Expert says he's going to China, may not testify in Spector trial

LOS ANGELES --Henry Lee, the famous forensic expert who became the center of a controversy in Phil Spector's murder trial, said he was flying to China on Tuesday and may not testify after all.

Lee, who had been billed as the secret scientific weapon of Spector's defense, said he believes that the record producer's team doesn't need him.

"I'm off to China," Lee said in a telephone interview from an airport. "It's up to the defense and my schedule whether I come back to testify. But it will cost a lot for them to bring me back."

"They have so many experts," he said. "One more or one less won't make a difference. I don't think my testimony will make the case or break the case.... I don't think they really need me."

Lee was still smarting from an attack on his credibility by Superior Court Judge Larry Fidler and said it was the first time in his 45 years as a forensic expert that he has come under such criticism.

The former head of the Connecticut State Police and its crime lab, Lee denounced the attack on his credibility as "ridiculous" and said he did not withhold evidence -- allegedly a piece of acrylic fingernail found at Spector's mansion after the gunshot death of actress Lana Clarkson.

"The bottom line is I did not take a fingernail," he said. "But they made it a smokescreen. A little thing became a big thing. What for?"

He said he believes that attorney Sara Caplan, a member of a former defense team, made a mistake when she testified at a hearing that she saw Lee pick up a small white object the size of a fingernail. He also labeled as "even more ridiculous" the testimony of a former sheriff's detective, Stan White, who claims to have seen Lee pick up a whole fingernail with red nail polish on it.

The judge has made a formal ruling that Lee did find something that was not turned over to prosecutors, a violation of rules of evidence. The judge also has found Caplan to be in contempt for refusing to repeat her story to the jury and plans to jail her if the state Supreme Court does not intervene.

In the weeks since the controversy erupted, Lee said prosecutors have subpoenaed his college records from some 40 years ago.

"Do they think I never got out of college?" he asked. "Why they have to spend so much public resources to find copies of my transcripts?

Now, he said, prosecutors have been searching records surrounding donations he made of about $1 million to the University of New Haven in Connecticut that has a forensic studies program named for him.

"When I come to this country, I had $50 in my pocket," he said, adding there were few teachers to guide him in his specialty of forensic investigations.

"I said if I ever have the money, I will help students learn about forensics. This country gave me a chance to grow and now it's my time to give back. It's my chance to teach."

He said he will be spending the next two weeks traveling to seven provinces in his native China teaching courses, giving speeches and helping local authorities unravel cold cases.

As for the residual effect on his reputation, he said, "I can live with my conscience. I didn't even know a fingernail was broken and I didn't find a fingernail. ... When they can't destroy the science, they try to destroy your reputation."