Rodriguez v. State Of Fla.

• Decision Date: 09 July 2010
• Docket Number: SC07-1314.,No. SC05-859,SC05-859
• Citation: 39 So.3d 275
• Parties: Manuel Antonio RODRIGUEZ, Appellant,v.STATE of Florida, Appellee.Manuel Antonio Rodriguez, Petitioner,v.Walter A. McNeil, etc., Respondent.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

39 So.3d 275

Manuel Antonio RODRIGUEZ, Appellant,

v.STATE of Florida, Appellee.

Manuel Antonio Rodriguez, Petitioner,

v.Walter A. McNeil, etc., Respondent.

Nos. SC05-859, SC07-1314.

Supreme Court of Florida.

May 6, 2010.

Rehearing Denied July 9, 2010.

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Neal A. Dupree, Capital Collateral Regional Counsel, Roseanne Eckert, CCR Counsel and Alisha D. Hurwood, CCR Counsel Staff Attorney, Southern Region, Fort Lauderdale, FL, for Appellant/Petitioner.

Bill McCollum, Attorney General, Tallahassee, FL, Sandra S. Jaggard and Katherine Maria Diamandis, Assistant Attorneys General, Tampa, FL, for Appellee/Respondent.

PER CURIAM.

Manuel Antonio Rodriguez appeals the circuit court's order denying his motion to vacate his convictions of first-degree murder and sentences of death and also petitions this Court for a writ of habeas corpus. We have jurisdiction. See art. V, § 3(b)(1), (9), Fla. Const. Rodriguez raised a significant number of claims in his postconviction motion, and the circuit court held two separate evidentiary hearings on the claims requiring evidentiary development. This Court, having reviewed the record in the original trial and on postconviction and having held two separate oral arguments, has determined that none of the claims individually or collectively warrant relief. As more fully explained in this opinion, we affirm the circuit court's denial of postconviction relief. We also deny habeas relief.

FACTS

Direct Appeal

The appellant, Manuel Antonio Rodriguez, was convicted of the first-degree murders of Bea Joseph, Sam Joseph, and Genevieve Abraham, which took place in Miami. The facts of this case are more fully set forth in our opinion on direct appeal. See Rodriguez v. State, 753 So.2d 29, 33-35 (Fla.2000). Briefly stated, in December 1984, Sam Joseph, Bea Joseph (Sam's wife), and Genevieve Abraham (the Josephs' friend) were found murdered in the Josephs' apartment. “When Abraham was found, her wedding band, diamond watch, and diamond earrings were missing. There was no sign of forced entry into the apartment, but the apartment was in disarray.” Id. at 33. Each victim “died quickly from gunshot wounds to the head.” Id. at 33-34.

Sam Joseph was Rodriguez's landlord. Rodriguez lived with his girlfriend, Maria Malakoff, in the same apartment building as the Josephs and often did odd jobs for them in their apartment. He was suspected of being involved because of several calls that he made to the police as a “tipster” after the murders. Id. at 34. However, the police did not have sufficient evidence to charge him at that time.

In 1992, Rafael Lopez contacted police and told them that his brother-in-law, Luis Rodriguez,¹ had confided to him that Luis and his friend, Manuel Rodriguez, committed the murders. Police contacted Luis, who eventually gave a formal confession in which he implicated both himself and Manuel Rodriguez. The police also arrested and questioned Rodriguez, who gave numerous conflicting accounts. Rodriguez finally admitted he was present at the time of the crime and helped Luis gain access to the Josephs' apartment, but “contended that the robbery and murders were committed by Luis and Luis's brother Isidoro, and that he had simply acted as a lookout.” Id.

Although it was Rodriguez who had the prior relationship with the victims and lived in the same apartment building, no physical evidence linked him to the murders. His codefendant Luis, who pled guilty to second-degree murder, testified against him at trial and was a key witness:

At trial, Luis testified that in 1984 he was living in Orlando. He stated that Manuel called him and asked if he was interested in making money by assisting Manuel in committing a robbery. Manuel told Luis that Luis would be the lookout and that Manuel would do all of the work. Luis flew to Miami and met Manuel. They went to the Josephs' apartment; Manuel knocked on the door and told Sam Joseph that Malakoff and the children were being held hostage and that they would be released only if the Josephs gave him money. Manuel then forced himself into the apartment. Luis followed and shut the door.

