Spetzer v. Tennis

• Decision Date: 22 May 2012
• Docket Number: No. 4:CV-10-0284,4:CV-10-0284
• Parties: JON A. SPETZER, Petitioner v. FRANKLIN J. TENNIS, Respondent
• Court: U.S. District Court — Middle District of Pennsylvania

JON A. SPETZER, Petitioner

v.FRANKLIN J. TENNIS, Respondent

No. 4:CV-10-0284

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA

Dated: May 22, 2012

(Judge Nealon)

MEMORANDUM

Petitioner, John A. Spetzer, filed the instant petition for writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254. He attacks a conviction imposed by the Court of Common Pleas for Centre County, Pennsylvania. (Doc. 1). For the reasons that follow, the Court will deny the petition.

I. Background

The following background has been extracted from the Pennsylvania Supreme Court's December 31, 2002 Opinion, reversing and vacating the Pennsylvania Superior Court's decision to grant a new trial. (Doc. 14, App. L, Opinion dated December 31, 2002).

Appellee's wife, Kim, who had been married to appellee for four years by the time of trial, described their marriage as "sadistic and very violent," as she endured repeated sexual, physical and mental abuse at the hand of her husband. Throughout the course of their marriage, appellee would order Kim to "step into [his] office," at which point appellee would take her into the bedroom of their home and physically assault her.

In January 1995, Kim's four daughters from a previous marriage, including twelve-year old B.G., traveled from Kentucky where they lived with their biological father, to Pennsylvania, intending to stay with the Spetzers until May. The Spetzers lived in a two-bedroom mobile home with their own two small children, leaving little space for the four older girls, who slept in sleeping bags on the Spetzers' living room floor. On a Saturday evening in April, B.G. awoke on the living room floor to find appellee fondling her breasts and vagina. Although B.G. repeatedly asked appellee to stop, appellee persisted despite her protests.

Within a few days of the fondling incident, appellee told B.G. to sleep in her younger stepbrother's room on the pretext that she could assist the child in the event of a fire in the mobile home. At around the same time, Kim, who normally went to bed between the hours of 10:00 p.m. and midnight, began falling asleep between 7:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. She later learned that appellee had been surreptitiously drugging her with chemicals that made her drowsy. Appellee, who also normally retired between 10 p.m. and 11 p.m., began going to bed between 2:30 and 3:00 a.m. In the same period of time, appellee told Kim that he did not want her daughters to wear bras and underwear to bed, claiming that the bras would cut off their circulation and the girls' underwear was creating too much laundry.

A few days after B.G. began sleeping in her stepbrother's bedroom, appellee entered the room while B.G. was sleeping and raped B.G. at knifepoint. B.G. could not scream during the attack because appellee forced a folded tube sock into her mouth, which caused the sides of her mouth to split and bleed. After the rape, appellee threatened to kill B.G. or ruin her life if she said anything to anyone. Appellee again sexually assaulted B.G. on each of the two following nights. Prior to the second rape, appellee put on a condom and applied vaseline, telling B.G., "it would slide easier." Again, he forced a sock into B.G.'s mouth, but this time he secured it with duct tape. On the third evening, appellee had unprotected, forced sexual intercourse with B.G. During each rape, appellee held a knife and threatened to kill B.G. if she told anyone.

In May 1995, Kim, who was unaware of the rapes, drove her four daughters, her two small children by appellee, her sister and her niece to Kentucky. Kim intended to return her four daughters to their father and then return to Pennsylvania, at which time she and appellee would move to Florida. En route to Kentucky, B.G. told her cousin that appellee had raped her. The cousin informed her mother, Kim's sister, who in turn told Kim. B.G.'s father also learned of the rapes from a family member and he immediately reported the rapes to the appropriate Kentucky child protection authorities.

Kim confronted appellee about the rapes over the telephone, at which time appellee became angry and told Kim that she "better make sure that kid keeps her mouth shut." You better tell your sister to mind her own business and you better get your ass back up here." Kim did not return to Pennsylvania. A few weeks later, however, appellee traveled by bus to Kentucky, retrieved Kim and their two children, and drove them back to Pennsylvania. During the trip to Pennsylvania, Kim told appellee that B.G. and her father had reported the rapes to authorities in Kentucky. She also told him that she was "sick to [her] stomach," "disgusted," and "didn't think [she] ever wanted him to touch [her] again." Appellee became enraged, grabbed Kim by the back of the head, pulled her head down and forced herto perform oral sex, all while driving the car with the couple's two children awake in the back seat. He then stated: "I think you will do what I want you to from now on."

