People v. Thomas
| Decision Date | 20 February 2014 |
| Citation | 985 N.Y.S.2d 193,8 N.E.3d 308,2014 N.Y. Slip Op. 01208,22 N.Y.3d 629 |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Respondent, v. Adrian P. THOMAS, Appellant. |
| Court | New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Jerome K. Frost, P.C., Troy (Jerome K. Frost of counsel), and Ingrid Effman, for appellant.
Richard J. McNally, Jr., District Attorney, Troy (Kelly L. Egan of counsel), for respondent.
Legal Aid Society, New York City (Lorca Morello of counsel), for Legal Aid Society, amicus curiae.
Adele Bernhard, New York City, for New York Law School Legal Service Post Conviction Innocence Clinic, amicus curiae.
Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr LLP, Washington, D.C. (David W. Ogden, Daniel S. Volchok and Sonya L. Lebsack of counsel), and Nathalie F.P. Gilfoyle, for American Psychological Association, amicus curiae.
Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP, New York City (Dorothy Heyl and LaTonya Brooks of counsel), for Innocence Network, amicus curiae.
Kathleen M. Rice, District Attorney, Mineola (Hilary Hassler and Vincent Rivellese of counsel), for District Attorneys Association of the State of New York, amicus curiae.
Sharon L. McCarthy, New York City, Susan Hoffinger, K. Babe Howell, Christopher Ferguson, Angle Louie and Terri Rosenblatt for New York City Bar Association, amicus curiae.
Defendant was convicted by a jury of murdering his four-month-old son, Matthew Thomas. The evidence considered by the jury included a statement in which he admitted that on three occasions during the week preceding the infant's death he “slammed” Matthew down on a mattress just 17 inches above the floor and a videotape of defendant's interrogation, near the end of which defendant, a particularly large individual,1 DEMONSTRATED HOw he raised the infant above his head and threw him down with great force on the low-lying mattress. The jury also heard testimony from the child's treating doctors from Albany Medical Center, the medical examiner who performed the autopsy on Matthew, and an expert on child abuse from Brown Medical School. These witnesses, citing radiologic and postmortem findings of subdural fluid collections, brain swelling and retinal hemorrhaging, as well as defendant's account of what he had done, said that Matthew died from intracranial injuries caused by abusively inflicted head trauma . Although defendant argued at trial and on appeal that the proof before the jury was insufficient to support a verdict finding him guilty of depraved indifference murder ( Penal Law § 125.25[4] )—the theory charged—the argument was correctly rejected. Defendant's written and videotaped confession together with the evidence presented by the prosecution's medical experts sufficed to demonstrate that defendant, with depraved indifference to human life, recklessly engaged in conduct which created a grave risk of serious physical injury to the four-month-old infant and thereby caused the child's death. Although there may have been uncertainty at the time of defendant's trial and prior appeal as to whether a one-on-one killing of a helpless infant by an adult through the infliction of physical abuse could qualify as depraved indifference murder, it is now settled that it can ( see People v. Barboni, 21 N.Y.3d 393, 403, 971 N.Y.S.2d 729, 994 N.E.2d 820 [2013] ), rendering defendant's argument to the contrary unavailing. That the evidence was sufficient to support the conviction, however, does not end the inquiry we are assigned on this appeal before us by leave of a Judge of this Court (19 N.Y.3d 1105, 955 N.Y.S.2d 561, 979 N.E.2d 822 [2012] ), since there is a persisting issue of law as to whether the jury should have had before it all the evidence it did. Inasmuch as we conclude that defendant's inculpating statements were not demonstrably voluntary, we reverse the order of the Appellate Division affirming defendant's conviction ( 93 A.D.3d 1019, 941 N.Y.S.2d 722 [3d Dept.2012] ), grant defendant's previously denied motion to suppress those statements, and direct a new trial.
On the morning of September 21, 2008, defendant's wife, Wilhelmina Hicks, awoke to discover that the couple's four-month-old, prematurely born infant, Matthew, was limp and unresponsive. Emergency assistance was immediately summoned and the child was rushed to Samaritan Hospital in Troy, New York. There, he presented with a range of symptoms, including a low white blood cell count, irregular heartbeat, low blood pressure, severe dehydration and respiratory failure. The most likely differential diagnosis was noted by the treating emergency room doctor as septic shock, although intracranial injuries were also listed to be ruled out. Blood tests to confirm sepsis were performed, but their results were not immediately available. Meanwhile, the child was placed on massive doses of antibiotics.
In the early afternoon, Matthew was transferred to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit at Albany Medical Center, where he continued to be treated for sepsis. The child's treating physician concluded that his patient had been a victim of blunt force trauma—indeed, that the by-then moribund child had been “murdered.” (At the trial of the case, this doctor and other prosecution experts testified that blunt force trauma was indeed the cause of death; defense experts disputed this, attributing the death to sepsis, and the defense suggested that the treating doctor was misled by his initial impression, later proved wrong, that the child's skull was fractured.) He so informed local child protective and law enforcement authorities on the evening of September 21st.
At the hearing upon defendant's motion to suppress his inculpating statements, the course of the ensuing investigation was described through the testimony of Troy Police Sergeant Adam Mason and the video recording of defendant's entire interrogation was placed in evidence. Mason stated that, based on the report that Matthew had been physically abused, he accompanied child protective workers to defendant's home and assisted in the removal of defendant's six other children.2 Defendant, who had been caring for the children while his wife was at the hospital with Matthew, remained at his residence subsequent to the removal. Hours later, the police returned and escorted defendant to an interrogation room at the Troy Central Police Station. There, they read the evidently distraught father his rights and commenced a course of videotaped interrogation. The interrogation lasted about 9 1/2 hours, broken into an initial two-hour and a subsequent 7 1/2-hour session. In between, defendant, having expressed suicidal thoughts during the initial interview, was involuntarily hospitalized pursuant to Mental Hygiene Law § 9.39 for some 15 hours in a secure psychiatric unit. By pre-arrangement, he was released back to his interrogators who immediately escorted him back to the police station where the interrogation resumed.
The premise of the interrogation was that an adult within the Thomas–Hicks household must have inflicted traumatic head injuries on the infant. Indeed one of the interrogating officers told defendant that he had been informed by Matthew's doctor that Matthew had been The interrogators, however, repeatedly reassured defendant that they understood Matthew's injuries to have been accidental. They said they were not investigating what they thought to be a crime and that once defendant had told them what had happened he could go home. He would not, they reassured over and again, be arrested. When, however, defendant continued to deny having hurt Matthew, even accidentally, the officers falsely represented that his wife had blamed him for Matthew's injuries and then threatened that, if he did not take responsibility, they would “scoop” Ms. Hicks out from the hospital and bring her in, since one of them must have injured the child. By the end of the initial two-hour interrogation, defendant agreed to “take the fall” for his wife. He said that he had not harmed the child and did not believe that his wife had either because “she is a good wife,” but that he would take responsibility to keep her out of trouble.
Before the interrogation recommenced on the evening of September 22nd, Matthew was pronounced brain dead. Nonetheless, the interrogating officers told defendant that he was alive and that his survival could depend on defendant's disclosure of how he had caused the child's injuries:
About four hours into the second interrogation session defendant gave a statement. He said that, about 10 or 15 days before, he accidentally dropped Matthew five or six inches into his crib and Matthew hit his head “pretty hard.” He supposed that that impact caused Matthew's brain injury. He also recalled accidentally bumping Matthew's head with his head on the...
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