Saturday, May 24, 2008

Lawyer: Male DNA Found In Sink Of Slain Realtor

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March 26, 2008

The woman accused of beating real estate agent and punk rock pioneer Linda Stein to death is due in court Wednesday -- a day after her lawyer said male DNA had been found ina bathroom sink mingled with the slain woman's blood.

Attorney Ronald Kuby, whose client is murder suspect Natavia Lowery, said this information was in a Jan. 11 medical examiner's report that prosecutors sent to him. He said it stated there was a "mixture of DNA from the victim and a male."

Kuby suggested in a March 25 letter to Manhattan state Supreme Court Justice Micki Scherer, the judge hearing Lowery's case, that the male DNA came from Stein's killer.

He said the man likely left the DNA while cleaning up after killing Stein.

The lawyer also said that while Stein's blood was spattered around her $3 million Fifth Avenue apartment, not a drop of her blood was found on Lowery's clothing.

However, Manhattan District Attorney spokeswoman Barbara Thompson said the finding was insignificant."There was a very tiny speck of blood found," Thompson said in a statement. "There is nothing to suggest that the blood came from the murderer."

Medical examiner's office spokeswoman Ellen Borakove said she had no comment on Kuby's statements.

Lowery, 26, is charged with beating Stein, 61, to death with a heavy stick in her penthouse around 12:45 p.m. on Oct. 30.

Surveillance cameras show Lowery leaving the building around 1:15 p.m.

Kuby has said the surveillance camera tapes prove Lowery's innocence.

He filed with the court a medical examiner's report saying Stein's daughter, Samantha Wells, told police she spoke to her mother by telephone around 2 p.m. on Oct. 30.

"If there is evidence that Linda Stein was alive and well after defendant Lowery left the premises," Kuby said in court papers, "then Ms. Lowery could not have been the killer."

Stein, once a co-manager of the rock group the Ramones, also was a real estate agent whose deals with clients who included Sting, Steven Spielberg and other show business figures earned her the nickname Realtor to the Stars.

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She was found face down in a pool of blood in her apartment around 10:20 p.m. on Oct. 30, 2007.

She had scalp cuts and a fractured skull.

Lowery, after a lengthy interrogation that Kuby says was illegal, gave police a statement admitting she beat her employer to death.

She is jailed without bail and is due back in court Wednesday.

Manhattan district attorney's office spokeswoman Barbara Thompson said she had no comment on Kuby's statements.