One Wichita defense lawyer with an interest in the topic is Dan Monnat, who represents a man who was forced through a court order to submit a DNA sample to police. The man, Roger Valadez, went to court last week in an effort to get the sample back.
Monnat said he doesn’t know where Valadez’s DNA or DNA information may be now. “We’ve been given no direct assurances about it,” he said. “There is no reason to have that information unnecessarily in the hands of the government.”
His lawyer filed a motion Tuesday in Sedgwick County District Court seeking the return of a DNA sample and personal items seized from Valadez’s home after his Dec. 1 arrest.
“Dr. Tiller has always consistently, carefully and appropriately followed the law in all respects,” read a statement released on Tiller’s behalf by Wichita lawyers Lee Thompson and Dan Monnat.
The lawyers pointed out that earlier this week Tiller complied with a Texas request for records, which they called “a legitimate inquiry…to more fully investigate a specific event.”
Dan Monnat said Tuesday “I don’t think you can lawfully kick down a citizen’s door to execute a warrant for a mouth swab for DNA the day you get the warrant,” Monnat said. “There’s no emergency. The DNA is not going to disappear.”
In a statement Friday night that Monnat said was approved by his client, Monnat said: “We don’t believe his name ever should have been connected to the BTK investigation….”
Late Friday, Wichita lawyer Dan Monnat released a statement saying that the man who was arrested “is not BTK.”
