Published: January 11, 2008 10:36 am         

Holcomb lawyers want independent lab to analyze evidence

PRINCETON — Brooklyn Holcomb died almost a year ago, but some of the evidence in her death has yet to be tested.

According to West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals documents, the state’s high court will determine where scrapings taken from the 5-year-old’s fingernails may be examined.

Attorneys for her father and accused killer, Ronald Holcomb, 35, have filed a petition to stop testing at the West Virginia State Police Crime Lab, citing what they argue is Holcomb’s right to evidence examination at an independent lab.

The case began Jan. 15, 2007, when Ronald Holcomb arrived at Princeton Community Hospital’s emergency room with the unconscious child. At the time, law enforcement and health care officials reported he claimed Brooklyn injured herself earlier in the day and he found her unconscious in an upstairs room.

Upon closer examination, doctors said extensive bruising, head trauma and various other injuries appeared inconsistent with Holcomb’s claim and notified police officers.

Holcomb was arrested at the scene without incident, Princeton Police Det. Sgt. C.N. Poe reported at the time.

Due to the severity of her injuries, Brooklyn was transported to Charleston, where she died two days later.

During her hospitalization and a subsequent autopsy, officials acquired scraping of the material under her fingernails, in the hopes of testing the evidence for DNA. According to the petition, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Scott Ash notified defense attorneys Tim and Joe Harvey on Aug. 22, 2007, the evidence had been forwarded to the crime lab and that the necessary tests would require all of the evidence, prohibiting the defense from conducting similar testing at a different lab.

The defense immediately filed a motion before Circuit Court Judge William Sadler to stop the testing, arguing “tangible evidence will be irretrievably destroyed through the process of such testing, and will not be available to the petitioner for an independent examination.”

Rather than testing at the State Police crime lab, the defense requested an agreement to test the evidence at an independent forensic lab.

Doing so would presume corruption on the part of the state lab, according to a response filed by Prosecuting Attorney Timm Boggess.

“Clearly, if the fingernail scraping sample is to be tested and there is inculpatory or exculpatory evidence to be produced, then the sample will not be available for further testing. However, Petitioner does not show any damage or prejudice in permitting the State Lab to perform the testing.

That the trial court does not presume corruption on the part of the State Lab does not indicated a ‘flagrant’ abuse of discretion on behalf of the judge,” he wrote.

In short, Boggess said the trial court, and Sadler, “got it right” by refusing to prohibit testing at the state lab.

The state Supreme Court of Appeals is set to review the evidence arguments on Jan. 23.

Meanwhile, the high court will also set a location for Holcomb’s trial. Sadler ordered a change of venue last fall, citing defense evidence that it would be difficult, if not impossible, for Holcomb to receive a fair trial in Mercer County.

A representative in the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office reported Wednesday that office had not received notice of a time or location for the trial.

Holcomb’s ex-wife, Tracy Farmer, pleaded guilty to child neglect in October, after a grand jury indicted her in June.

Circuit Court Judge David Knight sentenced Farmer to one to three years for her part in Brooklyn’s death, but he suspended the entire sentence, instead placing the 33-year-old woman on probation for the next three to five years.

She reportedly agreed to assist in the case against her ex-husband.

     

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