State v. Cooke

• Decision Date: 15 December 2022
• Docket Number: I.D. 0506005981
• Parties: STATE OF DELAWARE, v. JAMES E. COOKE, JR. Defendant.
• Court: Superior Court of Delaware

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STATE OF DELAWARE, v. JAMES E. COOKE, JR. Defendant.

I.D. No. 0506005981

Superior Court of Delaware

December 15, 2022

Upon Petitioner's Motion for Postconviction Relief DENIED.

Maria T. Knoll, Esquire, Matthew Bloom, Esquire, Department of Justice, Wilmington, Delaware. Attorney for the State.

James Lawley, Esquire, Beth Muhlhauser, Esquire, Office of the Federal Public Defender, Middle District of Pennsylvania Harrisburg

Christopher S. Koyste, Esquire, Law Office of Christopher S Koyste, LLC., Wilmington, Delaware, Attorney for the Petitioner.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

GRAVES, T., RETIRED JUDGE ^[1]

PREFACE

Pending before the Court is a Motion for Postconviction Relief filed by James E. Cooke ("Cooke" or "defendant") pursuant to Superior Court Criminal Rule 61 ("Rule 61"). This is my decision on this motion.

Any capital murder trial is difficult for everyone including the defendant, the family of the victim, the attorneys, and the judge. This one was much more difficult because of the Defendant's behavior as noted in the Supreme Court's decision affirming his conviction.

The submissions to the Court are voluminous. The motion, answer and reply total 670 pages of argument. Additionally, thousands of pages of reports, articles, etc. are included in the appendices. There have been evidentiary hearings to bolster or denigrate positions. But, in the long run, nothing has been presented by the defense to overturn the trial verdict and grant a new trial. Nothing has been presented that supports Cooke's claim of innocence. While the focus of this decision is on the 2012 trial and complaints as to what trial defense counsel and prosecutors did or did not do, the Court is mindful of the path that the players had in getting to a trial which included the "dress rehearsal" in the form of the 2007 trial. It is rare for defense attorneys to have the State's case laid out completely for them by a first trial that gets reversed. Counsel in the second trial (2012), which is the subject of this decision, had the opportunity to go to school on the first trial.

Initially, I issue a warning and an apology. The allegations of wrongdoing, judicial error, ineffective counsel and State misconduct are voluminous. Defendant argues six defense counsel, the prosecutors, and the two judges involved in this case just got it all wrong. To address these allegations, I have had to often state the relevant facts repeatedly so those facts are known to the reader in regard to the particular issue at hand.

COOKE WAIVES ATTENDANCE AT POSTCONVICTION EVIDENTIARY HEARINGS

In the run up to the evidentiary hearings counsel for Mr. Cooke informed the Court that he did not wish to be present at any of the hearings. He had health issues that could only be addressed multiple times every day at the prison. By video a colloquy took place to address his position and the fact that he had a right to attend but did not want to attend. In the conversation with Mr. Cooke, he was alert, focused, and on point. There was no evidence of the alleged incompetency. He simply chose not to attend. Also discussed was the possibility of a video link to the prison, but that would not work because the video set up was in a separate part of the prison from the infirmary.

With the aforementioned, the Court directed his attorneys to communicate with him both before and after each hearing to inform him of what was planned and what actually took place so he could have input into the process. If necessary, witnesses could be brought back to address any questions Mr. Cooke wanted.

Mr. Cooke and counsel all agreed this was the best solution to address his health issues and inability to attend the hearings. Counsel regularly informed the Court they had communicated with Mr. Cooke as to the aforementioned.

THE FACTS

For the facts I adopt the Supreme Court's summary with minor changes. Those changes are underlined. Citations are removed.

On April 30, 2005, Lindsay Bonistall was a 20-year-old student at the University of Delaware. That night, Bonistall went to her friend Nicole Gengaro's dorm room and watched Saturday Night Live with Gengaro, Katie Johnson, and Isabel Whiteneck (Rivero). When the show ended at 1:00 a.m. on May 1, 2005, Bonistall left, telling her friends that she might stop at a convenience store along the way home to pick up some food because she was hungry. After Bonistall came home someone broke into the apartment that Bonistall shared with her roommate, Christine Bush. Bush was out of town that weekend. The intruder attacked Bonistall in her bedroom, tied her hands with an iron cord, and shoved a t-shirt into her mouth as a gag. The intruder beat Bonistall, striking her above her eye and on her chin, and raped her. The intruder then knelt on Bonistall's chest and strangled her to death, using another t-shirt that had been tied and knotted around her neck like a ligature.

