A certified sexual assault nurse examiner testified about the April 5, 2022 forensic exam of patient Taylor Dempsey and law enforcement’s subsequent testing.

Naya Knighton, a forensic nurse, described routine SANE procedures: obtaining informed consent, documenting a patient's history and demeanor, photographing the surgical sites and collecting forensic swabs from the labia, vaginal/fornix area, abdomen and mons. Knighton testified she observed sutures close to the genital area and that Dempsey described being separated from her mother and having her underwear pulled down during an exam.

The state published a Texas Department of Public Safety crime‑lab report (laboratory case HOU220405819) and asked Knighton to read highlighted portions. The report includes statistical language: "Applying a statistical confidence interval of 95%, this profile is not expected to occur more frequently than 1 in 5,471 U.S. males," and states that particular swabs could not exclude the defendant or paternally related male relatives as contributors on those swabs. Knighton also read the report language that "no interpretable Y‑STR profiles were obtained" for the vaginal and labia swabs.

On cross‑examination, defense counsel emphasized that Knighton did not distinguish in the lab labels between labia majora and labia minora swabs and that the SANE diagram is not to scale; the defense argued those limits could affect whether DNA would be detected at a specific location. Knighton agreed that anatomy varies between patients and that labels reflected her standard practice.

Knighton told jurors that, in SANE training, "penetration is any contact past the labia majora," language the defense probed when the complainant’s early statements repeatedly described being "touched" and not "penetrated." Knighton said she collected specimens for law enforcement and a lab test was performed; she did not attempt to interpret the lab’s statistical conclusions beyond reading the report into evidence.

The jury will now hear further testimony and see additional exhibits as the state and defense develop competing narratives about what the forensic record shows and whether the statutory elements of the charged offense have been proven beyond a reasonable doubt.