State v. Mitchell
| Decision Date | 29 August 2017 |
| Docket Number | 48810-8-II |
| Court | Washington Court of Appeals |
| Parties | STATE OF WASHINGTON, Respondent, v. JAMES EDWARD MITCHELL, Appellant. |
UNPUBLISHED OPINION
James Mitchell appeals his conviction of first degree premeditated murder for stabbing a woman to death. Mitchell was convicted over 20 years after the crime based on DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) testing of blood evidence collected at the crime scene.
We hold that (1) the trial court properly admitted the DNA evidence because the State showed a sufficiently complete chain of custody of the blood evidence collected at the crime scene and any discrepancies affected the weight of the evidence rather than its admissibility, (2) the State presented sufficient evidence of premeditation, and (3) the trial court did not err by including Mitchell's Florida robbery conviction in his offender score because it was comparable to robbery in Washington.
Accordingly we affirm Mitchell's conviction of first degree premeditated murder and his sentence.
In 2015, the State charged Mitchell with first degree murder for the stabbing death of Linda Robinson. Robinson's death had occurred over 20 years earlier, in 1993. Robinson's Death
On the night of February 6, 1993, Robinson's young nieces and nephew were spending the night at Robinson's apartment. The oldest niece was seven years old, and the other two children were approximately two and one. The children were in the living room.
Around 10:30 PM that night, Robinson was talking on the telephone with her friend George Caldwell. Robinson told Caldwell to "Hold on, somebody's at the door." Report of Proceedings (RP) at 654. Then Caldwell heard Robinson talking to another person and said Robinson sounded "submissive " telling the person "okay, okay." RP at 655. But then the connection went dead.
Around 11:00 PM, the oldest child was awakened by the sound of the apartment's smoke alarm. She went to the kitchen where she saw food burning on the stove and Robinson lying on the kitchen floor surrounded by blood. A neighbor called the police.
The autopsy showed that Robinson had 10 stab wounds in her back. Multiple stab wounds penetrated her chest cavity and punctured her lung and liver. Robinson had significant amounts of blood in her chest cavity from her stab wounds. She also had defensive wounds on her hands and forearms and superficial cuts to her chest and torso. The shape of some of the wounds indicated that the likely cause was a single edged knife with a four inch blade. Police never found the murder weapon.
Police and forensic investigators searched Robinson's apartment for evidence. Robinson was lying on the floor in the kitchen. Her pants pockets seemed to be turned out and between her legs were a set of keys, a receipt, and a nickel. The telephone was about four feet away from her and the cord was cut or torn from the wall. In Robinson's bedroom, a dresser drawer was open.
Investigators collected blood evidence. There was blood on Robinson and around the kitchen, including a large blood smear on the refrigerator. There was a small smear of blood on the hallway wall across from the bathroom door. There were also blood spatters in front of a nightstand in Robinson's bedroom. The investigators took possession of the telephone from the kitchen and a jacket from the bedroom that appeared to have blood on it.
At the time, none of the evidence was tested for DNA because the science had not yet been developed to allow for DNA analysis of blood. Detectives were unable to identify a suspect or solve Robinson's murder.
In 2013, a detective reopened Robinson's case and arranged to have the blood evidence tested for DNA. Using a controlled sample of Robinson's blood from her autopsy, forensic scientists created Robinson's DNA profile. They then tested the blood samples taken from the bedroom, the jacket the telephone cord, and Robinson's jeans. DNA from an unknown individual was present in the blood, and the DNA profile for that individual matched Mitchell's DNA profile. Mitchell was located in Florida, where he was arrested on charges of first degree premediated murder and brought to Washington for trial.
Mitchell filed a pretrial motion to exclude the DNA evidence based on an insufficient chain of custody. The trial court held a hearing on the issue, and several witnesses testified. The court found that blood evidence was collected from the crime scene, stored in the sheriff's department forensics lab for 65 days, and then transferred to the sheriff's department property room. Robinson's clothing was originally collected by the medical examiner and then transferred to the sheriff's department property room four days later.
The trial court ruled that the State had established the chain of custody and therefore that the DNA evidence was admissible. The court ruled that any discrepancies in the chain of custody related to the weight of the evidence, not its admissibility. The court entered findings of fact and conclusions of law regarding its ruling.
Mitchell testified at trial that he knew Robinson and had been at her apartment a few times. The last time he was there some kids were asleep in the living room. He said that while he was with Robinson, she answered a knock at the door. An agitated man entered the apartment and tried to hit Robinson and Mitchell. Mitchell said that Robinson tried to get the man to leave and threatened to call the police, but the man stayed and exchanged blows with Mitchell.
According to Mitchell, the man left after Robinson again told him to leave. Then Mitchell followed Robinson to her bedroom and looked at himself in her dresser mirror. He later noticed that his hand was bleeding. Mitchell left the apartment and did not see Robinson again. He denied killing Robinson.
The jury found Mitchell guilty of first degree premeditated murder.
The State calculated Mitchell's offender score as 8, based on seven prior felony convictions. One of the prior felonies was a 1983 armed robbery committed in Florida. Mitchell argued that the Florida robbery should be excluded from his offender score because it was not comparable to a Washington felony. The trial court ruled that the Florida robbery was comparable and found that Mitchell's offender score was 8. The trial court imposed a standard range sentence of 450 months.
Mitchell appeals his conviction and sentence.
Mitchell argues that the trial court should have excluded the DNA evidence because the State failed to sufficiently establish the chain of custody of the blood evidence collected at the crime scene. We disagree.
Under ER 901(a), the proponent of evidence must authenticate or identify it "to support a finding that the matter in question is what its proponent claims." For physical evidence connected to the commission of a crime to be admissible, "it must be satisfactorily identified and shown to be in substantially the same condition as when the crime was committed." State v. Campbell, 103 Wn.2d 1, 21, 691 P.2d 929 (1984).
When an item of evidence is not readily identifiable and is susceptible to alteration by tampering or contamination, the proponent typically must show the chain of custody of the evidence from the time it was acquired. State v. Roche, 114 Wn.App. 424, 436, 59 P.3d 682 (2002). The proponent of the evidence must establish the chain of custody " 'with sufficient completeness to render it improbable that the original item has either been exchanged with another or been contaminated or tampered with.' " Id. (quoting United States v. Cardenas, 864 F.2d 1528, 1531 (10th Cir. 1989)). The trial court should consider factors such as the nature of the item, the circumstances surrounding preservation and custody of the item, and the likelihood of tampering or alteration. Roche, 114 Wn.App. at 436.
But the proponent does not need to identify the evidence with "absolute certainty" or "eliminate every possibility of alteration or substitution." Campbell, 103 Wn.2d at 21. "[M]inor discrepancies or uncertainty on the part of the witness will affect only the weight of evidence, not its admissibility." Id.
The trial court has a "wide latitude of discretion" in determining the admissibility of evidence subject to a chain of custody challenge. Id. We review the trial court's decision for an abuse of discretion. See id.
The trial court entered findings of fact in its ruling that the DNA evidence was admissible. Mitchell does not challenge the trial court's findings of fact, so they are verities on appeal. State v. Chambers, 197 Wn.App. 96, 124, 387 P.3d 1108 (2016), review denied, 188 Wn.2d 1010 (2017).
Forensic investigators Hilding Johnson and Ted Schlosser were responsible for collecting and processing the evidence from the crime scene. They did not have an independent recollection of the case, but testified at the hearing based on their reports and their standard practice in 1993.
The trial court's unchallenged findings of fact established that:
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