{"id":252637,"date":"2026-04-30T16:21:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T16:21:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/252637\/"},"modified":"2026-04-30T16:21:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T16:21:08","slug":"dna-must-be-analyzed-in-james-duckett-murder-case-florida-supreme-court-rules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/252637\/","title":{"rendered":"DNA must be analyzed in James Duckett murder case, Florida Supreme Court rules"},"content":{"rendered":"

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. \u2013 The Florida Supreme Court is demanding that DNA tested in the James Duckett murder case<\/a> must be subjected to a statistical analysis, overturning a lower court\u2019s ruling in the case.<\/p>\n

Duckett, a former Mascotte police officer who is on death row for the murder of 11-year-old Teresa McAbee in 1987, has long maintained his innocence in the case.<\/p>\n

In March, the Florida Supreme Court issued a rare stay of execution<\/a> for Duckett, pending the results of DNA testing on evidence from McAbee\u2019s underwear. <\/p>\n

Those test results came back inconclusive.<\/a><\/p>\n

[WATCH: DNA testing in James Duckett murder case inconclusive, Florida asks stay to be lifted]<\/p>\n

Lake County Circuit Judge Brian Welke subsequently ruled that Duckett had exhausted his options and could not have the tests further analyzed, a ruling Duckett\u2019s attorneys appealed.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, the high court ruled the underlying DNA testing data could be sent out for an analysis and an opinion under the direction of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, agreeing with Duckett\u2019s attorneys that without the analysis from the data, he had not been provided the complete testing results, which he was entitled to.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs the State readily concedes, an expert testifying at trial must provide statistical calculations of the testing data when reporting DNA results,\u201d Florida Chief Justice Carlos Mu\u00f1iz wrote. \u201cAn expert cannot simply say there is a \u2018match\u2019 between the defendant\u2019s DNA and the profile obtained from testing. Against this backdrop, the statute\u2019s reference to \u2018the results of DNA testing… be[ing] admissible at trial\u2019 suggests that those \u2018results\u2019 include the testing data necessary for a DNA expert to offer an opinion at trial,\u201d<\/p>\n

The court also noted that the FDLE itself had suggested Duckett received incomplete testing results.<\/p>\n

The high court, however, also denied Duckett\u2019s request for additional public records, with information about the testing process and protocols from the private lab that conducted the DNA tests.<\/p>\n

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Copyright 2026 by WKMG ClickOrlando – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TALLAHASSEE, Fla. \u2013 The Florida Supreme Court is demanding that DNA tested in the James Duckett murder case…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":212284,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[265,408,28,30,29,95312,2174],"class_list":["post-252637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-crime","tag-death-penalty","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-james-duckett","tag-lake-county"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252637\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/212284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}