David Garber Interview Transcript

Madison Fessia: Minutes 1-11:30

How did you become a forensic specialist?
David: How did I become a forensic specialist? Like most people I watched the tv
shows. I started 15 I mean were talking 15 to 17 years ago, a long time ago. It was
before CSI the show id watch the case studies and New Detectives on I think it was
Discovery and like the First 48 so it was like real life kind of stuff. I got fascinated by the
technology involved in the job and thats kinda how it started. then there was a university
where I was living that had a forensic science program so I got my degree in forensic
science.
About how old were you when you were watching those shows?
Oh man, I hate to date myself. That was like 1997 so I was 26, 25 or 26. I had already
gone to college and I had gotten a degree in biology and that just basically means you
need more schooling so I was working just like little jobs here and there and thats when
I went back to school and got my forensics degree. The best part about that degree was
the teachers were the ones who worked at the police department, so when I went in for
my interview, I knew them and they knew me. They knew I had a good work ethic and I
was smart enough and what not so that gave me the biggest advantage over that.
So you just jumped in basically into the job after going to school?
Yeah after going to school and then I got a job. Back then it wasnt as popular as it is
now. When I started the forensic science program there was 10 people in the program,
and the university is small so there was probably 1,000 students, like 1%. CSI came out
in the middle when I was going through the program and it jumped from 10 to 100 so it
went from 1% to 10%. STOP TIME 4:07 So with the popularity, now its crankin up
200-300 students every semester that want to get into forensics. When I interviewed
there was 2 people that applied for the job, myself and another girl. Now youre looking
at 400-500 people who are applying for the position to get one spot.
What personal and educational qualities do you think you had then and are good now
for people to get into that field?
Education, you gotta have your science degree. You gotta have a degree in biology,
chemistry, biochem or something like that. You need a hard science degree.
Any type of science degree?
Like a hard science like psychology, thats a science degree but thats not gonna get you
there. Its gotta be like I said, biology, chemistry, physics maybe but its gotta be
something pretty like one of the harder sciences. Man personal qualities for this job? I
dont really know, I think you have to be able to disassociate yourself from what youre
seeing to what you feel. Like when I started I was single, I didnt have any kids or

anything I could go and see whatever like a jumper off of 30 stories thats legs are on
one part of the parking garage and the body is like 2 stories down. I could see any of
that kind of gross stuff people shooting themselves all that. Now that im married and
have a daughter, my whole perspective changes. Its harder for me to disassociate
crimes against I dont know innocent victims and not relate them to .. what if that was
my daughter or whatever. You need that quality to be able to just separate yourself from
what you see and what it actually is so you can do the job if that makes sense. Thats
kinda more .. thats a deeper thing I guess.
Do you think youve mastered that specialty like being able to just ..?
I think ive regressed in that. Like I said before when I was single and I didnt really.. I
had a different mindset I could see anything, now its harder for me to see like dont get
me wrong like gangbanger on gangbanger crime I dont care whatever theyre idiots.
Theyre going through that, thats the life they chose I dont care. Its the old lady who
gets killed because shes living alone and some burglar comes in on her or like the little
kid who gets beaten by their parents something like that. Thats the kinda thing that
affects me where as back before it didnt so now it does but its a different mindset for
me. So to master it? eh I get through it I guess but its harder. STOP TIME 7:34
What do you look forward to when working or when being called in?
What do I look forward to ? *laughs* I look forward to long hours thats for sure. Like
what do I like about the job, what I like doing? I like trying to figure out the puzzle, put
the pieces together and figure it out. What I like to do most is ill go to the scene, well
process the scene, well photograph it, sketch it and collect evidence and process for
latent prints. I do bloodstain pattern analysis so well do that if we need to but having the
vision of the scene and knowing what happened by the evidence there and then
listening to the detectives interview the suspects STOP TIME 8:20 because we dont
interview them right, we just deal with the physical evidence we dont deal with the
interviewing. But Ill watch the interview through close circuit tv and ill text the detective
and ill be like ahhh thats BS theres no way that could have happened because of this
and ill point out this kind of evidence or that story doesnt make sense because of this
and it could be the victim, it could be the suspect. Thats what I like the most. Being able
to piece together what happened at the scene and then apply that to the interview. Its.. I
dont know. Its the part I always enjoy and i've always liked.
What does your day to day look like? Is is different all the time?
Yeah its different everyday because you know crime happens whenever so I could be
being called at 2 in the morning work all day, work all night whatever. I could be sitting
writing reports at my computer for 10 hours a day or processing evidence in the lab.
Everyday is different and thats what I like. I dont just want to have a desk job and I
dont wanna just be outside. I want to be able to do whatever. STOP TIME 9:38
Do you have a favorite part of your job?

