Leone v. State
| Decision Date | 22 October 2003 |
| Docket Number | No. 28S00-0206-CR-327.,28S00-0206-CR-327. |
| Citation | 797 N.E.2d 743 |
| Parties | Jeff A. LEONE, Appellant (Plaintiff below), v. STATE of Indiana, Appellees (Defendants below). |
| Court | Indiana Supreme Court |
Susan K. Carpenter, Public Defender of Indiana, David P. Freund, Deputy Public Defender, Office of the Public Defender, Indianapolis, IN, Attorneys for Appellant.
Steve Carter, Attorney General of Indiana, Scott A. Kreider, Deputy Attorney General, Office of the Attorney General, Indianapolis, IN, Attorneys for Appellee.
Jeff Leone had been banned from his ex-wife's trailer, but he went in anyway, and discovered her thirteen-year-old daughter inside. He took the daughter to his camper where he killed her, had intercourse with her corpse, and discarded her body on the property behind a shed.
The sentence for this murder was life in prison without parole, based on two statutory aggravating circumstances, torture and intentional killing while attempting or committing child molestation. Leone argues correctly that the evidence does not establish torture, which is something done to a live person. Even without that aggravating circumstance, however, we conclude that the sentence is sustainable.
Jeff Leone and Linda Watkins met in Texas, cohabitated, and later married, in October 1990. Linda's children from a previous marriage (Daniel, Stephanie, and Jennifer) remained with their father in Texas. Linda and Leone experienced marital problems and separated, and Leone moved to Ellettsville, Indiana. The couple reconciled, and Linda moved to Ellettsville. Linda and Leone secured employment at Indiana University in Bloomington, where Linda worked with computers and Leone worked in security.
During the summer of 1997, Leone's brother Robert and other family members living in Ellettsville noticed that Leone had difficulty with motor skills including driving, speech, and balance. He claimed that he was tired all of the time. A neurologist determined that Leone had suffered multiple strokes.
In 1998, Leone told Linda he wanted a divorce. Leone went to Tennessee for a week, and returned to Ellettsville, but never mentioned the divorce again. The marriage continued to deteriorate thereafter. Leone began to lose interest in all activities except eating, drinking, smoking marijuana, and watching movies. His hygiene also suffered as he stopped taking showers.
Linda's three children moved to Ellettsville after her ex-husband died in 1999. Leone, Linda, and the three children moved to a trailer in Greene County, Indiana. Leone continued to smoke marijuana and listen to music. Linda asked him to stop growing marijuana in their greenhouse, but he refused. Though Linda tried to encourage Leone to do more than sit around the house, his behavior did not change. Linda also discussed Leone's poor hygiene and attempts to have sexual intercourse with her when he was unclean. Leone told Linda that all she was good for was sex and a paycheck. Linda then informed Leone she did not want to have sex with him anymore.
On Thanksgiving Day 2000, Leone told Linda that he wanted a divorce and desired to move into the small camper that was on their property. Linda allowed him to take showers and wash clothes in the trailer home since the camper did not have running water. Early one Saturday morning, Leone entered the trailer, turned the television on and the volume up, and consumed food and drink. Linda became upset, and she told Leone that the trailer was no longer his home and that he was not welcome in it anymore. Leone then removed his belongings from the trailer and gave Linda the keys to the trailer.
On December 8, 2000, Linda took her oldest daughter Stephanie to high school, and then went to work. Her thirteen-year-old daughter Jennifer stayed home due to a cold.
At about 10 a.m., Leone entered the trailer with a key and took a shower. He told Jennifer that he would see her later, but then decided to kill Jennifer to prevent her from telling Linda he had been in the trailer.
Leone returned to the camper and retrieved duct tape. He entered the trailer, grabbed Jennifer from the kitchen table and taped her mouth to keep her from yelling. Leone bound her wrists with the tape and led her towards the camper.
When they arrived at the camper, Jennifer tried to run away from him, but Leone grabbed her and dragged her inside. Leone then threw Jennifer onto a mattress, and ripped her shirt off. When Jennifer asked if he was going to rape her, Leone responded, "Yep." He proceeded to cut Jennifer's clothes with a box cutter.
