[Back to Document View]

                            LexisNexisª Academic

         Copyright 2002 DR Partners d/b Las Vegas Review-Journal
                  Las Vegas Review-Journal (Las Vegas, NV)

                    April 19, 2002 Friday FINAL EDITION

SECTION: B; Pg. 1B

LENGTH: 905 words

HEADLINE: POLICE FORENSICS: DNA mix-up prompts audit at lab

BYLINE: Glenn Puit

BODY:
By GLENN PUIT
REVIEW-JOURNAL

    Authorities are reviewing hundreds of DNA tests at the Las Vegas police
forensics lab following the discovery of a clerical error that placed an
innocent man in jail for nearly a year.

The announcement of an audit of more than 270 DNA tests was just one of
several developments Thursday in the case of Lazaro Sotolusson. Sotolusson
has been cleared in three separate sexual assaults since authorities learned
his name mistakenly was placed on another man's DNA profile at the police
forensics lab.

'During the past year, we hoped and knew that justice would prevail,'
Sotolusson's father, Raymon Soto Rodriguez, said Thursday morning of his
son's plight. 'We believe in justice in American courts.' On Wednesday
morning, District Judge Joseph Bonaventure dismissed two sexual assault
cases against Sotolusson. The dismissals came once prosecutors acknowledged
the lab had switched the labels on the DNA profiles of Sotolusson and Joseph
Coppola.

In court Thursday morning, a third sexual assault case was dismissed by
District Judge Valorie Vega, who ordered Sotolusson released. Sotolusson, a
native of Cuba, was expected to be transferred to the custody of the
Immigration and Naturalization Service sometime Thursday.

Authorities confirmed that Coppola is a prime suspect in two of the three
sexual assaults Sotolusson once was charged with.

'He is a potential defendant,' Chief Deputy District Attorney J. Charles
Thompson said of Coppola. 'A decision has not been made as to whether or not
to charge him.'

The bizarre case's origins date back a year, when Sotolusson was housed in
the same cell with Coppola at the North Las Vegas Detention Center.
Sotolusson, who sought political asylum in the United States with his
parents when he was 13, was being held at the detention center by the INS
because of a prior conviction for aggravated stalking.

Coppola, meanwhile, was awaiting sentencing in a federal bank robbery case.

While in the jail cell together, Coppola accused Sotolusson of raping him,
Thompson said. Police took body fluids from both men and took them to the
Las Vegas police forensics lab for profiling.

Thompson said the lab properly profiled the samples. But while entering the
details of those DNA profiles into a computer, a lab technician accidently
switched the men's names, Thompson said.

The DNA profiles were then sent through a computer database, which matches
DNA profiles of suspects with DNA profiles recovered at unsolved crime
scenes in the region. Authorities said Coppola's DNA, mistakenly labeled as
Sotolusson's, came back as a match with two unsolved sexual assaults of Las
Vegas teens.

Sotolusson subsequently was charged with multiple felonies in the those
assaults and in the allegations of the jailhouse assault on Coppola.

Just three weeks before Sotolusson's trial, however, a forensic science
expert retained by Clark County Deputy Public Defenders Brigid Hoffman and
Darin Imlay discovered the error. This week, the forensics lab acknowledged
the mistake, and prosecutors immediately sought to dismiss the charges
stemming from the two assaults against the teens.

In court Thursday, Chief Deputy District Attorney Thomas Carroll sought the
dismissal of charges stemming from allegations of the jailhouse rape, saying
the victim has 'credibility problems.'

'He's now a prime suspect in several sexual assaults,' Carroll said of
Coppola.

Coppola, 31, pleaded guilty to one count of bank robbery with a deadly
weapon for a crime that occurred in 1999. U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt
sentenced him in July to 51 months in prison. He currently is serving that
time in a federal prison in California. Court records indicate he had a
gambling problem. His projected release date is Jan. 21.

It is not clear, however, whether Coppola ever will be charged in the sexual
assaults against the Las Vegas teens. In one of those cases, a victim
already made a courtroom identification of Sotolusson as her attacker.

Las Vegas police Deputy Chief Ray Flynn said Thursday that the department is
in the midst of an intensive review of procedures surrounding DNA testing at
the forensics lab. Although the error appears to be a clerical mistake,
Flynn said police are reviewing the procedures surrounding all of its prior
DNA testing to make sure there were no other mistakes.

'On a cursory look, it appears it was a transcriptional error,' Flynn said.
'And so far we know that the actual bench work and testing was correct. But
to ensure the credibility of our lab, we are auditing all 273 prior DNA
cases.'

Those cases date back to January 1997, when DNA testing at the lab started.
The audit will take about four weeks.

'We are also doing an internal investigation into what went wrong and why it
went wrong,' Flynn said. 'We will be installing additional procedures to
make sure this doesn't happen again.'

Flynn said if the investigation concludes the mistake was a clerical error,
lab technicians will be given additional training. If, for some reason, the
error is attributed to an intentional act, disciplinary proceedings will
result.

'We will do everything necessary to ensure the credibility of our lab, which
has a great reputation,' Flynn said. 'It is nationally recognized and many
of our key people teach forensics in the university system and are certified
nationally.  We are taking this extremely seriously.'

LOAD-DATE: April 22, 2002