So I do bloodstain pattern analysis right so when I present it in court I have to educate

the jury so ill put together a powerpoint and it will consist of the bloodstains at the
scene and then ill actually recreate those bloodstains in the lab. So I can say look this
is what I believe this bloodstain is whether its a you know to get technical a medium
energy impact stain which would be consistent with beating and be on the wall. I could
say look thats what that stain is at the scene, heres me recreating that scene, that stain
in the lab. They look alike so im pretty sure thats what it is. Thats where I bring it
together for the jury. STOP TIME 10:30 I can't just say thats a medium impact stain, I
mean they might believe me but if I show them I recreated it, heres the mechanism that
was done. So I like doing that because its, I play with blood, I set up the cameras, I
videotape and then I put it all together. I cut/slice the videotapes and I make the
powerpoint. I really enjoy that part, thats what I was doing yesterday as a matter of fact
so thats good, that was fun.
Carolina Castro; minutes 11:30-23
11:06David: Are you guys buddies? Kindergarten buddies? No, oh.
Anyway, , in your thing it said that you were an evidence specialist as well before, so
whats the difference between evidence and..?
Just the job title, its what , Honolulu PD calls their crime scene people, thats where I
worked before, Chula Vista calls them forensic specialists, the Sheriffs Department
calls them field evidence techs 11:27
What brought you from Honolulu to here?
, well, lets see, I dont know, I got divorced. I guess thats what brought me here. I
mean Im not from Hawaii, my ex-wife was, I moved down there after college. After I got
divorced I had no reason to be down there so... San Diego, Chula Vista was the first
job I got. 10 years later Im still here so I think it worked out.
Have you ever doubted yourself like while working?
All the time, all the time. But I think thats what you need to do grow. If youre always
thinking youre doing the right thing, you know, youre not gonna get any better but if
you take a look at what youve done and what went wrong and learn from it, youll
develop yourself. 12:31 Yea, so I doubt myself all the time, like when Im doing blood
stains, Ill look at it and Ill know what it is but then Ill say, but what if Im wrong?
Or could it be this or could it be that, and thats kinda that, scientific method, you
formulate your theory and then what else it could be, and then you test it, right? And
come back to what you, whats right. So its kinda using that, I guess using the doubt in
the scientific method. Does that bring it back around to what youre learning?
Is there anything that has stuck with you throughout your work, whether its a lesson or
a memory?

Oh man, I mean yea. Theres a lot of stuff. I was just talking to one of the detectives
earlier this week about just a minor case that we had worked probably 8 years ago, and
hes like, Hey do you remember that case that involved.., whatever it was and I like, it
instantly came up and I was like, Yea, I totally remember that, and Id rattle 13:43 off
detail after detail of that case, and it wasnt like a homicide case or it wasnt anything big
it just happened to be something we had worked together, , and came back around so
its amazing how much you remember about everything but if I were to tell you about a
case, I couldnt. I couldnt just pull it out of my head they all kind of blend together but if
you give me like a seed, I guess, I can-Ill remember that case just like that. As far as
other things that Ive learned, yeah you grow in 15 years, you know, so Ive learned a
lot, a lot of life lessons too while working so I dont know but thats-the recollection of
cases is kind of what amazes me, did that answer your question?
Yea, do you have any hopes for the future regarding a different field or do you just want
to stay.. TIME 14:05
, Im gonna, Ill stay in forensics. I want to move into management, thats my ultimate
goal. Its getting harder and harder to work 20 hours and then, you know, recover from
that and have to work your normal hours so, when you get older you kind of slow down I
guess, so I wanna get out of being on call and having to do crime scenes but I wanna
stay in forensics, I wouldnt see myself doing anything else. I dont wanna work in a lab
like analyzing evidence either, thats not me.
How does it look when youre on call, do they just- do you have a set time or do you
have certain dates that youre on call orSo, we work Monday through Friday. Our normal shift is Monday through Friday, 8 to 5.
Were on call nights and weekends and theres two of us in Chula Vista that go on-call
so were on call a month at a time, it just makes it easier. So we go first Friday of the
month or first Friday of the month, Im on-yea I have to be stuck to my phone 24/7, my
wife is amazed that like 3 in the morning out of the dead sleep that I can like pop up and
just be like, Hello, this is Dave!, you know, like I havent been sleeping or anything like
that, but yea thats how we do on-call so
And then you have to get there as fast as you can?
Weve got an hour, to be on scene, but typically what happens is: Ill get the call, and I
only live a mile from the the police department so it takes me like 2 minutes to get there.
All the detectives live where- Ramona, Rancho Bernardo, they live all over the place so
yea, it takes a long time to get there. But typically what will happen is, before we can do
anything were gonna need a search warrant anyway and thats gonna take a few hours,
like two three hours. So it says were supposed to be on scene within an hour but it
never happens. We kinda- we need to be at the PD within an hour and then we need to
wait for the search warrant and then well go to the scene. TIME 16:59 So typically, from
the time I get called and time I get to the scene is probably 3 hours later. Do you guys

