State v. Bentley

• Decision Date: 31 October 2008
• Docket Number: No. 06-0476.,06-0476.
• Citation: 757 N.W.2d 257
• Parties: STATE of Iowa, Appellee, v. Roger Paul BENTLEY, Appellant.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

757 N.W.2d 257

STATE of Iowa, Appellee, v. Roger Paul BENTLEY, Appellant.

No. 06-0476.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

October 31, 2008.

Mark C. Smith, State Appellate Defender, and Theresa R. Wilson, Assistant State Appellate Defender, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Darrel L. Mullins, Assistant Attorney General, and Janet M. Lyness, County Attorney, for appellee.

CADY, Justice.

In this direct appeal from a judgment and sentence of first-degree kidnapping and first-degree murder, we review a variety of claims of trial and sentencing errors. Upon our consideration of the appeal, we decline to address one claim of ineffective assistance of counsel and reject all other claims of error. We affirm the judgment and sentence of the district court.

I. Background Facts and Proceedings.

J.G. was ten years of age when her life ended as a victim of murder. The detailed events of her death are chronicled in this opinion in order to properly address the issues raised in this appeal from the trial where they were recounted by witnesses and memorialized as evidence. We use the initials of the name of the victim to identify her in this opinion in an effort to protect her memory from the brutal actions that accompanied her death. See Iowa Code § 915.36(2) (2007).

J.G. lived with her grandmother, mother, and two younger siblings in her grandmother's two-story home in Cedar Rapids. J.G. was the oldest child and maintained a bedroom in the basement of the home. She attended a local grade school and was fond of wearing her "Chicago Bears" jacket.

On the morning of March 25, 2005, police found J.G.'s lifeless body in a filthy and deserted trailer home located on the Orval Yoder Turnpike outside Cedar Rapids, several miles from her home. Her body was inhumanely wedged into a bathroom vanity in the trailer home. She had been brutally beaten, sexually abused, bound in plastic and wrapped in duct tape. A plastic bag had been placed over her head and wrapped with six rotations of tape around her neck. The cause of her death was determined to be asphyxiation from the plastic bag and compression to the neck and chest.

Roger Bentley was, ostensibly, a friend of J.G.'s family. On the morning of March 24, 2005, the day before the grisly discovery of the body of J.G., Bentley was at J.G.'s home for the purpose of making repairs to the family van. Bentley worked outside the house on the van for most of the day, but came into the house from time to time to warm his body, especially as evening descended on the day. He stopped working on the van at 7:30 p.m. and entered the house for the last time. He went into the living room, sat down and engaged in conversation with J.G.'s grandmother and the three children. J.G.'s mother was not at home.

At 8 p.m., J.G.'s grandmother announced it was time for the three children to go to bed. J.G. went downstairs to her bedroom by herself as directed by her grandmother. The grandmother took the two younger children to their upstairs bedroom and put them into bed. Bentley accompanied J.G.'s grandmother and the two children up the stairs and told the two children goodnight.

Bentley then left the house. However, the precise movements of his departure are somewhat shrouded by the grandmother's inability to clearly articulate the events. Her testimony at trial permitted the State to assert that Bentley left the house while she was still upstairs with the two younger children.¹ Bentley claims her testimony can be viewed to mean she showed him to the front door and locked the door behind him as he left the house. Bentley did not testify at trial.

Under either view, J.G.'s grandmother locked the front door after Bentley left the house. She later went downstairs to check on J.G. She did not find J.G. in her bed. The fear she sensed intensified, as she was unable to find J.G. in or around the house. She telephoned J.G.'s mother and then the police. The police issued an AMBER alert² and sought to locate Bentley.

Between 10:45 p.m. and 11 p.m. that evening, a motorist pulled to the side of the road and stopped after he was flagged down by Bentley. Bentley was in a pickup truck with a topper over the bed of the truck. Bentley asked the motorist for directions to Black Diamond Road. This road accesses Orval Yoder Turnpike. The motorist provided directions to Bentley, but did not observe anyone in the cab of the truck with Bentley. The topper had tinted windows, which did not allow the motorist to view the truck bed.

