SCHOENWETTER v. State Of Fla.

• Decision Date: 01 July 2010
• Docket Number: No. SC09-955,No. SC08-2271,SC08-2271,SC09-955
• Court: Florida Supreme Court
• Parties: RANDY LAMAR SCHOENWETTER, Appellant, v. STATE OF FLORIDA, Appellee. RANDY SCHOENWETTER, Petitioner, v. WALTER A. MCNEIL, etc., Respondent.

RANDY LAMAR SCHOENWETTER, Appellant,

v.STATE OF FLORIDA, Appellee.

RANDY SCHOENWETTER, Petitioner,

v.WALTER A. MCNEIL, etc., Respondent.

No. SC08-2271

No. SC09-955

Supreme Court of Florida

July 1, 2010

Bill Jennings, Capital Collateral Regional Counsel, and James L. Driscoll, Jr., Assistant CCR Counsel, Middle Region, Tampa, Florida, for Appellant/Petitioner

Bill McCollum, Attorney General, Tallahassee, Florida, and Barbara C. Davis, Assistant Attorney General, Daytona Beach, Florida, for Appellee/Respondent

PER CURIAM.

Randy Schoenwetter appeals a circuit court order denying his motion to vacate his convictions of first-degree murder and sentences of death, filed pursuant to Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.851. He also petitions this Court for a writ

of habeas corpus. We have jurisdiction. See art. V, § 3(b)(1), (9), Fla. Const. Having considered the issues raised in the briefs and having heard oral argument, we now affirm the circuit court's order and deny the petition for writ of habeas corpus.

I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

Appellant's case was previously heard by this Court on direct appeal from his conviction and sentencing in the circuit court. See Schoenwetter v. State, 931 So. 2d 857 (Fla. 2006). In our opinion affirming appellant's conviction and death sentences, we described the facts of the underlying offenses as follows:

At the time of the crimes, the Friskey family consisted of five people: the father, Ronald; the mother, Haesun; and the three children, Chad (eighteen years old), Theresa (sixteen years old) and Virginia, (ten years old). The defendant had known the Friskey family from childhood and attended the same karate school with the Friskey children. He was friends with Chad until Chad left for the Air Force a few months before the crime. Throughout his association with the family and before the crimes occurred, the defendant stayed overnight at the Friskey residence on a number of occasions.

At approximately 3 a.m. on August 12, 2000, the defendant left his apartment, where he lived with his mother. He rode his bicycle to the Krystal's Restaurant, where he was employed. After staying at Krystal's for a short time, he left on his bicycle and rode to the Friskey residence. According to the defendant's letter to the court confessing guilt, he decided to go to the Friskey residence so that he could force one of the Friskey daughters, Theresa, age sixteen, or Virginia, age ten, to have sex with him.

Schoenwetter arrived at the Friskey residence at approximately 5 a.m. He parked his bicycle on the back driveway of the residence and walked up to the back porch. He used a box cutter to cut open the screen and enter the porch. He then managed to push open the sliding glass door from the porch into the house just enough to slip through. There was a stick in the sliding door which only allowed the door to be opened twelve inches. After entering the house, he walked directly into the kitchen and armed himself with a large serrated kitchen knife from one of the drawers. He then walked down the hallway where the three bedrooms were located.

The first door he approached was to Theresa's bedroom; it was locked. He then peeked inside the bedroom on the opposite side of the hall and saw the parents asleep in their bed. He knew, based upon his previous overnight visits to the Friskey home, that the parents were heavy sleepers. He then entered Virginia's bedroom, which was directly across the hall from the parents' bedroom and next to Theresa's bedroom.

During his taped confession, Schoenwetter said he entered Virginia's room and began looking around. He said he never touched her body. While he was in her room, Virginia woke up and began to shriek. He put his hand over her mouth, threatened her with a knife, and told her to be quiet. She continued to shriek, she then recognized him, and said his name, Randy. He started to leave the room, but the mother came into the room and grabbed him. The father came into the room and tackled him. After struggling with the parents for a short time, he managed to break loose. Instead of leaving the house, he decided to go back to Virginia's bed and kill her because she had recognized him and could identify him. He stabbed her on her bed. After he stabbed her, the father tackled him. He then struggled with both parents until he managed to break loose again. The defendant then left the house the same way he came in, got on his bike, and rode home. After he arrived home, he took a shower, placed his clothes, shoes, the box cutter, and the knife inside a blue plastic bag, placed the blue bag inside a trash bag containing trash from his apartment, and put the trash bag in the dumpster.

