The judge didn't allow Ma- loof to tell jurors about Baker, saying the evidence against the street artist was too tenuous to raise a reasonable doubt. Because Baker had been buried nearly three decades earlier, exhuming his body was unlikely to yield usable DNA. The blood-spotted parking ticket found in Baker's van had been lost or destroyed.
Summing up the evidence for jurors, Maloof said that all the prosecution had was some "shoddy" DNA evidence.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Thursday, May 29, 2008 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 2 inches; 82 words Type of Material: Correction
DNA evidence: A May 4 article in Section A about the statistical calculations involved in describing DNA evidence in a murder case contained an arithmetic error. It said that multiplying the probability of 1 in 1.1 million by 338,000 was the same as dividing 1.1 million by 338,000. Actually, it's the same as dividing 338,000 by 1.1 million. The answer, a 1 in 3 probability of a coincidental match between crime scene DNA and genetic profiles in a state database, was correct.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Sunday, June 01, 2008 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 2 inches; 80 words Type of Material: Correction
DNA evidence: A May 4 article in Section A about the statistical calculations involved in describing DNA evidence in a murder case contained an arithmetic error. It said that multiplying the probability of 1 in 1.1 million by 338,000 was the same as dividing 1.1 million by 338,000. Actually, it's the same as dividing 338,000 by 1.1 million. The answer, a 1-in-3 probability of a coincidental match between crime scene DNA and genetic profiles in a state database, was correct.
An array of numbers
Through dueling experts, the prosecution and defense offered jurors a dizzying array of numbers to consider in weighing the DNA match.
A "likelihood ratio" presented by a prosecution expert placed the chance of a coincidental match at 1 in 1.7 million. A "combined probability of inclusion" put it at 1 in 152 billion.
The numbers all pointed to the virtual certainty that the DNA at the crime scene was Puckett's.
In an interview after the trial, Ranajit Chakraborty, the prosecution's DNA expert, told The Times that he generally favors giving jurors the database adjustment. He did not present an adjustment in this case because the judge, like most others, would not allow it.
In opening arguments, Merin sought to simplify things for jurors. "His DNA was found in her mouth," he said, drawing an inference allowed in court but not supported by science.
Merin focused the jury's attention on the 1-in-1.1-million general-population statistic, and did some quick arithmetic on a whiteboard.
There were about 18 million people in California in 1972, he said, half of them women. That left 8 million or 9 million men in the state. "You have eight or nine Caucasian men in the state that look like that crime-scene profile," Merin said.
"That man," he said, pointing at Puckett, "happens to be one of them."
His argument, a common one in DNA cases, was compelling. But it implied a certainty that DNA analysis cannot provide.
The defense team countered with its own experts, who made different calculations based on more conservative assumptions. Their numbers, 1 in 16,400 and 1 in 40,000, showed a greater, albeit still remote, chance of finding a coincidental match. Jurors would have to decide for themselves which numbers best fit the evidence.
The verdict
Not long into their deliberations, jurors sent the judge a handwritten question: "How was [Puckett] identified as a person of interest?"
