State v. John J. Pudelski
| Decision Date | 15 March 2001 |
| Docket Number | 01-LW-0699,77172 |
| Parties | STATE OF OHIO, Plaintiff-appellee v. JOHN J. PUDELSKI, Defendant-appellant |
| Court | Ohio Court of Appeals |
Criminal appeal from Court of Common Pleas Case No. CR-375,060
For plaintiff-appellee: WILLIAM D. MASON, Cuyahoga County Prosecutor, ROBERT T. GLICKMAN, Assistant, Justice Center Courts Tower, 1200 Ontario Street, Cleveland, Ohio 44113
For defendant-appellant: LESTER S. POTASH, Attorney at Law, 1717 Illuminating Building, 55 Public Square, Cleveland, Ohio 44113-1901
M. STEVEN POTASH, 8555 Sweet Valley Drive, Suite A, Cleveland Ohio 44125
KENNETH A. ROCCO,P.J.:
Defendant appeals from his conviction for murder following a jury trial. He argues:
We find no error in the trial court proceedings and therefore affirm appellant's conviction.
PROCEDURAL AND FACTUAL HISTORY
Appellant John J. Pudelski was charged in a two-count indict- ment filed April 14, 1999. Count one charged him with aggravated murder in violation of R.C. 2903.01 specifically, purposely causing the death of his infant daughter, Ellie Marie Pudelski. Count two charged him with murder; that is, causing the infant's death as a proximate result of committing or attempting to commit felonious assault, a first or second degree felony that is an offense of violence.
Appellant moved the court to suppress oral statements he made to the police, to dismiss the death penalty specification on count one, and to dismiss the murder charge contained in count two of the indictment. After a hearing on the motion to suppress, the court denied all three motions. However, the state was given leave to remove the death penalty specification from the indictment on July 23, 1999.
The case proceeded to trial on August 23, 1999. In addition to the charges of murder and aggravated murder, the jury was also instructed on the lesser included offense of involuntary manslaugh- ter as a proximate result of child endangering. The jury returned a verdict finding appellant not guilty of aggravated murder but guilty of murder. The court sentenced him to fifteen years' to life imprisonment and overruled his motions for acquittal and for a new trial. Appellant timely appealed his conviction and the denial of his post-verdict motions.
In the state's case at trial, the jury heard testimony from appellant's wife (who was also the mother of the infant victim), medical personnel involved in the delivery and postnatal care of the infant, paramedic and emergency room personnel who responded to the 9-1-1 call regarding the child's death, the county coroner and assistant coroner, and a police officer who investigated the matter.
The mother testified that the infant girl was delivered by Caesarian section on March 17, 1999, and she took her home four days later. The infant fed every four hours, approximately two and one-half to three ounces of formula or breast milk at each feeding, and behaved normally. The mother never noticed any injury to the infant's head.
The neonatologist who was present at the infant's birth had noted a caput or bruise under the scalp but above the skull bone on the back of her head. This is a common injury in newborns and does not have any serious effects on the infant's health. A pediatrician who saw the infant on March 18 and 20 reported that he saw no abnormalities. He would not necessarily have noted a caput in his records unless it was an unusual one. He did not note one here. Neither physician noted any cephalohematoma, or swelling and bleeding of the tissue under the bone, which would have been a more serious injury. A home nurse reported that the baby appeared normal and had no bumps or bruises on her head when the nurse saw her on March 23.
The mother testified that the baby behaved normally throughout the day of Sunday, March 28, 1999. The mother fed her at 8:00 or 9:00 p.m.; the baby consumed almost three and one-half ounces at that time. The mother put the baby to bed at approximately 9:30 p.m., then took a cough medication, Nyquil, and went to bed herself. The baby's crib was located in the mother's bedroom.
The mother awakened around 12:00 midnight when the baby cried and got up to feed the child. Appellant, her husband, was not in the room when the mother awakened but came in and offered to feed the baby, although he normally went to bed at that time. This was the first time he had fed the baby; he normally paid no attention to her. The mother then went back to sleep.
The mother awakened at 7:00 a.m. and was immediately concerned because the child had not awakened for her normal feeding at 4:00 a.m. She went to the crib and found the baby in a corner with her head against the bumper pad. Her forehead was cold. The mother picked the baby up and felt for a heart beat but felt none. She observed a lump on the side of the baby's head.
The mother began to yell for appellant to wake up. It was unusual for appellant to be sleeping at this time; he was usually up at 6:30 a.m. Appellant jumped up and took the baby from the mother and left the room, returning with the telephone. He ordered the mother to leave the bedroom and wait in the living room for paramedics to arrive.
Paramedics came and took the baby to Euclid Hospital. Appellant and his wife delayed going to the hospital while appellant woke his two daughters from a prior marriage and readied them for school, then took them to his mother's house. Appellant and his wife proceeded from there to the hospital.
At the hospital, they learned that the baby was dead. They went into a room to see the body, but appellant would not look at her. As they waited in the grieving room for the mother's mother to arrive, appellant said to his wife, Please don't leave me.
The coroner and assistant coroner testified that the baby died as a result of a cerebral edema, or swelling of the brain, which was caused by a blunt impact that also caused a fracture of the skull. They estimated the time of death at approximately 3:00 a.m., and approximately two to three hours after the injury was inflicted. They opined that she was injured after her midnight feeding. The assistant coroner testified that the child would have survived if medical attention had been sought immediately after the injury occurred.
The coroner and assistant coroner both opined that the fracture occurred very recently, certainly less than twenty-four hours before the baby's death. There were no signs of healing around it; the edges of the break were sharp and uncalloused and there was fresh blood at the site. There were no macrophages (clean-up cells) at the site of the fracture, though there were some in the adjacent scalp. They opined that these macrophages were present because of the caput that occurred at birth. There was no evidence the fracture was a new break at the same site as a fracture that had occurred earlier. Macrophages would have been present at the fracture site if the fracture were not new. The fracture could not have occurred after death because the body had to have been alive to pump the fresh blood that had oozed around the area.
The coroner opined that the death was a homicide. She reached this conclusion because the child had a fracture that was not a birth injury, she could not have caused the fracture herself, and nothing accidental had happened, so the injury had to have been inflicted.
Detective Raymond Jorz testified that appellant and his wife came in to the police station together voluntarily on March 31, 1999, and were interviewed separately. Appellant was interviewed by Detective Jorz and Lieutenant Brooks. They asked appellant whether the baby had suffered any accidental injuries, and appel- lant said she had not. Appellant related that he had fed the baby around midnight and stayed up with her until approximately 1:30 a.m., then put her in her crib after she went to sleep. He went to bed himself and awakened at approximately 3:30 a.m., used the bathroom, then returned to bed. He did not check on the baby at that time. His wife woke him the following morning after she found the baby cold and unresponsive.
When police informed appellant that the baby had a skull fracture, appellant suggested that the fracture was caused by the emergency medical technicians or that the coroner was examining the wrong child. He denied knowledge of any injury.
LAW AND ANALYSIS
Sufficiency of the Evidence
Appellant's first assignment of error argues the court should have granted his motion for acquittal because the state failed to produce evidence that appellant inflicted injury upon the child or that he did so with the requisite criminal intent. A motion for acquittal raises the question of the sufficiency of the evidence to support a conviction. When reviewing a claim as to sufficiency of evidence, the relevant inquiry is whether any rational factfinder viewing the evidence in a light most favorable to the state could have found the essential elements of the crime proven beyond a reasonable doubt. State v....
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