remember the Ferguson, this is a side note, the Ferguson shooting, one of the big
complaints was that they left the body laying out on the street for what? 8 hours or
whatever like that and Im thinking 8 hours? Thats it? Thats pretty quick to process a
whole shooting scene like that, especially high profile, but I dont know. It made sense to
me that the body was laying there because youre not gonna move it, its evidence,
youre gonna leave the crime scene as is so
Do you ever get complaints like that? Do you respond to that?
David: No. No, do we get complaints like why does it take you so long? I mean yea, but
the public doesnt know. I was at a suspicious death and the whole family was there. Its
a two apartment complex that share like a parking lot in the middle, and pretty much this
whole family lives in all the apartments, they kinda rented everything out. So the whole
family was there while were trying to process and we were there probably 7 hours. And
theyre like why is it taking so long? We want to see our loved one. We want to get in
there. Like we gotta take time, we have to get the search warrant, we have to do this
right. You know, were not gonna hurry just because you wanna see them, were gonna
do everything we need to.
What are you the most proud of while working?
David: Wow, thats a good question. Just doing my job right, you know, catching that
little thing that most people would overlook. Just being able to pull that and discover that
evidence, or whatever it happens to be, just that little, minor evidence that would break
a case. I guess thats what Im most proud in and I dont, Im not seeking to put people
in jail or do the most number of cases or anything like that. I think just doing my job
right.
How challenging do the hours get?
David: Yea, February this year, I did 115 hours overtime in the 28 days. Between the
23rd and the 28th, no the 24th and the 28th. The 24th and 25th I worked 42 hours out of
that 48 hour period and then I was able to take a day off and then between the 27th and
the 28th I worked 41 of the 48 hours in that period. Yea, and it wasnt- and then it
started early that month where we had a lot of cases, big cases that were coming up.
Like I said, were on call a month at a time so, when youre on call you take everything,
all the cases that come in so I mean thats the most challenging part, I think that- its
those hours- its like you work those 20-whatever hours, 27 hours and youre off a
couple hours and then you get called back and you gotta go back to work and you gotta
do this. And in those two days I have to drive up to San Gabriel, which is in LA, because
one of our killers lived up there so I had to drive up there twice in that time, and thats
like 3 hours up and 3 hours back plus the 12 hours of work up there and yea- thats
pretty challenging I guess.
Did you expect that, when you were going into-

David: Yea, when I started with Honolulu PD we didnt have overtime or on-call. We
were staffed 24/7. So, you worked you 8 hours and then you were off, if something
happens in the middle of the night, theres people working. Yea, we did have long hours
because if youre on a case you gotta finish it but, no. This is way more challenging
working these hours, on call up here. I thought itd be good just working day hours and
being done but youre not. youre not done, you still gotta work.
How did you adjust to that? 21: 58
Just sleep when you can. You know, you cant adjust to it, theres no way. I thought it
was good, that I wouldnt have to work midnights, but you know Im still working
midnights.
Is there like a big difference between tv shows and the actual job?
Oh yea, theres a huge difference. Yea like CSI, theres so many more people involved
in the investigation than what they show on the scene. We only deal with physical
evidence, so we go to the scene and we photograph, sketch, collect evidence. We dont
interview victims, we dont interview suspects, we dont go around the neighborhood
knocking door to door. Thats all for cops to do. I dont carry a gun, Im not a sworn
police officer. So yeah, theres a ton of differences. It takes me, obviously, longer than
an hour to solve a crime. TIME 22:58
minutes 23-34:30
Rafael Valdez
You mentioned you don't interview suspects or victims so why did you have to drive all
the way up to LA?
Well thats where he lived so we went up there to serve a search warrant on his house to
see if we could find any evidence up there and we ended up finding a lot of really good
evidence that kind of linked him back down here and what he was planning and what he
ended up doing so- but yeah that trip up there was well those 2 trips up there were
pretty vital in the investigation.
In cases do you ever think why he did it? 23:51
Yeah I kind of I try to figure out the motive, helps definetly why to lead you into solving
the case. You have to figure out why, you know, like why is this person dead. What do
they have that somebody else would want? You don't- maybe dont know the suspect or
you don't know that person but you want to figure out what they are thinking when they
are doing this, like okay I just killed this person now what am I gonna do. Oh Im gonna
search- rummage through their bedroom to find something, so you think like alright what
in the bedroom can give me evidence. Ok that can, so itll lead you there or you know
like it doesn't even have to be homicide or anything like that maybe just a burglary
where people break in, where are they gonna touch when they come in, well theyre
gonna open the door, theyre gonna touch this counter you know they got on top of the

