Pediatrician, forensic officers testify at Hopkins trial
Defendant, charged with attacking a 17-year-old girl in her home, continues to suggest conspiracy, evidence tampering
The court will hear from three final Crown witnesses before Stephen Hopkins, accused of breaking into a St. John’s home and sexually assaulting a teenager who lived there, will call his own evidence at trial.
Hopkins, who is self-representing in Newfoundland and Labrador Supreme Court on charges of break and entry, sexual assault, forcible confinement, uttering threats and breaching a court order, has not yet indicated who he plans to call to testify in his defence nor what his defence position entails, apart from suggesting police investigators had conspired against him.
A teenage girl, now 18, testified last week via video from another room in the courthouse that she had been sitting on the front step of her family home with a coffee one morning when Hopkins walked by and asked her for a glass of water. When she returned with the water, he pushed her back inside the house, pulled off her clothes and carried her over his shoulder to a bedroom, where he sexually assaulted her and threatened to burn the house down if she told anyone, she said.
Royal Newfoundland Constabulary investigators sent several swabs to an RCMP national forensic lab for analysis, the court heard. A DNA expert from the lab testified a swab collected during a sexual assault examination of the complainant was found to contain DNA from two sources: the teen herself and a male. More extensive testing revealed the male DNA was a match to Hopkins.
On Wednesday, May 11, prosecutor Jennifer Standen called Janeway pediatrician Dr. Jennifer O’dea, who testified about the sexual assault examination process and the collection of swabs from the complainant.
RNC Const. Chad Rogers testified he had retrieved three sets of fingerprints from the water glass in the girl’s home, but none of them had proved sufficient for a match when analyzed by an RCMP fingerprint databank. He also provided an overview of photos he had taken of items seized as part of the investigation — including a sweater Hopkins had reportedly been wearing — and reviewed photos he had taken of the rooms in the house.
The scene photos have been an issue at trial for Hopkins, who has repeatedly insisted a picture of a rumpled bed was altered since he had first seen the book of photos.
Hopkins began his crossexamination of Rogers by picking out typos in his forensic report and focusing on a photo of a coffee cup on the complainant’s front step.
“Did it strike you as odd that the coffee cup was still there? Me, personally, I would have picked up the cup of coffee,” Hopkins said, asking the officer if the coffee had been cold.
Rogers said he had examined the sweater under a UV light and areas inside and outside the garment had reacted, suggesting the presence of bodily fluid. The sweater had not been selected for further testing by the Ottawa forensics lab — which determines which items it will test and often rejects exhibits submitted by police for analysis — after the DNA match to Hopkins had been made, Rogers said.
Police examined the sweater under the light because the complainant indicated she had bitten the attacker’s arm in an attempt to get away from him, he explained.
“I’m wondering why the sweater would be requested for analysis only to be turned down by the forensics (lab). I see no just cause,” Hopkins said, questioning the officer about the RNC’S relationship with the staff at the lab. “It seems as if the process was guided by pre-contrived information and you are not able to explain these forensic in des crib abilities .”
Last to testify Wednesday was an RNC officer who had been tasked, with a partner, with collecting a sample of Hopkins’ DNA as per a warrant signed by a provincial court judge. The officers visited the accused at Her Majesty’s Penitentiary to take a blood sample and the court watched video of the interaction.
“I noticed there was some disturbance in your features when a reference was made to the signing of the warrant,” Hopkins said to the officer after the video was played. “There was a jump, a jolt, when the signing of the warrant was mentioned. Did you sign this warrant?”
“No, Mr. Hopkins, I did not,” the officer replied.