Celestina Rossi is a Senior Crime Scene Investigator and Crime Scene Reconstruction Expert with the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office and is also known nationwide as a blood spatter (Bloodstain Pattern Analyst) expert. She is also the President of the International Association of Bloodstain Pattern Analysts. She was promoted to the Crime Lab in 2002Â and has been court-qualified as an expert in latent print examination, bloodstain pattern analysis, crime scene reconstruction, and shooting incident reconstruction. Celestina is an Adjunct Instructor for the Texas Forensic Science Academy at the Texas A&M Engineering Extension Service (TEEX) where she teaches multiple courses that include Forensic Technician (80 hrs), Bloodstain Pattern Analysis, and Processing Evidence of Violent Crimes. She is also an Adjunct Assistant Lecturer at Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas in the Forensic and Investigative Sciences Program, Department of Entomology where she teaches two mini-semester courses in Crime Scene Investigation and Latent Print Processing.
For the third trial, Rossi was brought in by the Houston Police Department. Rossi told the jury that when she was given the list of all the Armstrong evidence while in the police property room, she noticed Armstrong’s T-shirt, pants, and sandals had been collected. “I wanted to take a look,” Rossi told jurors because, she said, she knew HPD and the Houston Forensics Science Center don’t employ their own bloodstain pattern analyst. Rossi said when she laid out Armstrong’s gray T-shirt, she “immediately saw what appeared to be an almost reddish, brown stain touching the bottom of the police sticker.” Upon further testing of the blood, Courtney Head, with the Houston Forensics Science Center, confirmed the blood is “very likely” from Antonio Armstrong Sr. Rossi testified that when she received the shirt, part of the police nametag appeared to be peeling, revealing the first stain. She conceded on the stand that the stain could be from cross-contamination. But, Rossi said, she then discovered a second stain when she peeled the sticker further. The stain appeared to have been “preserved” in the center of the HPD badge, she said. After analyzing the size and shape of the second blood stain, Rossi said it appeared to be caused by “expiration,” meaning, as Antonio Sr. fought for his life, Rossi explained, he could have exhaled the blood. Rossi also assisted in a reconstructed a to-scale model of the Armstrong stairs that led from the third floor, where AJ Armstrong’s bedroom was located, to the second floor, where his parents slept. Armstrong, now 23, is serving life in prison in Abilene, Texas at the Robertson Unit, west of Dallas. It’s a six-hour drive from his wife and young son in Houston.
He’s appealing his conviction. Armstrong will be 63 years old when he’s up for parole in 2063. that Now ABC13 has done a documentary on the case and Rossi is part of it
TEXAS TRUE CRIME: Only on ABC13, an in-depth documentary seven years in the making. After three trials, AJ Armstrong is now serving his life sentence for the murders of his parents at a prison in Abilene, Texas. Courtney Fischer is the only Houston reporter who covered this case from the beginning and sits down with people involved in the case who have never gone on record – until now.