Courtroom Weekly: The final chapter

January 30, 2014

by: the State Court Staff

We hope you've enjoyed the Courtroom Weekly over the past year. This will be the final article. Judgepedia's state courts team has worked hard to highlight the most interesting cases around the nation each week. If you want to look back at the top state court cases of 2013, check out the Courtroom Weekly page, where all of the past 54 issues are archived.

As we wrap up this series, we're gearing up to start a new weekly news publication: the JP Election Brief! The Brief was started in 2012 and covered judicial election news and analysis. We're bringing it back for the 2014 election cycle, starting on February 13th.

Thanks for reading!

Police searches, a school bus crash and an accidental shooting

Courtroom Weekly The latest and greatest in court cases around the nation In this issue... Featured case News from Ohio News from California News from North Dakota News from Indiana News from New York

Featured case Sperm donor ordered to pay child support   Court: Kansas Third Judicial District Judge Mary Mattivi of the Kansas Third Judicial District Court has ruled that a sperm donor is responsible for child support because a physician was not involved in the process. The lawsuit was filed back in October of 2012 by the Kansas Department for Children and Families, in the pursuit of $4,000 in child support from William Marotta. Marotta claims that he signed away all of his parental rights and responsibilities in a contract with the couple to which his sperm was donated. Marotta answered Angela Bauer and Jennifer Schreiner's Craigslist ad looking for a sperm donor in 2009. After meeting with the couple, a contact was signed by the three of them which said that Marotta would not have a relationship with the child. He did not intend to be responsible for the child's welfare in any way. However, they did not have a physician involved in the process of artificial insemination. Under state law, Marotta is therefore not covered by the same protections as other sperm donors. Judge Mattivi said she had to comply with the Kansas Parentage Act's requirement of a physician, and could not "look the other way simply because the parties intended a different result than that afforded by the statute." Marotta's attorney, Benoit M.J. Swinnen, called the ruling "politically motivated," and believes that they have strong reasons to appeal. "Two people wanted to have a baby and couldn’t do it by themselves, so I assisted – that’s about it. [The state] is undoing a family," said Marotta. The Kansas Department for Children and Families responded to the decision with the following statement: "KSA 23-2208(f) makes clear that individuals must go through a licensed physician in order to avoid the financial responsibilities associated with parenthood. The court and law support this position."

