The 2014 Bench Notes

The eleven handwritten pages are an inventory. They record each transfer from the property clerk and describe each item, in language that matches the “Items Submitted” section of Ms. Taylor’s typed report almost word for word, and end with a one-line statement of the requested analysis. Bench notes pp. 1–11; OCPD Forensic Exam. Rpt. SD-14-273, at 1–5. The five DNA profile summary forms tabulate final genotypes. The five serology worksheets are a second inventory, with columns for blood, semen, alternate light source and saliva tests; the only entries in those columns are negative results on Ms. Ligons’s oral wash and oral swab. Bench notes pp. 12–21.

Nothing in the twenty-one pages describes the examination of the pants: their condition when the bag was opened, what was seen under the light and magnifier, whether photographs were taken, or why the two swab sites on the fly were chosen. Nothing records the interpretation of the mixtures found on those swabs. And nothing records a decision to skip the screening the worksheet itself provides for. On the row for the pants, every column is blank, including “ALS,” “Saliva” and “Comments.” The form has a code for an item not examined, “NE.” It is not used.

Serology worksheet, page 2The row for the pants

Ms. Taylor has since given her reasons under oath. She said she began from “a really big assumption” that Ms. Ligons’s skin cells might be on the front of the pants, and did “not do any alternate light source testing of any kind” because she “was not thinking it was going to be saliva or vaginal fluids or semen at that point.” Asked why she did not test the pants for body fluids, she said she “was only looking for touch DNA on the front.” Taylor Dep. 18:16–19:5, 54:17–25 (Jan. 15, 2019). Her deposition may describe what she was thinking in 2014. The notes do not preserve it. They do not record whether alternate light screening or a saliva test was considered, rejected, or never came up. The ISO standard her laboratory worked under calls for records of “original observations” and enough information to establish an audit trail. ISO/IEC 17025:2005 § 4.13.2.1.

Page 10 records reference swabs from three women that reached the laboratory in October and November 2014. The date at the top is 10/16/15.

Bench notes, p.10A 2014 log page dated 2015

On September 28, 2015, at Mr. Gieger’s request, Ms. Taylor returned to the pants and swabbed the inside of the fly. She reported the results on October 7. Taylor Dep. 65:20–66:14 (Jan. 15, 2019); OCPD Supp. Forensic Exam. Rpt. (Oct. 7, 2015). The date on page 10 comes nine days after that report. Seven days after that, on October 23, the State gave the twenty-one pages to the defense as Ms. Taylor’s bench notes.

A mistaken year would not resolve it. If Ms. Taylor meant to write 10/16/14, the page would still be dated before the October 24 and November 4 deliveries it records.

The documents do not say when each entry was written. They do show that the date on a page is not the date everything on it was recorded. Several sheets list evidence that arrived after the date at the top. One handwritten page is dated October 16, 2015, and the set was produced seven days later as “Bench Notes created by Elaine Taylor in performing the DNA Analysis.”

The pages could be sheets begun in 2014 and added to later, copies of earlier notes, or entries written after the work was done. What the State has produced does not distinguish among them, and no earlier version has been produced.

The State handed these pages over as notes “created by Elaine Taylor in performing the DNA Analysis.” By their own dates, at least one was written in 2015. Taken at face value, the pages are an inventory of the evidence and a table of results. They preserve almost none of the analysis: not the examination of the pants, not the reasons the screening was skipped, not the reading of the mixtures.

Ms. Taylor’s own account of her examination, on video →