More PROOF Gov Brown hates California citizens

Brown also responded to the clemency request of Kevin Cooper — a death-row inmate convicted of killing four members of a Chino Hills, Calif., family at their home with a hatchet, knife and ice pick in 1983 after escaping from a nearby prison — by ordering new DNA tests on four pieces of evidence including the hatchet handle and sheath.

Brown stressed in the order that he takes “no position as to Mr. Cooper’s guilt or innocence at this time, but colorable factual questions have been raised about whether advances in DNA technology warrant limited retesting of certain physical evidence in the case.”

“The purpose of this new testing is to determine whether another suspected person’s DNA, or the DNA of any other identifiable suspect based on a match in the FBI’s Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) database, is present on the items tested,” the outgoing governor continued. “Given the nature of the testing requested, and the fact that the murders in this case occurred before the advent of DNA technology and related evidence handling protocols, both parties acknowledge the distinct possibility that further testing may yield multiple DNA contributors of unknown origin. As such, if the only result of further testing is to yield either no additional DNA matches, or only DNA from unknown contributors, this matter should be closed.”