State v. Mattox

• Decision Date: 10 March 2017
• Docket Number: No. 111,162,111,162
• Citation: 390 P.3d 514,305 Kan. 1015
• Parties: STATE of Kansas, Appellee, v. Joseph Dathian MATTOX, Appellant.
• Court: Kansas Supreme Court

305 Kan. 1015

390 P.3d 514

STATE of Kansas, Appellee,

v.Joseph Dathian MATTOX, Appellant.

No. 111,162

Supreme Court of Kansas.

Opinion filed March 10, 2017

Catherine A. Zigtema, of Law Office of Kate Zigtema LC, of Lenexa, argued the cause and was on the brief for appellant.

Steven J. Obermeier, senior deputy district attorney, argued the cause, and Stephen M. Howe, district attorney, and Derek Schmidt, attorney general, were with him on the brief for appellee.

The opinion of the court was delivered by Stegall, J.:

Joseph Mattox directly appeals his conviction and hard 50 sentence for the first-degree premeditated murder, aggravated kidnapping, and aggravated robbery of Keighley Alyea in September 2009 in Johnson County. We affirm Mattox's convictions; however, we vacate Mattox's hard 50 sentence and remand for resentencing because the district court, rather than the jury, found the existence of aggravating factors by a preponderance of the evidence, rather than beyond a reasonable doubt, in violation of Alleyne v. United States , 570 U.S. ––––, 133 S.Ct. 2151, 186 L.Ed.2d 314 (2013).

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

We recited the basic facts of Alyea's brutal murder when we affirmed the conviction (following a separate trial) of Mattox's codefendant and cousin Dustin Hilt.

"Johnson County detectives found the body of Hilt's ex-girlfriend, Keighley Alyea, in a field in Cass County, Missouri. Alyea had been stabbed dozens of times with a knife. Her body also showed signs that she had been asphyxiated and had suffered blunt-force trauma to her head.

"Six days before Alyea's body was discovered, she had invited Jessika Beebe; Beebe's daughter; and Beebe's boyfriend, Shawn Merritt, to spend the night at her apartment. Beebe and Merritt did not feel safe staying at Beebe's residence because they feared Beebe's brother, James. Two days earlier, James had intentionally rammed his vehicle into Alyea's vehicle and threatened to ‘shoot [Merritt's] house up.’ James was later arrested in connection with this incident.

"Merritt was so concerned about James' threat that he told Alyea he needed to get a gun for protection. Alyea suggested to Merritt that he contact Hilt. That night Merritt used Alyea's phone to send a text message to Hilt to ask if Hilt knew where to get a gun. After a series of text messages between Hilt and Merritt, Hilt asked for a ride. Merritt returned the phone to Alyea, and Hilt sent two additional messages requesting a ride. Alyea then sent a message identifying herself and asked Hilt if he wanted to ‘come kick it.’ Hilt again said he needed a ride. Shortly after 1 a.m., Alyea agreed to pick Hilt up and asked if he was with anyone else. Hilt responded that he was with Scott Calbeck. Before Alyea left to meet Hilt, Beebe advised her not to go.

"About 2 a.m., Hilt; Calbeck; and Hilt's cousin, Joe Mattox, entered a QuikTrip convenience store.... Meanwhile, Alyea, who was waiting in her car outside the convenience store, called her stepsister. Alyea accused the stepsister of having had sex with Hilt, threatened to beat her up, and then hung up. A heated text message exchange between Alyea and the stepsister followed—full of threats, name calling, and other insults. Alyea sent her last text message at 2:50 a.m. The stepsister would later testify that she had sent a text message to Alyea at 2:53 a.m. and expected it to elicit an immediate response. Instead, no response ever came.

"When Beebe woke up about 11 a.m., Alyea was not in the apartment. Beebe tried calling Alyea multiple times. When that was unsuccessful, she called Alyea's family and checked at Alyea's work, the hospital, and the jail. She did not find her.

"The Overland Park Police Department began a missing person investigation. Sergeant Thomas Smith interviewed Hilt and asked when Hilt last talked with Alyea. Hilt said it had been several weeks or months. When presented with a printout of Alyea's text message correspondence, Hilt admitted that he had recently communicated with Alyea, but he maintained that the two had not seen each other recently.

"The next day, police officers discovered Alyea's car in an apartment parking lot. When they opened the trunk, they found pooled blood and bloody clothing. During processing of the car at the Johnson County Sheriff's Office crime lab, a technician found a knife under bloody clothing in the trunk. The technician also noted that the car's taillight assemblies had been loosened from their mounts, and the connecting tabs had been disconnected, disabling the taillights. Both the taillight connectors and the trunk latch had smears of blood on them. Crime scene investigators did not initially link the knife to Alyea's disappearance or death.

