Top science cracks tough domestic and violent crimes

By Jowi A. Carteciano & Rodel G. Offemaria
Science and Technology Media Service

At about 10 AM on July 11, 1999, a fisherman and three barangay officers retrieved the bloated body of a 9-year old girl from the mud-spattered river in Rosario, Cavite.  The body in early stage of decomposition was taken to a nearby funeral house for autopsy.

Autopsy report indicated the girl was raped and strangled to death.  Three fresh vaginal lacerations and broken tracheal or neck bones snapped what could be a full life ahead.

With the cadaver's condition and its haphazard transfer from one place to another, retrieval of primary evidence such as the assailant(s) fingerprints was no longer feasible.  Only fluids and blood clots found in the victim's genital held hope against any hopes to track and nail the perpetrator(s) of the grisly rape with homicide.

Eleven years earlier, a man went to prison after rape complaint was filed against him on March 31, 1991.  The rape supposedly led to pregnancy.  Fingerprints and analyses of bodily fluids were futile as evidence since the complaint was filed 10 months after commission of supposed “rape that bore a child”.

During litigation, evidences were purely based on verbal information from the alleged victim and her mother who was the prime witness.  Defense would later rely on parentage analyses of the child, one of the first cases to involve cutting edge gene-level science in a local court.

In these two rape cases, the use of fingerprinting technology technically known as dactyloscopy was improbable.   The 80-year old investigative tool is widely used internationally. 

But domestic law enforcement recently adopted a new, far more reliable modern investigative tool called forensic DNA technology.  Forensic DNA technology is far superior than fingerprint analysis and serotyping or blood typing to identify a person in terms of clarity, consistency, and exactness of results, says Dr. Ma. Corazon A. De-Ungria, chief of DNA analysis laboratory at the University of the Philippines' Natural Sciences Research Institute.

The new technology zeroes in on the nucleus of human cell, the tiniest particle in a human body.

What is Forensic DNA Technology

De-Ungria explains forensic DNA technology as the application of scientific principles and technological practices to obtain documented results or evidence that may be used to study and resolve crimes, civil, and other regulatory issues.

The human body contains billions of cells.  The nucleus of each cell contains tiny compartments called chromosomes (46 for human).  In these tiny compartments are pairs of deoxyribonucleic acid or DNA molecules.

DNA molecules carry the genes responsible for programming or coding a person's physical and behavioral characteristics that in turn are transferred to children and to many generations thereafter.

Gene codes determine how a person looks and behaves.  They define the person's capacity to fight diseases and the ability to carry out biological processes like digestion and reproduction.  A person has approximately 30,000 gene codes all necessary to sustain life.

A person has a total of 3.1647 billion pairs of DNA containing gene codes called “human genome”, which makes a person distinctively different from everybody else, more so with other species, says Dr. Celia Aurora Torres-Villanueva, a leading Filipino micro-biotechnologist.

At the moment of conception, the fertilized egg (union of a father's sperm cell and mother's egg cell) contains the DNA profile inherited from the sperm and the egg.  As the fertilized egg divides and multiplies to develop human life form, the original structure and form or profile of inherited DNA simultaneously replicates itself.  This biological magic establishes the child's own and distinct DNA profile containing two halves of DNA profile, one each from father and mother.        Every DNA profile uniquely and exclusively identifies only one person and the identity stays until death, de Ungria explained.

Only identical twins have the same DNA profile, Torres-Villanueva also stressed.

Meanwhile, a tiny amount of substances from any part of a person's body like semen, blood (white blood cells only), hair roots (not strands), saliva or epithelial cells from linings of the oral cavity, skin, bone and bone marrow, is enough to obtain one and the same DNA profile.

Vivid illustrations of a person's DNA profile are in the form of bar codes, analyzed and processed in computerized electrophoretic apparatus—an equipment used for DNA analysis.  Bar codes help forensic scientists in comparing a person's bar coded DNA profile to those retrieved from a crime scene.

Disparity in bar code structures spares innocent suspects.  But similarities provide strong indication of guilt.  The technology has 99.99 percent accuracy rate, says Dr. Idabel Pagulayan, chief of the National Bureau of Investigation's forensic chemistry division.  There's just no wily way to escape the precision of this scientific analysis.

High science vs. Crimes

Forensic DNA technology is in full use and accepted in 18 states in the US since 1989.  These states allow DNA analysis results especially in establishing child paternity or in identifying crime suspects.  Over the years, convictions of 143 prisoners including 13 on death row have been overturned following introduction of DNA analysis results, Readers' Digest featured in its August 2004 issue.

In the Philippines, the immense value of forensic DNA technology in judicial proceedings was evident in the trial of two rape cases cited.

