Slain Girl’s Prints in RV, Expert Says

A Police Department fingerprint expert testified Wednesday that he was “absolutely certain” that two fingerprints near the bed in David Westerfield’s recreational vehicle were those of Danielle van Dam, the 7-year-old girl abducted from her home and murdered.

In sometimes gruesome detail, the expert, Jeffrey Graham Jr., explained how the fingerprints had been matched with prints taken from the mummified hands of the nude, decomposing corpse found Feb. 27, three weeks after Danielle disappeared from her bedroom in the upscale Sabre Springs area.

After several days of testimony about the sexually permissive lifestyle that Danielle’s parents purportedly led, the trial is focusing on detailed descriptions of forensic evidence gathered at the Van Dam and Westerfield homes and from the body, which was found in a rural area of San Diego County.

The grim nature of the testimony led Danielle’s mother, Brenda, to flee the courtroom.

A police evidence technician testified that strands of black hair had been found under one of Danielle’s armpits and clutched in one fist. Westerfield has black hair.

Questions about whose hair it might have been were deferred until prosecutors call DNA experts. When the case shifts to DNA, the prosecution will be handled by Deputy Dist. Atty. George “Woody” Clarke, a DNA expert who assisted Los Angeles prosecutors in the O.J. Simpson murder case.

Because the child’s body was left nude and uncovered, it decomposed quickly and was attacked by animals, technicians testified. That made getting fingerprints from the hands very difficult, Graham said.

“They were extremely mummified, dried up, wrinkled up, shriveled,” Graham said. “It really makes it a lot harder.”

Defense attorney Steven Feldman has not disputed that the fingerprints in the recreational vehicle might have been Danielle’s. But he has asserted that they were left there when Danielle, her mother and one of her brothers went to the Westerfield home to sell Girl Scout cookies.

Brenda van Dam has testified that her daughter went nowhere near the recreational vehicle during the visit to the home.

Graham testified that he could not tell when the fingerprints had been left in the vehicle.

Westerfield, 50, a self-employed design engineer, could face the death penalty if convicted of kidnapping and murder.

Prosecutors assert that he harbored sexual fantasies about small girls and may have spied on the Van Dam backyard with binoculars.