News from Ohio Father who accidentally shot child denied access to funeral   Court: Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas, Ohio The funeral of 11-year-old Achauntiara “Shanti” Lanza was held on January 18, 2014 at Riverside Academy School in Cincinnati, Ohio, where she was a fifth-grade student. In attendance was her mother, her family and members of the community. Absent from the service, however, was her father, Deandre Kelley, because a judge would not allow him to attend. The reason? Kelley is Shanti’s accused killer. Shanti died in the early morning hours of January 12, 2014 after being struck in the torso by an errant bullet. Prosecutors allege that the fatal shot came from Kelley’s gun as he fired it into the air in a drunken confrontation with Shanti’s mother, Kristina Lanza. Kelley is currently being held on $500,000 bond. Judge Nadine Allen of the Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas cited security concerns when she denied Kelley temporary release from jail to attend the funeral of his daughter. She explained, "This is not going to be in the safest community. It would have been better off if it wasn't Riverside, but the location of the funeral home is in a place where a huge percentage of individuals have guns." Allen then told Kelley that he would have to "mourn symbolically." At the hearing, assistant prosecutor Mark Piepmeier claimed that people were so enraged by Shanti’s death that Kelley’s safety could be in danger if he were let out of jail. Also, Piepmeier added, “I think he forfeited the right to grieve for his daughter when he took her life.” The motion to grant Kelley temporary release had been requested by his attorney, Hugh McCloskey Jr., on behalf of Kelley’s family, including the victim’s mother. McCloskey stated, “This is a family unit, whether we like it or not. In order to start healing, it’s something they need to go through together.” Though Kelley had been charged with domestic violence against Kristina Lanza three times prior to the shooting incident, Lanza had dropped the charges each time. She had wanted Kelley to be able to attend Shanti’s funeral and sobbed loudly when Judge Allen denied the motion. Kelley has pleaded not guilty to four felony charges, including involuntary manslaughter, reckless homicide, endangering children, and having a weapon under disability (from a previous conviction in Kentucky of cocaine possession).	News from California California court limits State Controller's power over the budget   Court: California Third District Court of Appeal In 2011, State Controller John Chiang deemed the California State Legislature's budget to be unbalanced, so he withheld the lawmakers pay. The court ruled on January 24, 2014 that the Controller does not have such authority over the budgeting process. The 2011-2012 budget initially estimated $87.8 billion in revenue and allocated $86.6 billion of that for appropriations to the various government agencies. Gov. Brown vetoed that budget, so the Legislature passed a new one. The final budget included expenditures of $86 billion. Chiang, however, withheld the pay of lawmakers because he noted that the revenue estimates were based on four bills that had yet to be signed into law. Thus, he believed the budget to be unbalanced at the time it was due. A 2010 amendment requires that Legislators pass a balanced budget on-time or else forfeit their salaries. The Legislature's initial budget was passed on June 15, 2011, which was the deadline. Following the Governor's veto, Chiang declared the budget to be late. The revised budget was passed on June 28th. The Legislators did not seek back pay, but sought a court ruling that justified their handling of the budget and defined the Controller's authority, or lack thereof, in the process so that the situation wouldn't repeat itself. Senator Darrell Steinberg and Assemblyman John Perez were the plaintiffs. Judge David I. Brown, of the Superior Court of Sacramento County declared that the Legislature had complied with their budgetary duties and that Chiang did not have the authority to withhold their pay. On appeal to the Third District Court of Appeal, the ruling was similar. Justice Kathleen Butz wrote in the opinion: “ …the Controller is not a party to the enactment of the budget bill. ” Chiang, of course, was disappointed by the ruling. He said, “ The ruling adopts the Legislature's argument that a budget is balanced if it -- without any independent verification -- says it is so. ” You can read more about this story on Ballotpedia's "John Chiang" page.
News from North Dakota Supreme court rules against Bismarck police in search case   Court: North Dakota Supreme Court The Bismarck police violated the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution during a bust, the North Dakota's high court ruled. The North Dakota Supreme Court wrote in its opinion, published in mid-January of 2014, that when they entered a home in August 2012, Bismarck police should have obtained a warrant first. The police had received an anonymous tip that a suspected drug dealer was at a duplex in the city. Residents gave them permission to search the duplex and, while the police did not find the suspect, they found a large quantity of methamphetamine and two handguns. Residents further advised that the suspect “[grabbed] some stuff” and left with resident Paul Sitte in Sitte’s red pickup truck. Officers decided to check Sitte’s home, where they saw two unidentified males bringing something to the house from their vehicles. When the officers knocked, the first suspect answered and was arrested. The suspect told them no one else was home, despite officers witnessing two males enter. The police then made a “protective sweep” of the house. They testified they were worried for their safety because of the presence of drugs and firearms. During the sweep, officers arrested Sitte and Alicia Hart, who were brought up on drug charges. Sitte and Hart pleaded guilty, conditional on the ruling in their appeal. The two argued that the search and seizure was illegal and that the court should throw out the evidence. The supreme court ruled in their favor, returning the case to district court for further proceedings. The court wrote in its ruling: “ We are aware of the ever-present dangers officers face in the line of duty. However, in balancing the significant equities between officer safety and the Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures, and given the facts of this case, the claim for officer safety does not outweigh the unreasonableness of the protective sweep at Sitte's residence. ” Three weeks before this ruling, there was a similar search and seizure case in Fargo, North Dakota, in which the court ruled in favor of police who used a drug-sniffing dog to sweep an apartment without a warrant. A district judge had ruled against police.	