August 29, 2008
Evidence bungled?
Blood work in DWI death trial might have been mishandled, according to testimony of troopers, others
The blood sample that prosecutors say shows that Martin Heidgen had as many as 14 drinks in his system on the night he drove the wrong way on the Meadowbrook Parkway appears to have been mishandled, according to court testimony yesterday.
As a string of people, from state troopers to a nurse and a crime lab technician, took the stand yesterday, Heidgen's lawyer, Stephen LaMagna of Garden City, suggested they botched the handling of Heidgen's blood as it was drawn, labeled, and passed between police officers and crime lab employees.
"I think it became apparent today that there is serious doubt as to whether this is his blood," LaMagna said outside court.
Heidgen, 25, of Valley Stream, is being tried for second-degree murder, on charges that he drove drunk on July 2, 2005, when his pickup truck slammed into a limousine and killed driver Stanley Rabinowitz, 59, of Farmingdale, and 7-year-old Katie Flynn of Long Beach, who had just served as a flower girl in her aunt's wedding.
Prosecutor Maureen McCormick said any mistakes the troopers made were insignificant. They don't change the fact that it was Heidgen's blood and that its blood-alcohol content was .28 percent, more than three times the legal limit, McCormick said.
"In every case where human beings are involved, they do things, they forget things. It's just people," McCormick said outside court.
The failure to properly label a blood sample could be damaging to prosecutors trying to convict Heidgen on second-degree murder charges, said lawyers who are not involved with the case.
Prosecutors will have a harder time persuading a jury to return a murder conviction because they have said they will prove Heidgen was drunk, said Riverhead attorney Susan Menu.
"It has tremendous impact on the case," she said.
"It could be very significant," said Richard Klein, a professor of criminal law at Touro Law School. Prosecutors may have other evidence showing Heidgen committed murder, Klein said, but the mishandled blood sample "definitely weakens the prosecutor's case."
State Trooper Daniel O'Hare said on the stand that he didn't know Heidgen's name at the time a Nassau University Medical Center nurse took Heidgen's blood, so he didn't put Heidgen's name on the tape sealing his blood in the vials and did not seal the blood kit box at all, as the kit's instructions require. Another officer did that later, O'Hare testified.
O'Hare also testified that he didn't fill out the blood collection report, a form required when submitting a blood kit to the state police department lab for testing.
"This is a very important form, isn't it?" LaMagna asked O'Hare. O'Hare answered that it was.
"And you didn't fill it out, did you?" LaMagna asked. O'Hare said he didn't.
Katie Flynn's great uncle, Michael Tangney, a Long Beach police officer, said questioning the blood sample is a smoke-and-mirrors game by the defense.
"If you have facts, you put on the facts," he said outside court. "If you have nothing, you pound on the podium."
Staff writer Carl MacGowan contributed to this story.
Copyright © 2008, Newsday Inc.
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