Once inside the apartment, Manuel, who had brought two pairs of rubber gloves with him, put on one pair and told Luis to wear the other pair and not to touch anything in the apartment without the gloves. Sam Joseph offered to get money from the bedroom, but Manuel instructed Luis to look there instead. Luis found a gun in the Josephs' bedroom, and Manuel became angry with Sam Joseph because he thought the offer to get money from the bedroom was actually a ruse to get the gun. Eventually, during the course of the crime, Manuel shot both Sam and Bea Joseph with a gun he had brought with him and then he ordered Luis to shoot Abraham with the gun Luis had found in the Josephs' bedroom. Because Luis was scared, he did as he was told and then he fled. He stated that he did not receive any of the proceeds from the crime and flew back to Orlando the next day.

Id.²

Luis's brother, Isidoro, also testified at trial and provided inculpatory evidence against Rodriguez:

He ... stated that, soon after the murders, his mother contacted him to tell him that she had found coins and jewelry in a bag under her trailer and that Manuel and Malakoff had shown up looking for it. Isidoro stated that he was aware of the murders in the building and that he took the bag back to Orlando, where he threw it into a field. Isidoro's mother also testified and confirmed Isidoro's story.

Id. at 35. Isidoro also provided documentation that he was working in another city at the time of the crime. Rodriguez's girlfriend, Malakoff, testified, stating

that she and Manuel had two children, one of whom died in 1984. She stated that members of her family did not like her or Manuel. She also said that Manuel was not angry with Sam Joseph at the time of the murders and that she did not believe that Manuel was involved in the murders. The State impeached her testimony through her sworn statement to the police in 1993, in which she said that Manuel had been angry with Sam Joseph and on the day of the murders had called him a son-of-a-bitch. Additionally, in her pretrial statement, she said that Manuel told her he killed Sam Joseph when Joseph reached for a gun; that he had made sure that Luis killed Abraham; and that Manuel made sure they were all dead.

Id. The jury convicted Rodriguez of three counts of first-degree murder.

In the penalty phase, the State presented evidence that Rodriguez had “seventy-one prior violent felony convictions (the contemporaneous murders in this case, twenty-three convictions of armed robbery, seventeen for armed kidnapping, eight for aggravated assault with a firearm, and numerous convictions for carrying a concealed weapon and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon).” Id. The State also presented evidence that Rodriguez was on probation and parole at the time of the murders.

Both the State and Rodriguez presented the testimony of numerous psychologists and psychiatrists who had evaluated Rodriguez over the previous twenty years. While the experts believed that Rodriguez had some sort of mental illness, many questioned whether he exaggerated his symptoms and was malingering:

Apparently, whenever Rodriguez was charged with a crime, a question of competency was raised and he was evaluated. Most of those who examined him agreed that he suffered from some sort of mental illness, but the testimony varied greatly in that some had previously found him to be incompetent and in need of hospitalization; others had found him to be malingering.

Id. at 35. The testimony did establish a long history of drug abuse. The State also called Detective Jarrett Crawford, who testified as to hearsay statements from Alejandro Lago, an inmate who asserted that Rodriguez admitted he was exaggerating his symptoms.

The jury unanimously recommended the death penalty for each of the murders. The judge sentenced Rodriguez to death for each murder, finding six aggravating circumstances: (1) the murder was committed while Rodriguez was under a sentence of imprisonment; (2) he had previously been convicted of violent felonies; (3) the murder was committed during the felony of armed burglary; (4) the murder was committed to avoid arrest; (5) the murder was committed for pecuniary gain; and (6) the murder was cold, calculated and premeditated (CCP).³ The trial judge found no statutory mitigation, but found the following nonstatutory mitigation: “Rodriguez was and is mentally ill, he has a history of drug abuse and drug psychosis, and he is a good brother, loving father, and caring son.” Id.

On appeal, this Court affirmed the convictions and sentences of death. As to the guilt phase, the Court reviewed a statement made by a detective during trial and an improper comment during closing argument-both which could have been interpreted as comments on Rodriguez's right to remain silent. Nevertheless, we found that the comments constituted harmless error beyond a reasonable doubt. Id. at 36-39. As to the penalty phase, we held it was error to permit Detective Crawford to testify as to the statements from Alejandro Lago but held the error was harmless. Id. at 45.

Postconviction Proceedings

Rodriguez filed his initial motion for postconviction relief under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.850 ⁴ on September 14, 2001, and his amended postconviction motion on April 16, 2004, raising numerous claims. ⁵ A Huff⁶ hearing was held August 24, 2004, at which the State conceded that an evidentiary hearing was necessary on six of the subclaims raised by Rodriguez. The trial court agreed to hold a hearing on the following claims: (1) trial counsel rendered ineffective assistance in failing to present evidence that Luis and Isidoro left Orlando together to commit the crimes; (2) trial counsel rendered ineffective assistance in failing to present testimony...