ARMANDO CABALLERO
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA
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A defendant challenging a conviction based on a Brady notice regarding improper CPI calculations in DNA analysis must establish that CPI was actually applied to the DNA evidence in his case, and paternity tests involving only two individuals do not involve CPI analysis.
[1] A defendant challenging a conviction based on errors in DNA analysis methodology must establish that the specific erroneous methodology was actually applied to the DNA ev…
Previewing 1 of 1 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“This is not the proper use of the great writ of habeas corpus, and his claim should have been brought upon Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.853.”
The court's opening statement regarding the procedural defect in Caballero's petition.
Caballero was convicted in 2006 of sexual battery based partly on two paternity tests showing he was the father of the victim's child. In 2016, the St…
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DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF FLORIDA
FOURTH DISTRICT
ARMANDO CABALLERO, Petitioner,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, Respondent.
No. 4D20-1954
[December 2, 2020]
Petition for writ of habeas corpus to the Circuit Court for the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit, Broward County; Andrew L. Siegel, Judge; L.T. Case No. 01-009967CF10A.
Armando Caballero, Chipley, pro se.
No appearance for respondent.
PER CURIAM.
Aramando Caballero petitions this court for a writ of habeas corpus, alleging he is illegally incarcerated based on faulty DNA evidence. This is not the proper use of the great writ of habeas corpus, and his claim should have been brought upon Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.853. But in any event, the claim is meritless. Since many incarcerated defendants raise the same claim, we explain why it lacks merit.
Petitioner was convicted in 2006 of multiple counts of sexual battery. The facts of the underlying case are laid out in this court’s opinion in Caballero v. State, 132 So. 3d 369, 370 (Fla. 4th DCA 2014). Because the sexual battery resulted in the birth of a child, the State used two paternity tests to show that he was the father of the victim’s child, thus proving sexual intercourse with the victim. A DNA expert testified and gave an undisputed opinion that the defendant was the father.
In 2016, the State mailed the defendant a Brady1 notice, informing him that the Broward Sheriff’s Office Crime Lab inappropriately used
2
Combined Probability of Inclusion (CPI) to calculate statistical probabilities in complex mixture DNA cases. The notice stated that the inaccuracies may have affected the defendant’s case, but only if CPI calculations were used. A complex mixture is one that contains more than two contributors. Most DNA analysis involves samples from either a single individual or a simple mixture of two individuals. See Exec. Office of the President, President's Council of Advisors on Sci. & Tech., Report to the President, Forensic Science in Criminal Courts: Ensuring Scientific Validity of Feature-Comparison Methods (2016).
The defendant then filed the instant habeas petition, alleging he is illegally incarcerated because DNA evidence used to convict him was faulty. The defendant has not established, however, that the DNA evidence was faulty, nor does the State’s notice constitute newly discovered evidence. The errors identified in the Brady notice apply only where the CPI was used to analyze complex mixtures of DNA. The paternity tests do not involve CPI, as they used DNA from only two persons – the petitioner and the victim.
In order to prevail on a claim that the 2016 notice provided newly discovered evidence, a defendant would have to show that the CPI applied to the DNA evidence in the defendant’s case. The petitioner here did not make that showing.
Petition denied.
WARNER, CIKLIN and KLINGENSMITH, JJ., concur.
* * *
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (U.S. 1963)
- Caballero v. State, 132 So. 3d 369 (Fla. 4th DCA 2014)