State v. Blurton

• Decision Date: 15 March 2016
• Docket Number: No. SC 93648,SC 93648
• Citation: 484 S.W.3d 758
• Parties: State of Missouri, Respondent, v. Robert Blake Blurton, Appellant.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

484 S.W.3d 758

State of Missouri, Respondent,

v.Robert Blake Blurton, Appellant.

No. SC 93648

Supreme Court of Missouri, en banc .

Opinion issued March 15, 2016

Rehearing Denied May 3, 2016

Blurton was represented by Craig A. Johnstonofthe public defender's office in Columbia, (573) 777–9977.

The state was represented by Daniel N. McPhersonofthe attorney general's office in Jefferson City, (573) 751–3321.

Patricia Breckenridge, chief justice

Robert Blurton appeals his convictions for three counts of murder in the first degree.Mr. Blurton was sentenced to death after being found guilty by a jury for murdering his aunt, uncle, and their 15–year–old granddaughter.On appeal, Mr. Blurton asserts that the trial court erred by refusing his proffered lesser included offense instruction, admitting testimony regarding cell phones and fingerprints, excluding evidence that someone else had the motive and opportunity to commit the murders, excluding bias evidence, and denying mistrial requests.Because this case involves the imposition of the death penalty, this Court has exclusive jurisdiction over the appeal.Mo. Const. art. V, sec. 3.

This Court finds that the trial court did not err in rejecting Mr. Blurton's proffered lesser included offense instruction because the instruction did not properly conform to the MAI requirements.Nor did the trial court err in admitting testimony from the state's cell phone analyst because his testimony was within the realm of a layperson.The trial court also did not err in admitting testimony from the state's fingerprint analyst because the trial court sustained three of Mr. Blurton's objections and the fourth objection was untimely.The trial court did not err in excluding evidence that someone else had the motive and opportunity to commit the crimes because Mr. Blurton did not attempt to present this evidence at trial.The trial court also did not err in excluding evidence of a witness's alleged bias against a potential witness because the potential witness was not called to testify at trial.Furthermore, the trial court did not err in denying Mr. Blurton's mistrial requests after the state inadvertently displayed crime scene photographs on three occasions because the display of the photographs was not intentional and all of the photographs were later admitted into evidence.Accordingly, this Court affirms Mr. Blurton's convictions and sentences.Additionally, after an independent review of the proportionality of Mr. Blurton's death sentences pursuant to section 565.035,¹this Court finds that Mr. Blurton's death sentences were not excessive or disproportionate to the penalty imposed in similar cases.

Factual and Procedural Background

Mr. Blurton's aunt and uncle, Sharon and Donnie Luetjen, and their 15–year–old granddaughter, Taron Luetjen,² lived together in Cole Camp.Mr. Blurton had not been to the Luetjens' home in about five years, but he had visited their home as a child and had lived with the Luetjens for a few months in 2004 after he was released from prison.At that time, the Luetjens had helped him buy a vehicle, find a job, and move into a new apartment.

On June 7, 2009, at 10:15 p.m., a 911 call was placed from Taron's cell phone.The operator disconnected the call after the caller did not speak for 45 seconds.A return call from the 911 operator was not answered, and the 911 operator did not dispatch the police.At trial, the state submitted a transcript of the original 911 call, which included the voices in the background of the call:

Dispatcher: Nine One One where is your emergency?

(unintelligible)

Female: Ohhh.

Dispatcher: Nine One One do you have an emergency.

Male: (unintelligible) in place ... I will kill you.

Dispatcher: Hello?

Female: I have three hundred dollars in my purse.

Male: I heard you.Set right there.Set right there.Sharon, I'll kill all you guys.Set right there.I liked all of you.Give me that other hand.

(unintelligible)

The male voice in the call was identified as Mr. Blurton's by the Luetjens' daughter and Mr. Blurton's girlfriend.³A few minutes after the 911 call, at approximately 10:30 p.m., a neighbor, who lived less than a half mile across the valley and who often heard sounds coming from the Luetjens' property, heard three pistol shots from the direction of the Luetjens' house.

Two days later, a neighbor discovered the Luetjens' bodies in their home.Each victim was found gagged, lying face-down on a pillow in the living room, with their hands bound behind their backs with brown fabric from Taron's canopy bed.Each had been shot once in the back of the head with a .22 caliber pistol.

