Update: A forensic expert in the Corryn Rayney murder investigation was asked to check whether a specific third person had left behind hair in Mrs Rayney's car or at the alleged crime scene, statements have revealed.

Statements from forensic scientist Rosalyn Treliving were among those released to the media today.

In her statements, the scientist says she had been given hairs found in Mrs Rayney's car and outside her Como home - the alleged crime scene - to see whether they matched her husband Lloyd Rayney or a third person whose name is blacked out of the statements for legal reasons.

Mr Rayney has pleaded not guilty to wilful murder and denies any involvement in the death of his wife who was last seen alive at a dance class that evening.

In her statements, Ms Treliving said that not all the hairs contained roots and of those that did no DNA was recoverable apart from partial profiles corresponded with Mrs Rayney's profile and therefore could have come from her.

She concluded the findings could not assist in determining whether Mr Rayney or the third person were involved in Mrs Rayney's death.

She also examined a handkerchief found in Mrs Rayney's grave, locating possible saliva but not blood. The handkerchief did not yield DNA.

Ms Treliving stated that tests were also conducted on DNA extracts from hair on Mrs Rayney's clothes, DNA from a tree branch at her gravesite and DNA from a hair in her body bag.

She said DNA samples from the gravesite branch and from on hair on her clothes could not be reliably said to have come from Mrs Rayney, her husband or the other suspect. but they did contain components that could not have come from the trio.

A single DNA component from hair on Mrs Rayney's clothes that corresponded with both Mrs Rayney and her husband's profiles bore little significance while a single DNA component from the body bag hair and which matched the un-named suspect was also of little significance becasue it was in one of every five people.

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Rayney investigators seek 'third person' DNA

HOUSTON (KTRK) -- DNA testing has led to a man being charged in the 2003 rape of an elderly woman.

According to court documents, the victim, who was 77 at the time of the alleged incident, told police she was raped on August 8, 2003 in the dining room of her apartment on N. Braeswood. The woman says a man grabbed her from behind and dragged her to her bedroom as she screamed for help. Then she says the man punched her and threw her to the floor.

Court documents state the suspect stole her coin jar and piggy bank, then tied her hands together and sexually assaulted her. The woman says he took her purse too.

The woman said she did not see the suspect's face because the room was dark and she suffers from degenerative eye disease. She got a rape kit on the same day.

Then on September 21 of this year, DPS crime lab identified a DNA profile match with Wesley Bernard Gordon.

Gordon, 40, is charged with aggravated sexual assault of elderly person. He is not in custody.

Court records show Gordon has prior convictions for theft in 1990 and burglary of a motor vehicle in 1991.

(Copyright 2012 KTRK-TV/DT. All Rights Reserved.)

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Original post:
DNA testing leads to charges in elderly woman's rape in 2003

A few months ago someone asked me (via email) which populations I would love to get typed (genetically that is). There is one population which did not come to mind at the time: the Sumerians. Why? Because these are arguably the first historic nation. The first self-conscious ethnic group which operated by the rules which we define as the fundamentals of literate civilization. Strangely, they are an ethno-linguistic isolate. My own assumption until lately has been that this is not too surprising, in that prior to the rise of expansive civilizations (Sargon of Akkad) there was much more linguistic and ethnic diversity than we currently see around us. Or, was evident even in the early Iron Age. In other words, the ancient Fertile Crescent may have resembled the highlands of Papua, with Hurrians, Akkadians, Gutians, Elamites, Sumerians, etc., all speaking mutually unintelligible dialects which diverged very far back in the mists of antiquity.

I am no longer quite so sure about this model. That is largely due to the possibility that there was a great deal of demographic change between the Mesolithic and the Bronze Age, with successive waves of layering and replacement. My rough model is that a few groups of farmers may have expanded to swallow up thousands of hunter-gatherer groups. These homogeneous farmer societies eventually would diversify, because they were not united by the institutional forces which cemented later imperial regimes, in particular, literate elites which had a sense of consciousness which extended deep into the past because of written records.Therefore, the diversification would presumably have been similar to what we see with Romance languages, or Indo-Aryan, branching out from an common root language which replaced many competitors rapidly. Without writing and large scale polities the divergence would be more rapid, and there would be many more tips on the phylogenetic tree.

The Sumerians, and their neighbors the Elamites, as well as groups like the Hatti and Hurrians & Urartian, pose problems for this thesis. None of these groups seem to be Indo-European or Semitic, the two dominant language families of Near East by ~1,000 B.C. You have in the ancient Near East then a situation where the light of history reveals before us not the diversification of Indo-European and Semitic speaking farmers, but rather a host of unique and disparate peoples, all simultaneously lurching toward literate civilization, one after another.

Something just does not add up in my models. Genetics will not solve the puzzle, but it may help in elucidating relationships. The origins of the Sumerians are murky, but many scholars have suggested that they may have arrived from the south (the oldest city, Eridu, is in the south). Others have suggested that the Sumerians descended from the mountains of the northeast. Though I presume that the people Arabia have changed a great deal since antiquity, it would be interesting if it was found that the Sumerians resembled the Qatari (at least the Eurasian component) more than they did the modern Assyrians.

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Ancient DNA and Sumerians | Gene Expression

Oct. 9, 2012, 4:30 a.m.

IN A first for regional NSW, criminals will no longer feel safe as new DNA technology helps authorities put them behind bars.

The innovative technology known as the DNA Guardian is set to revolutionise crime prevention in Dubbo, after it was installed at Club Dubbo and convenience store Lucky 7 yesterday.

It is the first time this kind of technology has been implemented in regional NSW.

DNA Security Solutions, based in Adelaide, specialises in criminal marking systems. When a DNA Guardian unit is installed within a premises, it can immediately pick up on when a crime occurs.

Business development worker Jeffre Murray explained how sterile water could help identify a criminal with one simple spray.

When a DNA Guardian unit is installed in a pub or shop, crime can easily be picked up. The unit is triggered when a theft occurs, and sprays the criminal with sterile water, marking them as they leave the premises, Mr Murray said.

DNA workers and business owners, he said, would immediately receive a text message informing them of the crime. Once it is brought to their attention, they can then view CCTV footage, get a clearer idea of what the criminal looks like, and help police track them down.

Once police are notified, they only have to shine a forensic blue light on criminals to match their DNA with what was found at the scene of the crime, and formally identify them as the responsible party, Mr Murray said.

He said he had notified members of Dubbo Police before his arrival to Dubbo, who were quite impressed with the DNA equipment.

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DNA to guard Dubbo stores