Transcript: Hidden Clues in George Smith's Cabin?
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}This is a partial transcript from "On the Record," January 12, 2006, that has been edited for clarity.
GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, HOST: Did police miss a key clue when they examined George Smith's cruise ship cabin? After the honeymooner was reported missing, Turkish police took fingerprints, photographs, blood samples and evidence.
Now, forensic scientist Dr. Henry Lee has been hired by George Smith's wife to go onboard the ship and conduct his own investigation. He expects to get on the ship on January 23rd. Dr. Henry Lee joins us live from Hartford, Connecticut, nice to see you Dr. Lee.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}DR. HENRY LEE, FORENSIC SCIENTIST: Nice to see you, Greta.
VAN SUSTEREN: All right, Dr. Lee, it's been more than six months. The cabin has been cleaned. Other passengers have been in and out of that cabin. What can you possibly learn at this point?
LEE: Well, the cabin if they still have original furniture or carpet then we can reconstruct. If the carpet is still there, of course, we can look at any possible bloodstains, how much blood there, what's the pattern of those bloodstains and can we study the mechanism how those blood deposit there?
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Maybe you have a broken fingernail or broken tooth or you have a hair, some trace evidence, so carpet actually is a good, a rich source of general physical evidence.
VAN SUSTEREN: If that carpet has not been changed, if it's simply been cleaned, I mean can they effectively get up all the blood so that it's of no value to you or not?
LEE: Of course if the carpet being cleaned now we'll have two different approaches. One is to look at the back, the padding of the carpet, whether or not any blood soaked through the carpet into the padding. That will give us the information about how much blood has been deposited on the carpet.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Second, we can use some chemical or forensic light sources, try to examine the carpet to see the pattern, how much original, what's the size of those bloodstains and what's the trail, any deposit let's say from doorway towards the sliding door next to the bath, any cast off pattern which is indicative of sort of a beating, struggle, fighting, so a lot of information we can find out.
VAN SUSTEREN: Are there any restrictions, Dr. Lee? You're going there on January 23rd. I assume that if you can detect some blood, you'd like to cut up the carpet and take it. I mean have you made any sort of arrangements with Royal Caribbean as to what you can do or can't do depending on your findings?
LEE: I did not make any direct contact with the cruise ship authorities and just went through the attorneys. However, I heard the carpet has been recently removed. If the carpet has been recently removed, then if new carpet really no reason to test the new carpet. If the original carpet wasn't there anymore, not much we can do.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}VAN SUSTEREN: Do you know if they'd tried to track down the carpet that was removed? I didn't know that it had been removed but do you know because I mean or has it been destroyed?
LEE: Of course this, you know, has to go through legal channel to find out what exactly Turkish police collect, the number of pieces of physical evidence and they should provide an inventory list. That's usually what we do.
In any case we investigate we have a chain of custody inventory list we usually provide to attorneys and other experts to look at what evidence so far been collected, been examined, what's the result? Then both sides we can reconstruct.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}VAN SUSTEREN: All right, Dr. Lee, so it's January 23rd. That's the day you go in. I hope you'll join us the evening of January 23rd. Thank you, sir.
LEE: Yes, sure.
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