Defense Says Dna Doesn’t Match Suspect’s

The defense attorney for a Chinese national accused of killing a University of Idaho graduate student and his wife says preliminary DNA tests on blood found on the alleged murder weapon does not match the defendant’s and probably neither of the victims.

“We kind of thought the DNA evidence to be neutral, and that’s how I view this,” Michael Henegen said.

The blood sample was taken from a knife that Deputy Prosecutor Robin Eckmann held during the preliminary hearing for Wenkai Li while saying, “We have our murder weapon.”

But with jury selection scheduled for next week and testimony the week after, Henegen said the preliminary DNA reports show the blood was not Li’s and there was less than a 50 percent chance that it came from either Ning Li or his wife Xia Ge.

Latah County Prosecutor William Thompson confirmed some of the state’s DNA test results had been returned from FBI laboratories, but he declined comment on the findings. Henegen said the prosecution has submitted a list of 332 potential witnesses.

Li, not related to the accused, and his wife were stabbed repeatedly on Memorial Day weekend.