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LAB TEST RESULTS DELAYED IN TRACY MURDER TRIAL

Oct. 31, 2001 – Potentially key forensic evidence is not yet available and may not become available before the scheduled Dec. 10 start date for the murder trial of Ian Tracy.
On Wednesday, Territorial Court Judge Ishmael Meyers ordered Lofton Holder, assistant attorney general, to contact FBI laboratory technicians to find out when test results from blood samples and DNA evidence will be known.
The judge said he wanted the evidence within 45 days, but Holder indicated that the results may not be ready for 60 to 90 days.
The blood samples and DNA evidence were in Police Department possession for more than six months before being sent to an FBI laboratory, Holder said, adding that he did not know the reason for the delay.
Defense attorney Treston Moore has said he wants independent testing of the evidence, and Meyers ordered that additional samples be made available for that purpose.
Tracy, a former Antilles School honor student and senior class president who attends Middlebury College in Vermont, has been charged with the murder of his 18-year-old former girlfriend, Adassa Rolle.
Police accused Tracy of shooting Rolle in the head while they were at Green Cay Plantation in the early morning hours of Dec. 31, 2000. Tracy, then 19, was at home from college on holiday break at the time.
Tracy called police shortly after the shooting, and investigators found Rolle's body in the back seat of the sport utility vehicle Tracy was driving. Tracy told detectives that he and Rolle were parked in the isolated area when a man approached the side of the vehicle and stuck a gun through the window in an apparent robbery attempt. Tracy told police he struggled with the gunman and several shots were fired. Rolle was hit in the head by a bullet at close range, investigators said.
After Tracy's arrest, detectives said his version of events did not correspond with physical evidence. But Moore has said the evidence could well mesh with Tracy's account, and that by arresting him police have not pursued the real gunman.
Once received at the FBI lab, the blood and DNA samples were put in line for testing with evidence in other cases, Holder said. But before the testing could be done, the FBI's laboratories were swamped with work as a result of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Holder said he was confident the tests would be carried out as soon as possible but said he did not know if that would satisfy Meyers' order of Thursday.

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