News from Indiana Indiana appellate court upholds $3.8 million ruling in school bus crash   Court: Wisconsin Court of Appeals District I On January 24, 2014, Indiana Court of Appeals Judge Rudolph Pyle III upheld a $3.9 million ruling against a contractor for the Indianapolis Public School District for a 2010 collision between a school bus and a student. Richard Bethel, a then-17-year-old student, was run over by a school bus on September 15, 2010 while riding his bike to school on the west side of Indianapolis. The driver of the bus reported traveling between 30 to 40 miles per hour at the time of impact. Bethel suffered severe injuries, including a fractured right ankle, a compression fracture to his spine, a laceration to his spleen and a degloving injury to his left foot. According to court documents, "[the skin on his foot] was basically peeled off, almost like you peel an orange." Bethel remained hospitalized for sixteen days, and was confined to a wheelchair for two to three weeks. At the time of the accident, Bethel was a junior at Ben Davis High School and was enrolled in a Marine ROTC class. His hope to enlist in the Marine Corps after graduation was no longer possible due to his spine injury from the accident. In the complaint filed in the Marion County Superior Court on July 11, 2011, Bethel’s lawyers argued for $35 million in damages. A jury trial was held on October 16 through October 19, 2012, where Bethel’s counsel argued a David versus Goliath theme by emphasizing Bethel’s youth versus the expertise of the driver and corporation. Durham School Bus Services, Inc., the Illinois-based school bus contractor that operated the bus involved in the accident, argued that Bethel was at fault for turning his bike into the path of the bus. The parties determined Bethel’s medical bills totaled $193,365.15. The jury then determined that Bethel was 25 percent responsible for the crash, and the total damages were worth $5,200,001. Superior Court Judge David J. Dreyer ruled in favor of Bethel for a total of $3,900,000.75, amounting to 75 percent of the total damages for Bethel’s role in the accident. Durham appealed the ruling for a retrial and reassessment of damages in the suit. Lawyers for Durham argued in the Indiana Court of Appeals that evidence had been admitted improperly and that the jury had awarded excessive damages to Bethel. Judge Rudolph Pyle disagreed, declining to overturn the lower court's ruling. In his opinion, Pyle stated that “this challenge is nothing more than a request to reweigh the evidence, which we will not do.”
News from New York Fatal attraction killer not entitled to do-over after murder conviction   Court: New York Court of Appeals In a majority opinion written by Chief Justice Jonathan Lippman, of the New York Court of Appeals, the court found that though errors were made during the jury trial of Paul Cortez, those errors did not require the court to throw out his murder conviction. Cortez received the maximum sentence and is currently serving 25 years to life. Prosecutors presented evidence that Cortez refused to accept that Catherine Woods wanted to end their relationship. She was found murdered about a month after she told him she no longer wanted to see him. Cortez and Woods were lovers for several months. He was an actor and a yoga instructor and promised to give her a better life. When he found out he wasn't the only man she was seeing, he called Woods' father in Ohio to tell him she was working as a stripper. Woods, a ballet dancer from Ohio, moved to New York when she was 17, hoping to become a dancer on Broadway. She had come to New York with her boyfriend from Ohio, David Haughn, and the two lived together. Woods had tried to keep Cortez and Haughn from finding out about each other. On appeal, Cortez did not dispute the evidence proving murder. However, he claimed ineffective assistance of counsel. He also claimed the trial judge should not have allowed prosecutors to introduce evidence from his journals, some of which was written between three and six years before the murder. The claims Cortez made were previously considered, and rejected, after he presented his appeal to the New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division. Woods informed Cortez she did not want to continue seeing him around October 19, 2005. Phone records presented at the trial showed Cortez called Woods 57 times on that date. Records show he called her phone 47 times on October 25. In all, he made 292 calls to her phone in the month of October. On November 25, 2005, Haughn left the apartment for 20 minutes to get his car. When he returned, at around 7:00 p.m., he found Woods dead on the floor of the bedroom. Woods had been stabbed in the neck. Crime scene investigators discovered a bloody fingerprint on the wall of the room, which was later identified as belonging to Cortez. Cell phone records show Cortez called Woods' phone 14 times shortly before the murder, from a location near her apartment. After killing Woods, Cortez never called her phone again. However, he testified during trial he did not find out she had died until 16 hours after the murder. One of the attorneys who represented Cortez was facing prosecution by the district attorney's office for smuggling drugs to a client in prison. The attorney had been hired because she was considered an expert at disputing forensic evidence. After being questioned during his trial about continuing to have the attorney represent him, Cortez told the judge he understood the conflict but wanted to keep both of his attorneys. On appeal, he argued the trial court should have done more to ensure his attorney could devote her complete attention to representing him during his trial. Woods also appealed his conviction based upon the admission of his journals. The trial court allowed the prosecutor to present evidence from journals Cortez kept. In the journals, he wrote about his feelings after he was rejected by Woods. However, other journal entries detailed his hostile feelings toward previous girlfriends and women in general, during a time period long before the murder of Woods. The journals included drawings and poems which discussed using knives to seek revenge. Both the prosecution and the defense agreed none of the other women Cortez talked about in his journal had ever been harmed. According to the prosecutor, the journals showed how Cortez progressed from fantasizing about revenge killing to actual murder. However, the court found the journal evidence should not have been admitted at the trial. Since evidence linking a defendant's previous acts to a crime they are currently charged with is not acceptable evidence, the court stated it should be even less acceptable for a defendant to be convicted based upon evidence linking their past thoughts to a current charge. The court acknowledged the trial judge made a serious error by allowing the prosecutor to present the journal evidence. However, the court noted: “ The properly admitted proof of defendant's morbid preoccupation with Ms. Woods combined with the forensic crime scene evidence linking him to her murder, was extraordinarily powerful as were the cell phone records tracing defendant's movements toward and away from the locus of the crime. We agree with the Appellate Division that the proof before the jury overwhelmingly pointed to the conclusion that defendant was Ms. Woods' assailant. ” The claims Cortez made were previously considered, and rejected, after he presented his appeal to the appellate division. The court of appeals found his claims deserved consideration, but ultimately decided Cortez was not entitled to a reversal of his murder conviction.

See also

• Courtroom Weekly