PORT ANGELES — In the world of science, where repeatable proof is the standard, there is not definitive evidence that Melissa Leigh Carter was strangled and raped, expert witnesses hired by Robert Gene Covarrubias’ attorneys testified Tuesday.
In the world of law, the accumulation of facts must exceed “reasonable doubt,” which in theory is what Covarrubias’ legal team is fighting to prevent.
In a trial that has featured self-admitted drug users and dealers — and in which the defendant himself is scheduled to testify today — Tuesday’s 10th day of testimony in the first-degree murder trial featured two experts who offered opinions on how long semen can survive inside a dead person and whether Carter, 15, was strangled.
Clallam County Prosecutor Deborah Kelly objected frequently to questions by Covarrubias’ lead attorney, public defender Ralph Anderson, as he did while the prosecution was laying out its case.
In the morning, Randell Libby, a University of Washington School of Medicine neurogeneticist who has a private forensic DNA analyst practice, said various scholarly articles state that semen cells can remain useful to investigators for anywhere between several minutes to several hours to more than a day.
Covarrubias, 25, has maintained that he had consensual sex with Carter after he followed her away from a party at the Chinook Motel on East First Street the night of Dec. 23, 2004.
After sex, the two parted ways, Anderson has said.
Carter’s nude body was discovered less than three days later in brush off Waterfront Trail just east of downtown Port Angeles.
Covarrubias, who originally denied that he had any sexual relations with Carter, has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder.