State v. Davis

• Decision Date: 03 January 2008
• Docket Number: No. 2005-1656.,2005-1656.
• Citation: 116 Ohio St.3d 404,2008 Ohio 2,880 N.E.2d 31
• Parties: The STATE of Ohio, Appellee, v. DAVIS, Appellant.
• Court: Ohio Supreme Court

880 N.E.2d 31

116 Ohio St.3d 404

2008-Ohio-2

The STATE of Ohio, Appellee, v. DAVIS, Appellant.

No. 2005-1656.

Supreme Court of Ohio.

Submitted September 19, 2007.

Decided January 3, 2008.

Robert L. Becker, Licking County Prosecuting Attorney, and Kenneth W. Oswalt, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee.

David C. Stebbins and Carol Wright, for appellant.

O'CONNOR, J.

{¶ 1} During the late evening of July 10 or the early morning of July 11, 2000, an intruder entered 86-year-old Elizabeth Sheeler's Newark, Ohio apartment. The intruder then murdered Sheeler by stabbing her in the neck and chest. The intruder stole money from the apartment and fled the scene.

{¶ 2} The murder went unsolved for almost four years. In 2004, DNA testing identified defendant-appellant, Roland T. Davis, as the murderer of Sheeler. Subsequently, Davis was convicted of the aggravated murder of Sheeler and sentenced to death.

{¶ 3} Davis now appeals, raising an array of challenges to his convictions and sentence. We determine that none of his propositions of law has merit and affirm Davis's convictions. We have also independently weighed the aggravating circumstances against the mitigating factors and have compared Davis's sentence of death to those imposed in similar cases, as R.C. 2929.05(A) requires. As a result, we affirm Davis's sentence of death.

State's Case

{¶ 4} Sheeler was a widow who lived alone in a basement apartment at the Plaza Garden Apartments. Sheeler frequently used Yellow Cab taxis for transportation to the grocery store, the bank, and other locations in Newark.

{¶ 5} Davis worked intermittently as a driver for Yellow Cab from 1995 until April 20, 2000. Sheeler often asked for Davis as her taxi driver because he helped Sheeler carry her groceries into her apartment. Yellow Cab records show that Davis provided Sheeler with taxi service on many occasions.

{¶ 6} Davis and Sharon Wright lived together off and on from 1994 until July or August 2000. Wright was a driver with Yellow Cab for about a year. During their relationship, Wright said that Davis "carried a few bucks in his pocket, but most of the time he was broke." Davis was unemployed from June 2 to at least July 10, 2000.

{¶ 7} Davis lived with Terri Geer from late October or early November 1999 until mid-May 2000. Geer said that Davis "never had a lot of money" during that time.

{¶ 8} On the evening of July 10, 2000, Sheeler was at her apartment. Between 8:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m., Sheeler and her close friend, Elladean Hicks, talked on the telephone. Hicks stated that nothing appeared to be out of the ordinary, and there was no indication that anyone else was at Sheeler's apartment or that she was expecting anyone.

{¶ 9} Melissa Frost was Sheeler's next-door neighbor. At approximately 12:30 a.m. on July 11, 2000, Frost noticed that a light was still on in Sheeler's apartment. Frost also heard loud noise coming from the television in Sheeler's apartment, which stopped sometime after 12:30 a.m.

{¶ 10} Frost did not see Sheeler for the next two days. Frost noticed that Sheeler's front door was not ajar, an unusual circumstance because Sheeler had the habit of keeping the door slightly open during the day. On July 12, Frost noticed two newspapers outside Sheeler's front door. Frost's husband then knocked on Sheeler's front door and called her name. He turned the doorknob and noticed it was unlocked. The Frosts then contacted the apartment manager.

{¶ 11} Kenneth Patterson, the co-owner of Plaza Garden Apartments, entered Sheeler's apartment to check on her well-being. The living room, dining room, and kitchen looked normal. Patterson looked inside Sheeler's bedroom and saw blood on the bed and a foot sticking out from underneath bedding on the floor. The police were then called.

{¶ 12} Around 1:30 p.m. on July 12, 2000, Newark police officers arrived at Sheeler's apartment. Officers found Sheeler's body on the floor next to her bed. Her body was covered by a mattress pad, mattress cover, fitted sheet, and comforter. Sheeler's face had been battered, and her neck and chest area had numerous sharp-instrument wounds. Her dentures were found underneath the bed. Sheeler's housecoat was open and bunched up under the middle of her back. Her panties were torn and cut in the crotch area and rolled up underneath her breasts.

{¶ 13} Detective Timothy Elliget, a Newark police criminalist, found blood spatter that formed a misting pattern above the dresser on the bedroom wall. This blood spatter showed that Sheeler was standing when she was hit in the mouth or throat area. Bloodstain patterns on the bedding indicated that Sheeler had been face down on the bed for a period of time. Elliget also found a bloodstain pattern on the fitted sheet, which was consistent with a blood-covered hand "grabbing the item and pulling [it] off." Another bloodstain formed a butterfly pattern on the mattress pad, which was consistent with the wiping of an object such as a knife.