Leone sat next to Jennifer and smoked marijuana while she lay there nude. He periodically fondled her genital area and breasts and performed oral sex on her. Leone tried to have sexual intercourse with Jennifer but was unable. Jennifer asked Leone what he was going to do next, but he did not respond. Leone then retrieved a dog choker that was hanging nearby, placed it around Jennifer's neck, pulled on it, and killed her. He had intercourse with Jennifer's corpse. He then dragged her body outside, cut the tape off of her mouth, and taped her ankles and wrists together. He dug a hole and placed Jennifer's body in it with her clothes and buried her. Thereafter, he visited his brother Robert, and they smoked marijuana.
When Stephanie arrived home from school around 3:15 p.m., she called for Jennifer when she entered the trailer, but did not hear a response. Stephanie called her mother at work, and then her grandmother, to ask about Jennifer's whereabouts. She eventually went to Robert Leone's residence across the road to see if Jennifer was there playing with his two sons. She inquired whether Robert saw Jennifer that day, and he said he had not.
Robert Leone, Lillie Paddie, Daniel Watkins, and Leone searched different areas of the eighteen-acre property to look for Jennifer, and Leone never indicated he knew what had happened to her.
Around 6:30 p.m., Detective Chris Lewis and an Indiana State trooper arrived to help search for Jennifer and to look around the trailer. Detective Lewis went to Leone's camper to ask his whereabouts for the day; Leone replied that he had been in the camper all day and had not seen or heard anything. Leone initially said he had not been inside of the trailer since Thanksgiving, but later admitted entering it several times to take showers after everyone left. Leone continued to insist he had not entered the trailer on the day Jennifer stayed at home.
The police left the premises around 4 a.m. Thereafter, Linda, Stephanie, and Daniel tried to sleep in the living room. The sound of Leone opening the door to the trailer awakened Linda. Leone walked in, dropped the keys on the bar stool next to where she was sitting, picked up the phone, and called someone, whom she later discovered was a 911 dispatcher. Linda heard Leone say, Leone talked for a couple of minutes and then handed the phone to her. When Linda asked Leone why he killed Jennifer, Leone said because she made him a "sexless man." Linda testified that after she hung up the phone, Leone said that he could show her where Jennifer was buried and that Jennifer "did not suffer". When the police arrived, Leone put his hands out and told them to take him away.
Detective Lewis placed Leone in a car, read him his rights; Leone waived his rights and gave a statement of what happened. Leone then showed where he buried Jennifer's body in a hole behind the shed. Leone expressed his sorrow for his actions. He later told Detective Lewis that since he did not have any more marijuana and since he was going to get caught, he would just turn himself in.
The next day, forensic pathologist Dr. Roland Kohr went to assist with the exhumation of Jennifer's body. He noticed an abrasion around Jennifer's neck that was consistent with a ligature abrasion. He later testified that fresh blood appeared to be coming from Jennifer's vagina, which indicated that she was possibly sexually assaulted.
The autopsy revealed that the duct tape had been placed across Jennifer's mouth while she was still alive. Dr. Kohr observed petechial hemorrhages on Jennifer's face, which are strongly associated with asphyxial deaths where blood flow is cut off by strangulation and causes small capillaries to rupture from the increased pressure. Kohr also noticed that contusions on the larynx indicated that pressure had been applied to that area, and he believed that the pressure from the dog choker caused the contusions.
Dr. Kohr believed that Jennifer was dead before she had been buried. He opined that Jennifer's heart continued to beat for a short time after she lost consciousness and stopped breathing because he found congestion in her lungs. He said Jennifer was probably conscious for approximately thirteen to fifteen seconds after the ligature interrupted the blood flow to her brain, and he concluded that her death was caused by ligature strangulation. Kohr further found lacerations, contusions, and hemorrhages to the external genital area.
On December 12th, Leone gave a second statement to Detective Lewis in which he complained he had not been sexually involved with Linda for the last two months. He said that when Linda told him that she did not plan to engage in intercourse with him anymore, he began to think about raping and killing Stephanie, Linda's older daughter. Leone said he killed Jennifer to keep her from telling Linda that he showered in the trailer. He stated that he decided to rape Jennifer after he already decided to kill her. Leone attributed his high sexual appetite to his strokes. His appetite was particularly strong when he smoked marijuana.
Leone eventually pled guilty. The trial court found Leone guilty of felony murder, but mentally ill. It found that Leone intentionally killed Jennifer while committing or attempting to commit child molestation, and he tortured...
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