9.Robert Shawn Yao — Direct

ROBERT SHAWN YAO: I have a bachelor of science degree in microbiology from Auburn University. I have a bachelor's in science degree in criminology from the Florida State University. And I have a master's in criminal justice administration from Southern Columbia University.

At FDLE, upon hiring, I go through a very -- I went through a very rigorous training program to prepare me for the collection, preservation, and collection of physical evidence with regards to the various forensic disciplines that FDLE has. This is training in the collection, recognition, and preservation of things like latent prints, firearms, DNA, toxicology, computer evidence recovery, and a variety of other more specialized trainings to enable me to do that sort of crime scene analysis or forensic crime scene analysis, which is what my certification is jin.

I'm trained in the documentation and collection of forensic entomology evidence, which is insect evidence, forensic archaeology and anthropology, the recovery of buried bodies and buried remains and skeletal remains, bloodstain pattern analysis, trajectory analysis, hazardous weapons and weapons of mass destruction, responses to scenes for hazardous materials, environment, and a variety of other training.

The training takes, for primary, takes about a year. Textbook learnings, practical examinations, as well as going through specialty courses, and then going through a supervised casework period where I made the decisions and processed the scene under the supervision of a supervised analyst.

At the end of about a year, you're certified to respond and perform independent casework as a crime scene analyst with FDLE. And then the training after that is continuous from there on throughout your entire career.

ROBERT SHAWN YAO: In looking and based upon the deposition testimony I gave previously, I took a look at the Medical Examiner's report, because I had never seen the deceased, nor the injuries, nor a report on what type of injuries he had.

During the deposition, I testified that based upon the height of the projectile hole in the window that anybody from -- that it would be consistent with both a short, as well as a tall shooter.

So in looking at the injuries to the deceased and in assuming things that were brought forth in the deposition, assuming that the individual is firing in a normal manner rather than in some weird manner of holding the firearm, a normal extended arm shot into the window and assuming that the deceased was sitting in an upright position and looking out the window or looking toward the shooter at the time the shot was fired.

Using those assumptions, based upon the evidence that's present and what I was able to see, the injury and the hole in the window is more consistent with was somebody of a taller stature being six foot or higher -- or close to six foot rather than somebody being short.

ROBERT SHAWN YAO: The height of the hole that's in the window is approximately 49 inches from the floor of the garage. If you look at a standard six-foot-one person, their approximate shoulder height is somewhere around 58 inches, if you -- just as a standard -- or as a general rule of thumb or if you measure somebody approximately that height. Somebody about five-foot-four is going to be significantly shorter.

If somebody fires in a normal course of manner with the arm extended with a pistol, somebody that's short, where their arm, shoulder height, is approximately 48 inches or 49 inches from the ground is going to have a more direct or parallelled line to where the hole is in the window versus somebody that's taller. It's going to be more of a downward angle.

The initial projectile strike that goes into the deceased strikes the left cheek. It's a slightly downward angle from right to left, where the projectile ends up behind the left ear. There's pseudo stippling around the injury, which is consistent with the breaking of the window.

So because of the downward angle, if you assume that the person is sitting upright at the time the shot was fired, connected to the hole in the window is more consistent with somebody being taller firing at a downward angle into the passenger compartment rather than a shorter person firing, where it would be almost parallel. That strike would have been more straight across and into the deceased rather than at a downward angle into the deceased.