State v. Saenz, Docket: Han-15-452

• Decision Date: 25 October 2016
• Docket Number: Docket: Han-15-452
• Citation: 2016 ME 159
• Parties: STATE OF MAINE v. CHRISTOPHER SAENZ
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

2016 ME 159

STATE OF MAINE v. CHRISTOPHER SAENZ

Docket: Han-15-452

MAINE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT

Argued: September 14, 2016

October 25, 2016

Reporter of Decisions

Panel: SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, MEAD, GORMAN, JABAR, and HUMPHREY, JJ.

SAUFLEY, C.J.

[¶1] Hilary Saenz died in her Ellsworth home on Christmas Day, 2013, after several days of beatings and injuries inflicted on her by her husband while her children were present. The immediate cause of her death was a subdural hematoma, a brain bleed that caused her to lose consciousness and die. Her husband, Christopher Saenz, was charged with her murder, and, following a jury-waived trial in the Superior Court (Hancock County, A. Murray, J.), convicted of depraved indifference murder, 17-A M.R.S. § 201(1)(B) (2015). He appeals, arguing that there was insufficient evidence for the court to have found beyond a reasonable doubt that (1) his actions caused his wife's death, and (2) he acted with a depraved indifference to the value of human life. See id.; State v. Erskine, 2006 ME 5, ¶ 9, 889 A.2d 312. We affirm the judgment.

I. BACKGROUND

[¶2] Because Saenz challenges the sufficiency of the evidence, we summarize the trial court's extensive, supported factual findings in detail.

[¶3] In November and December 2013, Hilary Saenz and Christopher Saenz were living together with their twelve-year-old daughter and eight-year-old son. In November 2013, Saenz expressed suspicion that his wife was cheating on him after he borrowed her telephone and did not recognize some of the telephone numbers in the call history. In the weeks leading up to Christmas 2013, Saenz argued with his wife about the numbers on her telephone four or five days per week.

[¶4] Saenz physically assaulted his wife during many of these arguments. Over the course of December 22 through December 24, Saenz grabbed Hilary's arms, pushed her away, and smacked her face, causing a black eye. He also punched her legs, punched her arm, pushed her, held her down on a chair with his knee in her stomach, and squeezed her hand so tightly it bent the ring on her finger. On December 23, Saenz punched Hilary in the forehead during an argument in front of their son.

[¶5] On December 24, the daughter observed bruising near her mother's eyebrow, cheekbone, and nose. Saenz admitted to his daughter that he had punched her mother in the face. He promised her that he would not do it again. That night, the daughter woke up in the middle of the night and saw Saenz pin her mother on the couch and hold her hands back.

[¶6] In the early morning of December 25, a neighbor who lived diagonally across the street awoke to loud banging and profanity. He looked outside to see Saenz slamming the apartment door repeatedly and yelling back toward the inside of the apartment.

[¶7] After the children opened presents on Christmas morning, Saenz again argued with Hilary about the unknown calls and texts on her telephone. The daughter told Saenz to stop fighting because it was Christmas, and he said that he would try.

[¶8] Saenz and his wife then took a nap in their bedroom. After they woke up from the nap, they resumed arguing in the living room and then went into their bedroom and closed the door.

[¶9] The daughter initially heard shouting from the bedroom, then she could not hear arguing any more. Saenz came out of the bedroom, went into the daughter's room and took her telephone. Later, Saenz told the daughter and son to go to the neighbor's home because he was going to call an ambulance. The daughter testified that Saenz told her their mother had "passed out."

[¶10] At 2:13 p.m., Saenz performed an internet search for "What do you do when someone gets knocked out." Eight minutes later, he performed another search and reviewed an article titled "Helping a Person During an Epileptic Seizure." Saenz called the local hospital seven minutes after this search and the charge nurse told him to call 9-1-1. After he had called and texted his mother several times over the next ten minutes, Saenz dialed 9-1-1, but the call never connected. Shortly thereafter, Saenz spoke with his mother on the telephone for just under three minutes. More than half an hour after Saenz's initial web search, he again called 9-1-1, and an ambulance arrived a few minutes later. The court heard testimony that soon after the ambulance arrived, Hilary's pulse stopped, and although rescue personnel performed CPR for more than half an hour, until 3:33 p.m., they could not resuscitate her, and Hilary died at her home.

[¶11] The cause of Hilary's death was blunt force trauma to her head and torso. These traumas caused a subdural hematoma and a lacerated liver, which were the fatal injuries. The immediate cause of her death was the subdural hematoma. The lacerated liver was a potentially fatal injury, but it, alone, would not have caused Hilary's death on the day she died.

[¶12] At the time of her death, Hilary had more than fifty visible, external bruises on her body, including at least fifteen bruises on her head. Among these were injuries to her forehead, chin, and right eye that were hours or days old, and there was a bruise to her abdomen that was days old. She also had multiple internal bruises.

[¶13] Several of Hilary's bruises were caused by multiple injuries that occurred at different times. Her left temple had both an older injury and an injury that was only minutes or hours old. There were bruises to the top of Hilary's skull and to her right temple that were caused by older injuries as well as injuries that were hours old.

[¶14] Saenz gave a variety of accounts of the events leading up to his wife's death. When he called the hospital, he told the receptionist that his "buddy" had hit his head after falling on ice and was having a seizure. Saenz told the ambulance personnel that his wife was dizzy, fell and hit her head on the bed, and had a seizure. He also made statements that she had hit her head on the mattress, that she had hit her head on the floor, that she "might" have fallen, that it might have been a reaction to medication, that she had recently changed medications, and that she and his ex-girlfriend had recently gotten into a fight.

[¶15] Two days after his wife's death, Saenz was arrested for her murder, and he was later charged, by a single-count indictment, with intentional or knowing murder, 17-A M.R.S § 201(1)(A) (2015), or, in the alternative, depraved indifference murder, 17-A M.R.S. § 201(1)(B). The court held a jury-waived trial from May 18 to May 28, 2015, during which it heard testimony from the children, rescue personnel, police officers, neighbors, friends, coworkers, and competing medical experts.

[¶16] The court heard specific testimony from the medical examiner that a punch to the head could cause a subdural hematoma and that the risk increases with multiple blows.

[¶17] As part of his alternative argument that Hilary's death was brought about by a "spontaneous" seizure¹ that caused her to fall and strike her head, Saenz offered expert testimony that Hilary's subdural hematoma was unlikely to have been caused by a punch. Saenz introduced evidence that his wife had sustained head injuries from a motor vehicle accident and from a fall on ice, years earlier, in support of this explanation. However, the courtalso heard testimony that Hilary had never been diagnosed with a seizure disorder and had denied ever having had a seizure when asked by medical personnel on at least four occasions. There was additional testimony that after his wife's death, Saenz told at least three people that she had never had a seizure before the day she died.

[¶18] Based on the evidence presented, the court found that the State had proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Saenz caused Hilary's death by inflicting blunt force trauma to her head within the thirty-six hours before her death and that this trauma either directly caused the subdural hematoma or caused her to fall and strike the floor with the same result. The court further found that the physical violence Saenz inflicted on his wife in the days leading up to her death and the delay in seeking medical assistance amounted to a depraved indifference to the value of human life.

[¶19] In accordance with these findings, the court found Saenz guilty of depraved indifference murder, entered a judgment of conviction, and sentenced him to forty-seven years' imprisonment. Saenz was thirty-two years old at the time of sentencing. Hilary was...