DNA analysis didnt follow guidelines

Sample not preserved for 96 hours and evidence of Anwar's experts dismissed as 'armchair experts'.

PUTRAJAYA: Defence counsel Ramkarpal Singh submitted that the government DNA experts and labs did not adhere to international standards and guidelines and the analysis was unsafe to rely on.

Ramkarpal said there were contradictions in the DNA analysis and the government chemist Dr Seah Lay Hong was unable to provide manuals, guidelines and the standards used to draw her conclusions.

The fallacy is that DNA evidence is never wrong. The defence was seriously disadvantaged during the trial as Anwars expert could not respond.

The Court of Appeal did not even consider the evidence of Anwars DNA experts concluding them as armchair experts, he said.

Ramkarpal submitted that the integrity of the DNA samples was in question due to degradation.

Even the government DNA expert agreed that the samples ought to have been severely degraded because they were unpreserved for 96 hours, he said.

He pointed out that the samples had been kept in the investigating officers filing cabinet for 40 hours before being sent to the chemist.

I would even argue that it is not the same sample having regard to its history in Saifuls rectum and then left unpreserved by Investigating Officer, he added.

Ramkarpal also said the presence of another mans sperm on the swabs as clear contamination, adding that the IO might have contaminated the samples, but there was no way to know without an exclusion process.

Originally posted here:
DNA analysis didnt follow guidelines