According to Wikipedia, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement formally coordinates eight boards, councils and commissions. The commissioner is appointed to his position by the Governor and Cabinet and confirmed by the Florida Senate. The FDLE employs two thousand people; has an annual budget of $300,000,000.00; has 15 field offices and seven crime laboratories. During the State of Florida vs. DeShon Thomas murder trial, three employees with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement testified—Jack Martin, Jennifer Roeder, and John Ryan Jr. were called to the witness stand by State Prosecutor Jack Campbell. NONE of these witnesses gave incriminating testimony against DeShon Thomas.
As part of State Prosecutor Jack Campbell’s case against DeShon Thomas—the fact that DeShon Thomas’ DNA was found on the back door knob of the victims’ residence seemed unusual for Leon County Sheriff’s detectives to understand. FDLE Biology Section, Crime Laboratory Analyst Mr. Jack Martin’s testimony, basically stated that DeShon Thomas and Trentin Ross (DeShon Thomas’ former co-worker, roommate—state’s key witness) were the only DNA profiles provided for comparison. Where Ross’ DNA was not found anywhere at the residence, DeShon Thomas’ DNA was found on the back door knob as part of a mixture of DNA. This was not an unusual mixture considering DeShon Thomas used to live at the residence. Mr. Martin was not provided with Laqecia Herring’s cell phone that was found away from her body and cell phone charger—between a mattress and a wall. At the crime scene it seemed as if someone had hid Herring’s cell phone in her upstairs bedroom. No DNA test was conducted on Herring’s cell phone.
FDLE Digital Evidence Section, Crime Laboratory Analyst Ms. Jennifer Roeder’s testimony was basically that she did not find any incriminating information of value on either DeShon Thomas or Trentin Ross’ cell phone. State Prosecutor Jack Campbell claimed that DeShon Thomas made contact with Trentin Ross as Ross sat outside the victims’ residence in a parked car waiting for him as he murdered the victims. There is absolutely nothing to support that cell phone contact. Instead of Regional Defense Counsel Daren Shippy accepting DeShon Thomas’ mother’s offer to pay for a private investigator and any other needed expert to rebut State Prosecutor Jack Campbell’s “expert” witnesses (Leon County Sheriff’s staff members—his dad’s employees), Mr. Shippy instead chose to ignore DeShon’s mother until a few weeks before his trial. In part, Ms. Roeder’s testimony was that the last text message sent from Laqecia Herring (the female victim) cell phone was at 10:59 p.m. Ms. Roeder never said that it was in fact Laqecia Herring that sent the last text message from her cell phone. No one in the courtroom can say for sure who sent that last text message from Herring’s phone–Herring or her and her brother’s murderer.
FDLE Firearms Section, Crime Laboratory Analyst John Ryan Jr. basically testified that the projectiles taken from the victims heads were from a class 38/357 caliber firearm. Mr. Ryan’s testimony completely disintegrates what Chief Assistant Georgia Cappleman told the Tallahassee Democrat in March 2011. FDLE firearm’s laboratory report is dated February 17, 2011—weeks before Cappleman went before the grand jury. The victims’ autopsy reports were conducted the day after they were found murdered (January 28, 2011) at which time two projectiles were removed from the victims heads. Dr. Anthony Clark is the medical examiner who performed the autopsies—he removed the projectiles from the victims heads. The same day the victims were found murdered, DeShon Thomas’ girlfriend told detectives that she’d seen DeShon with a 9mm handgun. Instead of contacting 17-year-old DeShon Thomas and/or his mother to get the facts right—Leon County Sheriff’s detectives instead contacted AT&T to have DeShon’s cell phone GPS tracked and began to build their case. It was then reported that DeShon Thomas murdered the victims with a 9mm pistol (click link) Georgia Cappleman is a LIAR When the State Attorney’s Office and the Leon County Sheriff’s detectives got caught in that LIE—they went back and tried to clean up their mess. During the trial is when they acknowledged that the victims were murdered with a class 38/357 firearm. When DeShon’s girlfriend at the time of the murders was lead by State Prosecutor Jack Campbell in asking if DeShon had a .38 firearm, she answered, yes. In this case there was no murder weapon recovered. However, FDLE laboratory reported that the projectiles were fired from the same unknown firearm.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement employees and their laboratories are more sufficient than the Leon County Sheriff’s Office. When the Leon County Sheriff’s Office submits evidence to the FDLE and get the results within a timely manner, the Leon County Sheriff’s Office and the State Attorney’s Office should not be allowed to continue to build their case on false evidence. They should have to use FDLE laboratory reports—even when they don’t support their theory. Leon County Sheriff’s detectives theory was DeShon Thomas used his cell phone to contact Trentin Ross during the early morning hours from inside the victims residence (this is FALSE); LCSO detectives theory was that both victims were murdered with a 9mm pistol—they went even further to say that they had an eyewitness to DeShon Thomas going into the victims residence and that the bullets from the pistol matched that to which the victims were murdered (FALSE). Leon County Sheriff detectives and Assistant State Prosecutor Jack Campbell both LIED to judges to obtain search warrants. Chief Assistant State Attorney Georgia Cappleman knowingly LIED to a grand jury and then to the community through the media.
If these types of LIES can be told to taxpayers to make it seem as if the Leon County Sheriff’s Office alone is fighting crime—then are they not sending a message saying that they don’t need the Florida Department of Law Enforcement Agency? Obviously, the Leon County Sheriff’s Office does not need or respect any of the FDLE laboratory reports. Think about it— Taxpayers payout $300,000,000.00 annually to the FDLE. When the Leon County Sheriff’s Office provides FDLE laboratories with what they believe to be viable evidence from a crime scene—the FDLE criminal analysts conduct the research, put their results in a report and provide the report to the Leon County Sheriff’s Office. If FDLE laboratories reports are optional for the Leon County Sheriff’s Office to utilize then what’s the point?
Some kind of way, Reserve Deputy Don Odham replaced Official Deputy Melinda McBride as lead detective on this double murder case. As Det. Melinda McBride began to follow up on other leads–as a more experienced detective would do—-wanna-be-cop Don Odham signed Trentin Ross’ and his name to a Miranda Waiver form–no other deputy witnessed the signatures. This is one of many legal documents that were fabricated in this case against 17-year-old DeShon Thomas. FDLE was not asked to analyze any documents.
Mothers Against Unethical Laws (MAUL) 