The intruder scrawled messages on the walls and countertops of the apartment. The intruder wrote "KKK" at multiple locations around the apartment. In the kitchen area the intruder wrote "WHITE Power." On a wall in the living room, the intruder wrote, "We Want are [sic] weed back" and "Give us Are [sic] drugs back." The intruder also wrote, "More Bodies Are going to be turn in [sic] up Dead."

To eliminate evidence of the crime, the intruder doused Bonistall's body in bleach. The intruder then dragged her body to the bathtub, put it in, covered it with flammable items, and set it on fire. The fire burned until it set off the hallway smoke alarm and other residents began to evacuate the apartment building. The fire department was called at 2:49 a.m. and the Newark volunteer fire department responded. The next day the Fire Marshal discovered Bonistall's burned body in the bathtub, still bound and gagged. The Fire Marshal determined that the fire had been intentionally set, and testified that the fire would have had to burn for at least an hour before it was put out to cause the damage it did. An autopsy determined that the cause of Bonistall's death was strangulation, and that Bonistall was dead before the fire was started. In other words, the fire would have been set at around 1:45 a.m. at the latest, meaning that Bonistall was killed less than an hour after she left her friends at around 1:00 a.m.

Following the murder, an anonymous person who was attempting to disguise his voice made at least three calls to the Newark Police Department's 911 call center. On May 1, 2005 there was a 911 hang up call with the same phone number as the May 2, 2005 call. In the call on May 2, 2005, the caller said that Bonistall's murder was related to two break-ins that had occurred at nearby apartments during the week before Bonistall's murder. The phone call led the Newark Police Department to investigate connections between Bonistall's murder and the break-ins at the nearby apartments.

The first break-in occurred four days before Bonistall was murdered. Around 1:00 a.m. on April 26, 2005, Cheryl Harmon returned to her apartment. Harmon discovered that someone had written "I WHAT [sic] My drug Money," DON'T Mess With My Men," and "we'll be back" on the walls of her apartment with red fingernail polish. Harmon noticed that she was missing several DVDs and two personalized rings. The point of entry was a living-room window with a pried-off lock.

The second break-in occurred three days later, on April 29, 2005-the evening before Bonistall was murdered. Amalia Cuadra woke up in the middle of the night because someone was shining a flashlight in her face. Cuadra called out to see if it was her roommate, and the intruder responded, "Shut the fuck up or I'll kill you" and "I know you have money. Give me your fucking money." Cuadra gave the intruder $45 in cash, but the intruder said "Give me your fucking credit cards or I'll kill you." Cuadra gave him an American Express card and a VISA card. The intruder then demanded, "Take off your fucking clothes or I'll kill you." Cuadra screamed for her roommate Carolina and dialed 911 on her cell phone. The intruder fled, taking Cuadra's backpack, which had her name in it and contained an iPod and some diet pills in a tin container.

The anonymous caller made two additional calls to the 911 call center on May 7, 2005. In those calls, the anonymous caller gave detailed information about the three crimes, including information that had not been released to the public. The calls convinced the Newark Police that the crimes were linked and had been committed by the same person. Evidence also emerged that focused the investigation on James E. Cooke.

Cooke lived with Rochelle Campbell, his girlfriend and the mother of three of his children. Campbell was pregnant with a fourth child by Cooke at the time. Harmon, Cuadra, and Bonistall's apartments were all within a quarter mile of Cooke's residence and could be seen from his back door. Campbell saw Cooke with the backpack from the Cuadra robbery in the early morning hours of April 30, 2005. Cooke told Campbell that he got the backpack from some college kids who had gotten into a car accident and had left it outside their house. Cooke said the backpack was thrown from the car while the police were investigating the accident. Cooke told Campbell they were drunk. Newark Police have no record of a car accident or a DUI investigation at this location. Cooke showed Campbell the credit cards and told Campbell that he was going to try to use them. Cooke tried to use Cuadra's VISA card at a nearby ATM, but it did not work because Cuadra had already cancelled the card. Cooke then returned home without the backpack or the credit cards.

But Cuadra's credit card company noticed that someone tried to use her stolen credit cards. The Newark

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