chair to get to the shelf- in the closet shelf or whatever so youre always like trying to
think of motives of what the suspect is- youre actually trying to think of what the suspect
is thinking, so you can find the evidence. I just had a trial where it was attempted
kidnapping these 2 guys went in a garage so theres a door from the garage into the
house and theres this car parked right there and they shot through the door so they shot
straight through the door so Im thinking so they had to get around the car, its a tight
space so if you're gonna go around that car you're going to put your hand on it, and they
did and I got a dusted it and I got a palm print and that ended up leading to the suspect.
not right away, it was years later but this trial I just testified in was all about that palm
print I mean it was 2 hours about what did you do with this, what did you do with that but
it took me 10 minutes to do this but its taking me two hours to explain it in court. just
thinking like that, like I'm a suspect I'm gonna touch here.
Have you ever had any cases that you just like cant crack
I mean I don't personally have any cases im part of a team that has cases yeah we
have a lot of unsolved everything I mean like burglaries theres a lot of unsolved
burglaries a lot of car thefts homicides we have a pretty good streak, theres a four year
period were we were 17 for 17 for solving homicides which was really good you're not
gonna find that anywhere else so its been a really long time since we haven't solved a
homicide which I guess is pretty nice we do have 3 going right now which two of them
are solved and one isn't.
26:45 Does it make you frustrated when you can't figure out what exactly happened
No its oh I didnt mean to cut you off not its not that we didn't figure out what happened
its just finding the evidence to solve it I mean we know what happened, the investigators
know who did it its just finding the evidence to link them there and yeah I guess thats
kind of frustrating but I don't deal with that part of it like putting all that together so for
me its just like I did my job and I think I did it well so im good.
how do you deal with evidence thats like not like making sense like if they were careful?
like lack of evidence,yeah you're think wow thats a smart criminal but there always
gonna leave something but it is what it is you can only deal/work with what you have its
I think that when I get frustrated about is um having the evidence but not knowing that
thats the evidence kind of thing or overlooking something so thats what thats what
frustrates me. I hate to say this on tape but we just had an unattended death this
suspicious death that we just had there was a knife that was on the table by all her stuff
we didnt take and it was just like a steak knife it wasn't like bloody or anything but I kind
of kicked myself for not recovering it into evidence because it turned out it could've been
used and its uh we didn't know it at the time cause the body was pretty decomposed we
couldn't tell she was cut up but she was so I kick myself for not taking that so its just a
simple little thing like that like put a number by it photograph, collect it, it would have
taken me five minutes it was ahh we're not gonna need it but it turned out we did.

Do you have a favorite type of case?

No I Wouldn't choose burglary over homicide
do you have specific type of cases you like?
I like cases that have blood stains on them because I can do blood stain analysis that
kind of thing yeah. but we don't get too many of those we might get maybe a few but not
too many
Did you have a case that really stood out to you?
um I think theres a lot of different stuff. stood out as in gruesome or stood out as in
stupid criminal
Stood out as in you were really into it/ favorite stories
Not really like I said all the cases blend together but if you give me a specific case and
say hey remember this one i could spit out the details. um I use to tell a story about
stupid criminals I got called to a burglary one morning at a tailor shop and this person
had stole a safe house three and a half feet tall this huge cast iron safe really old really
heavy and it had wheels and he wheeled it out um through the tailor shop out the door,
down the sidewalk and there parallel scratch marks from where the safe was on the
floor, out the door, down the sidewalk, up the alley to this like really just ghetto
apartment building and theres these two parallel scratch marks going right in there,
30:57 up the stairs, 2 flights of stairs to the front door of an apartment and officers just
follow them down up to the apartment. they got to the apartment and they heard
clanging and sawing so they knocked on the door, the guy opens the door and he says
are you here about the safe? the officers bust in and arrest him and everything so its
stupid criminals like that. its like idiot you're leading us right to you um but you know
when we you know the gross stuff you think we want to deal with the gross stuff but you
don't you really don't I really don't think people want to deal with that gross stuff thats
why I don't like tell gross stories or anything like that you know.
If we are able to come down to the police department is there anything that you can like
show us like how you work or anything
um i mean yeah I can show you like how we process fingerprints or how we process
blood stains or something like that we can show you how we work or our work flow but
all our work is done outside the lab for the most part and we do do some in lab
processing so yeah I can show you around if you guys are interested in doing that yeah
thats not a problem.
um I know forensics specialist usually recreate the crime scene like you said like in trial
would you be the one to do the building like would you be ohh she was doing this.
no no so theres two different things so documentation or evidence collection uhh thats
what forensics specialist do and then the recreation is done by the expert so typically
what we do in court is just present the scene the pictures that we take we show them to
the jury the sketches that we take we take it to the jury and the evidence we get we also

