would you agree with me, Ms. Biagiotti, that there is a high likelihood that the DNA contained in the saliva on a chewed blue chewing gum would be transferred to that shell casing? Sultan asked.

Yes, I would agree with that, she said.

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DNA on joint at murder scene matches Hernandez, Lloyd