They continued to argue about the rapes during the rest of the trip back to Pennsylvania. At one point, lat at night near Cumberland Maryland, appellee became upset and pulled the car into an empty parking lot. There, he assaulted Kim and choked her while telling her to make sure B.G. "kept her mouth shut," and that "when I tell you to do something, you're going to do it."

Once back at home in Pennsylvania, Kim and appellee again discussed the rapes of B.G. and the fact that Kim's family was angry with her for not reporting the rapes in Pennsylvania. Again, appellee became very angry and began screaming at Kim, who was two and one half months pregnant at the time. Appellee kicked her, pushed her against a wall and punched her arms, causing bruising. Kim managed to flee from the home and rand down the street screaming that appellee was going to kill her. She went to the home of a neighbor whom she had never met and called the police. The police responded and arrested appellee, who as then admitted to Meadows Psychiatric Hospital.

Following appellee's arrest, Kim petitioned for a Protection From Abuse (PFA) order. When she returned home, however, she found a note from appellee's father stating that he wanted the car, which he owned, returned to him or he would have Kim arrested for stealing it. The note also informed Kim that she had two weeks to vacate her mobile home, which appellee's parents also owned. Kim testified that she had no money, job, car or place to live on her own, and that she was completely dependent upon appellee and his parents. Therefore, she agreed to withdraw the PFA petition. In response, appellee's parents returned the car to Kim and allowed her to remain in the mobile home.

In an effort to learn more about what appellee had done to B.G., and to determine whether he had abused any of her other children, Kim spoke several times on the telephone to appellee and visited him once while he was at Meadows Psychiatric Hospital. During the visit, appellee told his wife that he did not rape B.G.; instead, he said, "it really wasn't sex because I didn't get it all the way in." He also admitted that he kept B.G. quiet during the attack by stuffing a sock in her mouth and securing it with duct tape and that he "really had her scared with a knife." Appellee told Kim that B.G. was "so terrified of me after a while she just let me do it." Kim testified that, as appellee was relating this fact to her, he "was laughing about it like it was fun to him, funny to him that he had terrified her so much that she would do what he wanted her to do without having to terrorize her any more to do it." Appellee admitted to having raped B.G. five times, and to threatening B.G. that if she ever told anyone of the assaults he would kill her.

In July of 1995, B.G.'s father brought her three sisters and B.G. to Pennsylvania to report the rapes. Both B.G. and Kim made statements to the police about the rapes, B.G. stating what had occurred and Kim reporting that appellee had admitted to her that he had sex with the twelve-year old B.G., although appellee deemed it to be consensual. Appellee, who had been released from the hospital by that time, became enraged that B.G. and her father had reported the rapes and that Kim was unable to convince them to return to Kentucky and he again assaulted Kim. He threatened to kill B.G. and her father by shooting the tires of their car as they were driving or to follow them to Kentucky and shoot B.G. with his compound bow and arrow as she returned home from school.

On July 14, 1995, appellee was charged with rape, statutory rape and related crimes as a result of his assaults upon B.G., and bail was set at $25,000. While appellee was in jail and after he was released on bail, he continued to engage in a course of conduct designed to intimidate Kim and B.G. into recanting their accusations. During one jail visit, appellee told Kim to tell his lawyer that she had lied to police about the rapes and to have B.G. write a letter to the District Attorney's Office stating that she had also lied. Appellee suggested that B.G. write that she had seen a magazine or a newspaper article about rape and that the article gave B.G. the idea to falsely accuse appellee. Kim eventually agreed to appellee's demands because she was fearful that appellee would soon be released from jail since his parents had the financial resources to post bail. Accordingly, she told appellee's lawyer that she had lied to the police. Kim also telephoned B.G. and told her that appellee wanted her to writ a letter to the District Attorney's Office indicating that she had fabricated the rapes. B.G. refused. Appellee wrote several letters to Kim urging her to have B.G. write the recantation letter. Appellee also asked that B.G. write letters to him saying that she was sorry, that he was a good stepfather, and that he would never have raped her.

By the time of his arraignment, appellee had been released on bail and had been ordered to stay away from

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