Police found no evidence of forced entry.Inside the home, three cups—a white coffee mug, a plastic Royals souvenir cup, and a red travel mug—were found on the living room table.Mr. Blurton's fingerprints and DNA were discovered on the white coffee mug.⁴Mr. Blurton also could not be excluded as a contributor to the DNA found on the brown fabric used to bind Donnie's right hand.The DNA on Sharon's bindings also exhibited male characteristics, but the results were inconclusive as to whether the DNA was consistent with Mr. Blurton's because not enough data could be developed from the DNA that was found.The DNA on the binding on Taron's right hand exhibited male characteristics.Mr. Blurton was excluded as a contributor, but Donnie could not be excluded.The DNA on the binding on Taron's left hand also exhibited male characteristics, but Mr. Blurton and Donnie were both excluded as contributors.

In addition to the murders, police found evidence of a robbery.Donnie's wallet and its contents were found beneath a pillow on a chair near his body.His wallet contained no money although he was known to carry at least $200.Sharon's purse was sitting on the floor in the hallway near her bedroom.Her wallet had been removed and also did not contain any money.

In the Luetjens' bedroom, a dresser drawer was sitting on their bed with the contents dumped out.The drawer usually contained a large amount of change and Donnie's sizeable arrowhead collection.

Only a small amount of change remained, and the arrowheads were missing.Mr. Blurton had been caught stealing change from this drawer when he was a teenager.A gun cabinet in the Luetjens' bedroom was open, and three guns, including two .22 caliber pistols, were missing.Taron's cell phone was also missing.

On June 27, 2009, based on the daughter's identification of Mr. Blurton's voice on the 911 recording and the DNA results linking him to the crime scene, Mr. Blurton was arrested and charged with three counts of murder in the first degree under section 565.020.Prior to his arrest, Mr. Blurton asked his girlfriend to tell the police that he was with her that night.Mr. Blurton lied to her—telling her that he was at his boss's house in Nevada on the night of the murders but was unable to drive home because of severe weather and because his boss's wife was hitting on him.His boss and his boss's wife later testified at trial that Mr. Blurton had never been to their home.Mr. Blurton's girlfriend agreed to tell the police that Mr. Blurton had been with her on the night of the murders but she later recanted, telling the police that Mr. Blurton had asked her to lie for him.

At trial, the state's evidence included cell phone tower evidence showing that Mr. Blurton's cell phone had traveled from Garnett, Kansas, to Cole Camp between 8:16 p.m. and 9:59 p.m. on the night of the murders; the DNA and fingerprint evidence linking Mr. Blurton to the crime scene; and the identification of Mr. Blurton's voice as the male voice in the background of the 911 call.As motive for the robbery and murders, the state presented evidence that Mr. Blurton had recently lost his job and had been asked to move out of the home he had shared with his girlfriend.The girlfriend testified that Mr. Blurton had told her that he owed people money.Moreover, she testified that Mr. Blurton had told her that he would inherit land, a vehicle, and 22 percent of $6.6 million from the Luetjens.

A jury convicted Robert Blurton of three counts of murder in the first degree under section 565.020.At the penalty phase, the state presented evidence of Mr. Blurton's prior conviction for robbery in the first degree, as well as his convictions for forgery, burglary, stealing, and possession of a controlled substance in a department of corrections facility.The state also presented victim impact evidence from the Luetjens' daughter and grandson.Mr. Blurton presented mitigating evidence from his stepmother, two prisoners who were previously incarcerated with him, and a psychologist who testified that it was unlikely that Mr. Blurton would be violent in prison.

The jury recommended a sentence of death on all three counts.The jury found the following statutory aggravators: (1) Mr. Blurton had a prior serious assaultive conviction;⁵(2) each murder was committed while he was engaged in the commission of two other murders; and (3) the murders involved depravity of mind and, as a result, the murders were outrageously and wantonly vile, horrible, and inhuman insofar as each victim was bound or otherwise rendered helpless and Mr. Blurton, therefore, exhibited a callous disregard for the sanctity of all human life.The trial court rejected Mr. Blurton's motion for a new trial, accepted the jury's recommendations, and sentenced Mr. Blurton to death for each offense.Mr. Blurton now appeals his convictions.

On appeal, Mr. Blurton asserts that the trial court erred by: (1) rejecting his proffered jury instruction for felony murder in the second degree; (2) allowing a lay witness to testify regarding the location of the cell phone towers to which his cell phone connected on the night of the murders; (3) allowing the state's fingerprint analyst to testify that two other "qualified" examiners had "verified" her fingerprint identifications as part of her crime laboratory's peer review process and that ...