{¶ 14} Sheeler's bedroom had been ransacked. Dresser drawers were on top of the mattress, a cedar chest had been opened, and items were scattered around the room. The spare bedroom had also been ransacked, with drawers opened and property strewn about.

{¶ 15} Several purses were found in both bedrooms but none of them contained a wallet, identification, pictures, or keys. Police did find $500 in an envelope on the floor of the spare bedroom, two metal boxes containing $2,300 in the closet of the spare bedroom, and $210 in silver certificates elsewhere in the same closet.

{¶ 16} Police found no evidence of forced entry. No knife or other possible murder weapon was found in the apartment. Investigators found 14 usable fingerprints and three usable palm prints. The fingerprints were later entered into the automated fingerprint identification system ("AFIS"), but no matches resulted.

{¶ 17} Police found a bloodstain on a small kitchen towel next to the kitchen sink. It "tested presumptive for blood" and was forwarded for DNA analysis.

{¶ 18} On July 13, 2000, Dr. Patrick Fardal, then the chief forensic pathologist for Franklin County, conducted the autopsy on Sheeler. Sheeler suffered blunt-force injuries to her face and 11 sharp wounds to her chin, neck, and upper chest area. Dr. Fardal found that a stab wound in Sheeler's chest and a stab wound in her neck that injured the left jugular vein were fatal wounds. Sheeler probably would have lived no more than "10 to 20 minutes after sustaining these wounds."

{¶ 19} In 2000, Ramen Tejwani, a criminalist with the Columbus police crime lab, tested evidence from Sheeler's apartment. DNA analysis of the bloodstain on the kitchen towel did not match the DNA from Sheeler or other persons tested at that time. Additionally, presumptive testing of an oral swab taken from Sheeler showed the presence of semen. However, no useful DNA was extracted from the swab.

{¶ 20} In 2001, Tejwani retested the DNA on the towel's bloodstain using the short tandem repeat ("STR") method. This analysis showed that the DNA was from a male contributor.

{¶ 21} Nevertheless, the investigation moved into a cold-case status because there were few leads. On March 1, 2004, Davis became a suspect in the murder after Newark police obtained information from an out-of-state law enforcement agency.

{¶ 22} After investigation of Davis began, police learned that he had purchased a Mercury Grand Marquis on July 10, 2000. He had paid $300 in cash for the car and had agreed to make regular payments.

{¶ 23} Geer stated that after she had not seen Davis for a week or more, Davis showed up at her house on July 11, 2000, driving the Grand Marquis. On the same day, Davis bought Geer's son a drum set with $1,253.98 in cash. Davis also offered to purchase Geer "anything [she] wanted that night."

{¶ 24} Wright had no contact with Davis on July 10 or July 11, 2000. However, on July 12, 2000, Davis drove the Grand Marquis to Wright's home. Davis said that he had obtained the money to pay for the car by "running drugs from Florida to Ohio." On July 13, Davis took Wright's daughter to a Columbus mall and bought her a $100 pair of tennis shoes and a car stereo, and he took her to dinner. On July 16 or 17, Davis and Wright drove to Florida and returned to Ohio about a week later.

{¶ 25} After Davis became a suspect, police obtained a DNA sample from him and sent it to the Columbus police crime lab. Analysis showed that Davis's DNA matched the DNA from the bloodstain on the kitchen towel. According to Tejwani, the approximate frequency of this DNA type in the population is one in 547,000,000 for Caucasians, one in 332,400,000,000 for African-Americans, one in 1,939,000,000 for southeastern Hispanics, and one in 2,816,000,000 for southwestern Hispanics. Davis is Caucasian.

{¶ 26} Following receipt of the DNA results, Newark detectives Stephen Vanoy and Melanie Mummey interviewed Davis in Florida, where he was living. After Davis waived his Miranda rights, he was shown a photograph of Sheeler. He said that she looked familiar, but he did not remember her name. Davis denied seeing Sheeler's photograph on reward posters following her death. He said, "I didn't know she got killed, [until] you just told me." Davis also did not remember ever going into Sheeler's apartment.

{¶ 27} Vanoy told Davis that his DNA was found in Sheeler's apartment. When asked for an explanation, Davis said there was no reason his semen or blood could be in her apartment. However, Davis said that he might have pricked his finger or left a hair in Sheeler's apartment when carrying her groceries.

{¶ 28} As the interview progressed, Davis said, "I'm putting a face with a person * * *." Davis had just said that he had provided taxi service to Sheeler and "liked her a whole lot." Davis also said that Sheeler had shown him around her apartment. As a result, he might have touched a doorknob. However, he denied entering the kitchen and...