The next morning, Robin Walker and Danny Hill were home getting ready for work. They heard the AMBER alert on the morning news broadcast. The alert announced J.G. was missing and that police were looking for Bentley. Walker and Hill were almost immediately overcome with suspicion that Bentley may have taken J.G. to the trailer on Orval Yoder Turnpike. Bentley occasionally did automobile repair work for them, and he had accompanied Walker and Hill to the trailer three days earlier. Walker and Hill were interested in purchasing the trailer. They promptly called police about their prophetic feeling.

A short time later, law enforcement officers converged on the trailer. Bentley emerged from the rear door of the trailer and was taken into custody. Officers observed that he was "scruffy," "unkempt," and "unshaven." He was wearing jeans with blood on the fabric in the area of the front zipper.

Officers entered the trailer. They found it in a general state of disarray. In a bedroom, a youth-sized "Chicago Bears" jacket was observed, along with a child's pink tennis shoe. Officers also observed a substance later determined to be blood on the mattress in the bedroom.

Officers called out for J.G., with no response. A hurried search by the officers of the other rooms of the trailer failed to reveal her presence. The officers did observe a filing cabinet and a large piece of wood positioned in front of the vanity in the bathroom.

A canine unit was summoned to the trailer to search for J.G. After an unsuccessful search of the wooded area surrounding the trailer, the dog and his handler went into the trailer. Within a short period of time, the dog alerted to the area of the vanity under the sink in the bathroom. The officers removed the debris in front of the vanity and opened the vanity door located below the sink. The search had come to an end.

J.G.'s body was cool to the touch. Lividity had set in. The officer who opened the vanity door observed blood in the area of J.G.'s exposed lower back and buttocks.

State criminologists were summoned to the trailer. They removed J.G.'s body from the vanity. A plastic garment bag had been taped tightly around her neck. Her feet were also wrapped with plastic and bound with tape. The criminologists found blood on the bedding in the bedroom, as well as on the walls and doorjamb of the bedroom. The blood was later determined to be from J.G.

An autopsy of J.G.'s body revealed bruising to the deep tissue of her neck, blunt-force trauma to the side of her head, and less severe bruising to the face, abdomen, shoulder, back, arms, and legs. Petechial hemorrhaging was present in her eyes, face, heart, and lungs. A frothy substance was found in her larynx. These findings supported a cause of death by asphyxiation from the plastic bag and compression to the neck and chest.

The autopsy also discovered seminal fluid in J.G.'s vagina and anus. DNA from the fluid was tested and matched the DNA collected from Bentley.

Criminologists additionally analyzed scraping from Bentley's fingernails. The analysis found blood containing DNA from J.G. Blood was also found on Bentley's underwear, shirt, and fly area of his pants. This blood contained DNA from J.G. The "Chicago Bears" jacket and shoe were confirmed to belong to J.G.

Bentley was charged and found guilty following a jury trial of first-degree kidnapping and first-degree murder. The district court sentenced Bentley to two consecutive life sentences. It indicated consecutive sentences were justified based on the violent and cruel nature of the criminal acts and to send a message to the parole board and governor that any future application for commutation of sentence "should not be taken seriously."

Bentley appealed and raised three issues. He first claims there was insufficient evidence to support a finding that he was the person who removed or confined J.G. to support the conviction for first-degree kidnapping. Second, he claims his trial court counsel rendered ineffective assistance in two ways. The first component of the claim is his trial lawyer should have requested a new trial based on jury misconduct after it was discovered that a juror used a dictionary to ascertain the definition of the word "necromancy" and went on-line to Amazon.com to search for a book titled "The Necromantic Ritual Book." A copy of this book was found at Bentley's house and was introduced into evidence at trial. The second component of the claim of ineffective assistance of counsel was based on the failure of Bentley's trial counsel to object to the malice-aforethought instruction given by the trial court to the jury. Bentley claims the instruction permitted the jury to convict him without adequate proof of malice aforethought. Finally, Bentley claims the district court used an improper reason to impose consecutive sentences.

II. Standards of Review.

The principles governing our review of a district court's denial of a criminal defendant's motion for judgment of acquittal are well-established. State v. Henderson, 696 N.W.2d 5, 7 (Iowa 2005). A motion for judgment of acquittal is a means of challenging the sufficiency of the evidence, and we review such claims for correction of errors at law. Id. A guilty verdict must be supported by substantial evidence. Id.

"`Substantial evidence' is that upon which a rational trier of fact could find the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt." In conducting our review, we consider all...