do we arent recreating the crime to the jury thats uhh usually done by criminalist or
people more specialised chula vista is more different because were so small I kind of
take on a dual role that I do do a documentation and I do do a recreation and its not so
much a crime scene its just bloodstain pattern recreation so its really specific to like
blood stains or telling you know movements prior to uhh its just prior to like what the
blood shows basically its kind of what we typically do is specialized on what your
asking.
minutes 34- 45:30
Allan Capuyan
34:19 Are you in trial a lot?
No maybe once every couple months. Not that often... yeah.
Is there ever like a jury or a judge you dont like?
No, theres defense attorneys I dont like. But not jurys I dont. I dont know any of the
juers theyre just common people. Judges? I know a few of em I dont know them
personally but their court the court room meaners always the same. Theres a couple
defense attorneys I dont like just because of the way they try to pin you on the stand
that the defense kind of start a focusing on the evidence discrediting the evidence to
win their case so by.. to do that they discredit the person who recovered the evidence to
put that doubt in the jury's mind so a lot of the defense attorneys kinda go after us and
me pretty hard.
Do you guys ever work closely with the San Diego police department?
We do every once in a while. So our jurisdiction is just Chula Vista so I only deal with
crimes in Chula Vista but yeah theres a lot of cross border kind of stuff. Last month we
had a shooting in Chula Vista that was done by people who lived in San Diego so we
searched search warrants on two houses in San Diego which we used San Diego PD
swat team to.. to enter those houses so yea we do work with San Diego PD because
their a bigger lab theyre a good resource for us to just ask questions you know: How do
you do this? What do you want for that? That kind of thing and I know quite a few
people with San Diego PD just from being involved in different activities and what
not...so...yea we do work with them. We work more often with the sheriff's department
since their county their resources are available to us so we work more with them theyre
the ones who process our evidence for like DNA or drug analysis or anything like that
theyre the ones that do that for us.
37:51 So Chula Vista police cant go to houses in San Diego?
We can. Yeah but our jurisdiction is only within the city limits. So we only work on
crimes that happen in Chula Vista. but if theres suspects that live outside of Chula Vista
and theres potentially evidence at those places then we can get a search warrant to go
there but typically that city doesnt want us just running around you know doing stuff
in their city so we gotta let them be aware of it and take.. you know...be apart of it.

Do you ride in the cop cars when you go to scenes or do you have special cars?
Yeah we have a special car its a big white panel van. I try to stay away from junior
highs and that kind of stuff because it looks like Im in a molester van but nah we just
have a big white unmarked panel van. Nothing exciting.
Do you put all your equipment in there?
Yeah and its not any like high tech specialized equipment its a lot of bags and boxes
and tape measures and tape and that kind of stuff its... its not like its
Is it like construction stuff?
Yeah we have a lot of tools.. it kind of is we have a lot of tools and its not like have big
lasers you know or anything like that in there. We dont carry around our chemicals its
basically just like I said bags and boxes and tape, gloves, booties,that kind of stuff. Its
not that exciting.
Is there ever cases you cant get search warrants on?
Well we...I dont do. I dont write the search warrants thats the police officers job but
yeah ..theres been times where I havent been able to get a search warrant. They dont
think our evidence is close enough or lead to that person, point to that person so yea it
happens.
40:01 How do you deal with thinking you can get evidence from somewhere but cant?
Yeah I mean thats what makes America great right thats protecting the innocent. So if
the judge doesnt think that person is that closely related then I mean hes protecting his
right. So how do I deal with it? Well it is what it is you know. Just try to work harder to
get other evidence I guess or other information that will lead to that person.