Rape with Homicide

Gerrico Samartino joined hardened criminals in New Bilibid Prison's death row after the Supreme Court affirmed on March 9, 2002 a lower court decision that found him guilty of rape with homicide on the hapless 9-year old girl in Rosario, Cavite.

The SC positively noted the forensic DNA technology results used as bases for the conviction, which showed Samartino's DNA profile matched those in the semen found in the victim's genitalia.

Rape resulting to pregnancy

As for the rape complaint against Victoriano Paras, the Pasig City Regional Trial Court Branch 163 Judge Aurelio C. Trampe considered the merits of comparative analyses of DNA prints of Paras and his alleged child in a simple process called parentage analysis.

 DNA analysis showed none of the half DNA prints that the child should have inherited from Paras' DNA profile.   Judge Trampe ruled that Paras could not be the father of the complainant's child.

The case demonstrated the cold precision of scientific truth over inconsistencies of verbal testimonies of alleged victim Joanna Ocray and her mother and prime witness Maura Ocray.  Paras came out clean of criminal stain on May 5, 1999.

Swifter justice

In the Samartino case, it took only 12 months and five days for the Cavite City Regional Trial Court Branch 88 to complete the litigation process with the aid of forensic DNA technology and come out with decision, quite swift in Philippine prosecution standard.  The rapist was arraigned July 26, 1999 and convicted July 31, 2000. 

Meanwhile, the Paras paternity trial was done in just two weeks.  Court proceedings lasted only four months leading to the acquittal.

Paras should not have languished in jail that long if only forensic DNA technology was used either immediately during the first stages of the criminal investigation, when the crime allegedly occurred or in the early parts of the trial, especially at the time the child was born.

Forensic DNA Technology in the Philippines

The National Statistics Office reported a total of 79,248 crimes committed in the country's 15 regions in 1995.   Majority of crimes involved physical injury, theft, robbery, murder, homicide, and rape.

Analyses of these index crimes showed high probability of isolating biological materials from crime scenes or from the victims.  This also means high probability of inclusion of DNA materials as part of loads of evidences for criminal investigation, de-Ungria said.

Since perpetrators and victims in many crimes are in one place at the same time, the opportunity to isolate biological material such DNA may be used to retrace or reconstruct sequences of the criminal act.  DNA-backed investigation is easier especially when there is direct contact between perpetrator and victim particularly when there is violent struggle before injury or death of assault victim, de-Ungria added.

Of all the crimes cited, rape cases require closer scrutiny due to alarmingly high number of reported cases that NBI says average 366 per month.  Rape conviction carries life imprisonment (reclusion perpetua) or death penalty.

So far, there are only four DNA testing laboratories in the country such as the DNA sections of NBI, Philippine National Police, St. Lukes Medical Center Institute of Pathology and DNA Analysis Laboratory, and UP-NSRI in Diliman.

The NBI and PNP focus on criminal and civil cases, SMLC only accepts paternity cases for private clients, and UP-NRSI undertakes forensic researches that cover validation of methods, quality assurance procedures, and training.  UP-NSRI also accepts DNA tests for civil and criminal cases as part of community services.

Most of the analyses of DNA prints used as court evidences especially those in high profile criminal and civil cases go through the government DNA laboratories.  SLMC maintains a policy of non-accommodation of or involvement with high profile cases.  

But with already high and increasing number of crimes, experts and equipment resources are overstretched.  NBI maintains a P4 million DNA analysis equipment and its scientific criminal investigation services unit works on a P94.9 million budget, records of the 2003 General Appropriations Act show.

Dr. Pagulayan who trained at the US Federal Bureau of Investigation heads a staff of 32 specialists and chemists.

The UP-NSRI also conducts a European Union- funded training program annually since 1996 for NBI, PNP, and some judges and lawyers on the science of forensic DNA technology.

In criminal cases, government laboratories do DNA analysis free of charge.  But in civil cases like parentage analysis, the cost of laboratory work that takes 2-4 weeks is P20 thousand.  The chemist-on-case appears in court to interpret and explain results.

Forensic DNA technology more recently was used to identify decomposing bodies of victims of disasters including those of the shipwrecked WG&A passenger liner early this year, and the charred bodies of children in Damas de Filipinas orphanage razed by fire in 1998.

The strength of DNA-based evidence in solving crimes is well established in Australia, Japan, UK, the US, and other developed countries.  But de-Ungria said its full recognition in Philippine criminal cases has still a long way to cover. 

Advances in forensic DNA technology overseas offer the Philippines a significant opportunity to improve its administration of justice.  The technology achieved quantum leap with the completion of the Human Genome Project in April 25, 2003, which took the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium 13 years and $US3 billion to finish.

De Ungria, Pagulayan, and other pioneering Filipino scientists has taken the first steps to integrate a powerful scientific investigative tool into the judicial system.  The executive, legislative, and judiciary branches just have to pick up the tab.