TOP PROSECUTOR CITES “PRECISION AND CERTAINTY OF SCIENCE” AS RAPE TRIAL BEGINS Mar. 3, 2008 The top prosecutor in Suffolk County today described the investigation into the Aug. 22, 1995, rape of a 50-year-old woman as “the power of physical force against the power of science.” First Assistant District Attorney Josh Wall told a Suffolk Superior Court jury that CHE BLAKE SOSA (D.O.B. 7/22/69) gained access to the victim’s Jamaica Plain home through an open window as she slept on a hot summer night, beat her badly, and raped her twice, threatening to kill her if she even looked at him. Sosa, Wall said, came to light as a suspect in 2003 after DNA from that incident was submitted to the FBI’s Combined DNA Index System – or CODIS – database as part of an initiative targeting unsolved rapes that had been committed before DNA technology was available to Massachusetts law enforcement agencies. “This case is about the power of physical violence used to terrorize and violate against the power of science used to act fairly, objectively, and without bias to identify a perpetrator,” Wall elaborated. “They applied their scientific expertise and developed a DNA profile,” Wall said of the members of the Boston Police Department’s Crime Laboratory, who retrieved DNA from evidence at the crime scene and submitted it to the nationwide database. When those samples matched Sosa’s CODIS profile, they collected an additional sample from the suspect’s saliva using a cheek swab. “They compared the DNA sample from the swab to the profile from the [evidence] and it matched exactly,” Wall said. Though she did not directly acknowledge the eight Department of Corrections officers and six court officers who escorted Sosa into the courtroom, Superior Court Judge Christine McEvoy reminded the panel of 16 jurors – 12 of whom will decide the case – that “Che Blake Sosa is presumed innocent until and unless, from the evidence, the Commonwealth proves him guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.” Sosa is represented by attorney Joseph Krowski. Prosecution testimony is ongoing in courtroom 808 of Suffolk Superior Court. Return to the Press Releases page.