Exclusive:DNA matching man accused of murder was found on Joanna Derkacz's body, court is told
Stephen Sexton has denied murdering and raping Joanna Derkacz.
A man’s DNA was found on the body of a woman who was allegedly murdered, a court has been told.
Stephen Sexton, 38, is on trial accused of the murder of Joanna Derkacz, as well as rape, and controlling or coercive behaviour. The 37-year-old was found dead at the couple’s home in Nevinson Way, Waterlooville on December 28, 2023. Sexton denies the charges.
The trial, which has already been ongoing for two weeks, started this week with evidence about DNA on Joanna’s body, which was examined during a post-mortem in the days following her death.
DNA found on Joanna’s palms, and the back of her hands, was deemed more than a billion times more likely than not to come from Sexton. Further DNA profiles on her right nipple and a scrunchie on her wrist were also found to likely match the defendants, 10,000 times and 110,000 times more likely respectively.
Speaking to the jury about the evidence, forensics expert Ruth Shackel said: “Although his [Sexton’s] profile isn’t fully represented, so there are some areas where it’s missing, it is sufficient enough for me to say that his DNA is present in these results.
“[For the nipple and scrunchie] we describe it as being a very strong match, rather than exremely strong. We cannot say for certain whether it was saliva, or another bodily fluid.”
A DNA swab was also taken from “intimate area” of Joanna’s body, the jury was told.
Here, a trace amount of semen was found, which was 11,000 times more likely than not to match Sexton’s DNA profile. Ms Shackel explained this DNA would typically have been lost a few days after being “deposited”.
She said: “I would usually say [it’s lost after] up to three days. Semen that has been deposited in the vagina will be lost be drainage, which is basically gravity and menstruation, or degredation. Over time, the sperm cells will break down and start to degrade.
“We could not exclude Sexton from being a contributor.”
Further white stains were found in the Adidas trousers that were found on Joanna’s body, which were also found to contain seminal fluid that matched Sexton’s DNA profile.
(Proceeding)