"The day after Alyea's vehicle surfaced, detectives conducted a search at Mattox's residence. They found a piece of charred metal pipe in a smoker grill, as well as other charred and burned items. A can of gasoline sat next to the smoker grill. In the basement, detectives opened a dishwasher and discovered a black plastic trash bag full of bloody clothing.

"The same day, Alyea's body was found. Its condition had been damaged by decomposition and insects." State v. Hilt , 299 Kan. 176, 179–181, 322 P.3d 367 (2014).

Alyea's body had been found in Cass County, Missouri, approximately 4 miles from Mattox's father's home. An autopsy revealed a total of 20 stab wounds and several larger blunt force trauma injuries to Alyea's head and neck. Either the blunt force trauma causing a skull fracture or any of the stab wounds could have caused her death. Subsequent forensic analysis tied the DNA profiles of Mattox and Alyea to the same bloodstained clothing.

During the investigation, police interviewed Mattox. He initially denied having any knowledge about the killing. But a few days later, Mattox made a full confession, describing the course of events in detail. According to Mattox's confession, while in the QuickTrip, he, Hilt, and Scott Calbeck had hatched a plan to rob Alyea. When Alyea and her killers left QuickTrip, Hilt was driving, Alyea was in the front seat, and Mattox and Calbeck were in the back seats. Soon after, Mattox and Calbeck attacked Alyea—they beat her with their fists, and Mattox dragged Alyea to the back seat, struck her with a pipe, and choked her. When Alyea stopped struggling, Mattox told Hilt to stop the car. They put Alyea in the trunk and kept driving. Mattox proposed disposing the car and Alyea's body in a rural area he knew.

The group pulled over near Harrisonville, Missouri, when they heard Alyea screaming for help in the trunk. They pulled Alyea out of the trunk, and Calbeck beat her again with the pipe. Hilt stabbed Alyea twice in the abdomen with a hunting knife that he took from Mattox's residence. The three men loaded Alyea's limp body back into the trunk and later dumped it in a field.

The group drove back to Overland Park, Kansas, to clean Alyea's car and dispose of the evidence. Mattox removed the battery from Alyea's cell phone and threw it out the car window. The group divided up cleaning tasks—Mattox was responsible to clean the car trunk, and Hilt planned to discard the clothing and the knife. The group abandoned Alyea's car in an apartment parking lot, returned to Mattox's house, and burned Alyea's purse on a grill.

Pretrial, Mattox moved to suppress his confession, but the district court denied the motion. A jury found Mattox guilty of premeditated murder under an aiding and abetting theory, as well as aggravated kidnapping and aggravated robbery. The district court imposed a hard 50 sentence for first-degree murder pursuant to K.S.A. 21-4635 (recodified at K.S.A. 2015 Supp. 21-6620 ) without fact-finding by the jury.

Mattox now appeals his convictions and sentence. We exercise jurisdiction pursuant to K.S.A. 2015 Supp. 22-3601(b)(3) (direct appeal to Supreme Court when life sentence imposed).

1. Mattox was sentenced in violation of the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

Mattox first claims that his Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial was violated when the district court imposed a hard 50 sentence without fact-finding by the jury. He argues his hard 50 sentence is unconstitutional because the sentencing judge found the existence of aggravating factors by a preponderance of the evidence, in violation of Alleyne , 133 S.Ct. 2151. The State concedes this point. We likewise hold that the imposition of Mattox's hard 50 sentence violated his Sixth Amendment right.

The constitutionality of a sentencing statute is a question of law over which this court exercises unlimited review. Hilt , 299 Kan. at 202, 322 P.3d 367.

"Any fact that, by law, increases the penalty for a crime is an ‘element’ that must be submitted to the jury and found beyond a reasonable doubt." Alleyne , 133 S.Ct. at 2155. Therefore, "any fact that increases the mandatory minimum is an ‘element’ that must be submitted to the jury." 133 S.Ct. at 2155.

In Hilt the district court likewise imposed a hard 50 sentence without fact-finding by the jury. We found this sentencing scheme ran afoul of Alleyne , stating:

"Were it not for the sentencing judge's finding by a preponderance of the evidence of four aggravating factors, Hilt would not have faced a minimum sentence of 50 years rather than 25 years for Alyea's murder. Because the judge, rather than the jury, found the four aggravating factors existed, and did so on a preponderance-of-the-evidence rather than a beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard, Hilt's Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial, as interpreted in Alleyne , was violated." 299 Kan. at 203, 322 P.3d 367.

Furthermore, we concluded that Hilt was not one of the rare cases where a hard 50 Alleyne error can be declared harmless. 299 Kan. at 204–05, 322 P.3d 367 ("[W]e cannot say on the record before us that (1) proof of the aggravators was so overwhelming that their existence was certainly established, and (2) no rational factfinder would decide beyond a reasonable doubt that the...