DNA testing in Rock Falls’ Valentine’s Day fatal stabbing hits legal snag, May 13 trial faces delay

MORRISON – Five days before a Rock Falls man’s murder trial is set to begin, Whiteside County’s state’s attorney is asking to delay the trial because her office continues to wait for DNA test results held up in the Illinois State Police crime lab.

Whiteside County State’s Attorney Colleen Buckwalter’s motion to continue Kyle Cooper’s first-degree murder trial was met with pushback from defense attorney James Mertes at a hearing Thursday, during which he vehemently opposed delaying the trial and argued that the state’s inability to “get its act together” to get DNA testing done is not reason enough to push it into June.

Cooper is charged in the Feb. 14 stabbing death of Daniel J. Gordon during an early-morning confrontation in a Rock Falls home’s driveway. Cooper and Gordon knew each other because Cooper’s previous girlfriend was dating Gordon. The woman was with Gordon the night of Feb. 13, when they crossed paths with Cooper while out in the Rock Fall bar scene that night and began feuding.

[ Rock Falls fatal stabbing trial delayed until May ]

Gordon, 27, was found unresponsive with multiple abdominal stab wounds about 2 a.m. Feb. 14 in the 600 block of West 20th Street in Rock Falls after Cooper and Gordon fought in a driveway, police said. Gordon died later that day at CGH Medical Center in Sterling, according to officials.

Cooper, 36, was charged with first-degree murder and two counts of aggravated battery in connection with Gordon’s death.

In laying out details of the state’s case in late February, Whiteside County Assistant State’s Attorney Ryan Simon said Cooper was taken into custody in the hours after Gordon was stabbed.

Cooper, wearing blood-stained clothes, turned himself in at the Whiteside County Sheriff’s Office later that morning and was charged with aggravated battery, police said. He was formally charged four days later with murder and an additional count of aggravated battery.

He pleaded not guilty, demanded a speedy trial and has been detained in the Whiteside County Jail since his arrest.

During the hour-long hearing Thursday, Whiteside County Circuit Court Judge James Heuerman sifted through layers of issues regarding the case, including whether the trial should be delayed to June 10 at the state’s request because the test results have not been completed.

The main issue concerning the delay – and who is at fault for the absent lab results – hinges on a consumptive testing order Heuerman issued in April in response to a motion made earlier by Mertes.

Consumptive testing happens when bodily fluid evidence tests leave little to no remaining sample after testing is complete. The Whiteside County State’s Attorney’s Office requested at an April 4 hearing that Heuerman allow consumptive testing, after which Mertes followed up with his request to allow a defense designee to be there to videotape the procedure. Mertes said he wanted that safeguard in place “to protect the due process and rights of the defendant.”

Mertes said it is important to memorialize such testing through video and sought to have a designee of the defense present at the testing to be done on DNA and blood samples collected from Cooper’s vehicle and a bloody pair of pants he was wearing when he turned himself in at the Whiteside County Sheriff’s Office in the hours after the stabbing.

Mertes, at that time, said that in previous cases in which consumptive testing was allowed, the ISP refused to let a defendant’s designee observe, even after a judge ruled that a designee would be allowed in.

Simon responded at that time that the ISP doesn’t want someone in the lab video recording out of concern that they could contaminate the lab. He said the ISP would want someone who understands the testing process and can follow lab protocols, such as making sure they are not recording testing in other cases.

Heuerman, on April 4, granted Simon’s request for consumptive testing on the five pieces of evidence, then followed up with granting Mertes’ motion for video recording, but imposed conditions that the video be done by an employee of the Illinois State Police Department of Forensics, not a defense designee. That video, which would not contain audio, would then be given to the State’s Attorney’s Office, which would disclose it to the defense.

“Whether they’ll do it or not, we’ll find out,” Heuerman said of the ISP at that time.

In fact, after receiving the order, the ISP turned the matter over to its legal department, Simon said Thursday. He said the director of the department told him she is doing everything she can to move forward with the testing. The Illinois Attorney General’s Office, in the meantime, filed a petition to intervene in the case on behalf of the Illinois State Police. Whether that will be allowed will be determined at a May 9 hearing in Heuerman’s courtroom.

Buckwalter, just days away from trial, told Heuerman on Thursday that she doesn’t control the state crime lab and, because of that, does not have the results. She said moving the trial to June 10 still keeps it three days under the 120-day speedy trial deadline. She also requested to extend that deadline, weaving in an argument about the Safe-T Act’s guidelines. Heuerman said the request was not necessary because she was under the 120-day deadline.

He was concerned, he said, that at the time charges were filed in February, Buckwalter could have asked for more time based on the nature of the case, and by not asking then, she signified she could be ready within the 120 days.

Mertes at one point countered Buckwalter’s motion by saying that her office could have looked at bringing in an independent lab to do the testing and that while she doesn’t run the lab, per se, as the chief law enforcement officer of the county she does have control over law enforcement agencies and getting the evidence testing done.

Mertes also contended that Buckwalter must provide a step-by-step account of how she tried to get the testing done as a way to prove that there was good cause to delay the trial date until June.

At the conclusion of the hearing, Heuerman said he would rule on whether to delay the trial to June 10 right after the intervener hearing on Friday. He also is expected to hear and rule on several motions in limine regarding the trial.

If he decides the trial will start May 13, any remaining motion work will be done Monday afternoon.