Id. at 862-63. Regarding the injuries suffered by the victims, we stated:

The forensic evidence revealed Ronald Friskey died as a result of multiple stab wounds, including a stab wound to the eyebrow, forehead, left upper back, left middle back, middle back close to the spine, right lower back, right side of the neck, and three wounds to the right side of the chest. Ronald Friskey also had wounds on his right hand, which were consistent with defensive wounds. The wounds to the right side of the neck and the left middle back were lifethreatening wounds, because they were very deep and caused extreme blood loss. The wound to the left middle back penetrated Ronald Friskey's lung.

It was determined that Virginia Friskey also died as a result of multiple stab wounds. One stab wound was inflicted to each side of her chest. The stab wound on the left was four inches deep and the one on the right was three inches deep. She also had a wound on each hand which entered the back of the hand and came out to the front of the hand. It appears that she was shielding her chest and that these wounds occurred at the same time as the chest wounds. The wounds to her chest penetrated her heart and both lungs. She also had wounds to her lip and to her lower jaw.

Haesun Friskey was stabbed multiple times but survived. She was in critical condition when she arrived at the hospital and had to undergo surgery to stop the bleeding in her liver and the bleeding on two parts of her arm. She suffered from massive blood loss and received 100 units of blood during her hospital stay. Dr. Emran Imani, the trauma surgeon who treated Haesun Friskey, testified that this was the equivalent of replacing her entire blood volume more than twenty times. He described her survival as miraculous, stating that she was expected to die when she arrived at the hospital.

Id at 864.

The morning after the incident, law enforcement officers encountered the appellant after following a trail of blood which led from the Friskey residence to the apartment complex where Schoenwetter lived with his mother. Schoenwetter agreed to accompany two detectives to the police station for an interview, whichwas videotaped. Although he initially denied any involvement, Schoenwetter subsequently confessed to the crimes and gave a detailed statement to the officers. See id. at 863-64. This statement was corroborated by blood DNA testing based on samples taken from Schoenwetter's clothes, Virginia Friskey's bedroom, and other items and locations. The blood trail leading from the Friskey residence was determined to match Schoenwetter's blood DNA, which was also found on the handle of the knife used against the victims. See id. at 864.

Schoenwetter was indicted on August 29, 2000, for first-degree murder in the death of Virginia Friskey, first-degree murder in the death of Ronald Friskey, attempted first-degree murder of Haesun Friskey, and armed burglary of a dwelling. See id. at 861. On February 17, 2003, Schoenwetter wrote a letter to the trial judge confessing his guilt and indicating that he wished to change his plea from not guilty to guilty. He also stated that his reason for entering the residence was to force one or both of the Friskey daughters to have sex with him. A status hearing was held on February 26, 2003. Against the advice of counsel to remain silent, and after a cautionary instruction by the trial judge, Schoenwetter admitted to the court that he had written the letter and expressed his desire to change his plea to guilty. A guilty plea to all charges was entered on March 5, 2003.

Penalty phase proceedings were held from September 15 through September 25, 2003. At the end of the proceedings, the jury recommended death for themurder of Virginia Friskey by a vote of ten to two, and for the murder of Ronald Friskey by a vote of nine to three. The court held a Spencer¹ hearing on November 7, 2003, and subsequently imposed a sentence of death for each first-degree murder charge and sentences of life in prison for the attempted murder and armed burglary charges. The court found three aggravating circumstances to be applicable to both murders: (1) the defendant had been convicted of another capital offense or of a felony involving the use or threat of violence to some person; (2) the crime for which the defendant was to be sentenced was committed while he was engaged in the commission of or the attempt to commit the crime of burglary; and (3) the crime was committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest. As to the murder of Virginia Friskey, the court also found the aggravating circumstance that the victim was a person of less than twelve years of age. As to the murder of Ronald Friskey, the court found that the crime was especially heinous, atrocious or cruel (HAC).

The trial court considered and assigned weight to the following statutory mitigating circumstances: (1) lack of prior criminal history (little weight); (2) extreme mental or emotional disturbance (little weight);² (3) lack of capacity toconform conduct to the requirements of the law (little weight);³ and (4) the defendant's age (eighteen) at the time of the crime (little weight). The court also considered and weighed eight of the nine nonstatutory mitigators proposed by...