A man charged with killing two women in Severn last year asked an Anne Arundel Circuit judge yesterday to let his defense experts evaluate the scientific evidence against him.
Darris Ware, 23, of no fixed address, could get the death penalty if he is convicted in the Dec. 30, 1993, deaths of Betina Gentry, 18, and her neighbor, Cynthia Vega-Allen, 22. The women were found shot to death in Ms. Gentry's Severn home.
Mr. Ware, who was engaged to Ms. Gentry, is scheduled to be tried March 8.
At yesterday's hearing, assistant public defenders Mark Blumberg and Robert Waldman asked Judge Lawrence Rushworth to allow four cartridges and four bullets from a .38-caliber pistol to be transported, under police escort, to a Belair laboratory where they would be examined by a defense firearms expert.
Mr. Blumberg said William Welch, a former state police firearms expert, has to examine the cartridges and bullets in his laboratory, where he has a specially mounted microscope.
"Because of the delicate nature of the instrument, it cannot be moved, and he needs it to do a thorough examination," Mr. Blumberg told the judge. The lawyers also asked Judge Rushworth to allow a slide of microscopic human connective tissue taken from Mr. Ware's shirt to be taken to a Towson laboratory for defense examination.
Police say the tissue belongs to one of the victims, and the defense lawyers want Dr. John Adams' opinion on whether that is the case.
Dr. Adams, a former assistant state medical examiner, is a pathologist at Greater Baltimore Medical Center.
"The state says that it's human connective tissue. The defendant's position is that that's an invalid opinion," Mr. Blumberg said after the hearing.
Judge Rushworth said he would review the defense requests.
Mr. Waldman said defense teams are routinely allowed to take scientific evidence to private laboratories for examination.
He also said that Deputy State's Attorney Gerald K. Anders, the prosecutor in this case, is blocking defense efforts to obtain routine information to prepare for the trial.
"This defendant, facing the death penalty, is getting less access to information about his case than many other defendants in this courthouse," Mr. Waldman said.
Mr. Anders said he has cooperated fully with the defense.
"I've given them everything that I have," he told Judge Rushworth.