Defense in rape case casts doubt on DNA

The attorney for a man charged with raping a Holtsville woman in her garage urged jurors Thursday to look past DNA evidence linking him to the crime.

Defense attorney Gregory Grizopoulos, in his closing argument, suggested police framed John Kluge by planting his DNA on her underwear.

"It can be very powerful evidence," said Grizopoulos, the attorney for Kluge, 25, of Holbrook. "But it can't tell you how it got on a piece of underwear."

Kluge is charged with first-degree rape and other crimes stemming from the Oct. 26, 2009, attack. Suffolk prosecutors have called him a "sexual predator" responsible for other sex crimes, but he was tried before Suffolk County Court Judge Barbara Kahn on just this case.

Grizopoulos said police targeted Kluge after he filed a brutality suit against them in early 2010 related to another arrest. He said it was suspicious that there was DNA on the victim's underwear, but not on or in her genital area.

"Someone could move it [the DNA] there" to the underwear, he said. "It could be a police officer. It could be someone who has something against John Kluge. It could be someone involved in the lawsuit."

Assistant District Attorney Carl Borelli called that theory "ridiculous" and "insulting" in his summation. "The DNA is exactly where it's supposed to be," Borelli said, adding that seminal fluid lacking DNA was found on the victim's body.

Responding to Grizopoulos' allegations about evidence being planted, "I forgot the part where they got John Kluge's semen and saliva before Oct. 26, 2009," Borelli said, sarcastically. "I missed that part."

He reminded jurors that the Suffolk crime lab is not run by police but by the county Health Department, and there was no testimony suggesting that anyone tampered with the evidence.

Grizopoulos also tried to cast doubt on the victim's description of her attacker as clean-shaven and stocky. Kluge's mother testified that her son had a chinstrap beard and was thin in October 2009.

But Borelli said the attacker wore a hoodie, covering the side of the face. And to the 5 foot 1 inch victim, the much taller Kluge could have seemed stocky, he said.

He returned to the DNA, noting the odds that it could be anyone else were 256 quadrillion to one. "It's his DNA. He left it there because he raped her. There's 256 quadrillion, and then there's one," he said, standing next to Kluge. "This man. John Kluge. Find him guilty."

The jury deliberated three hours, asking for readbacks of testimony on how the DNA evidence was handled and guidance on how to consider Kluge's suit against police.