Shadow Vigilantes

by Paul H. Robinson

  Key Evidence Suppressed because Child Molester Was Denied the Opportunity for His Roommate to Destroy or Hide It

  In the middle of a rainy night in Arizona, Gary Ault walks the quarter mile from his residence and slips into the home of a six-year-old girl—Jane Doe—who is sleeping in her bedroom.32 As Ault creeps silently toward Doe's room, he leaves large, muddy footprints behind. He enters the little girl's room, approaches the bed, unzips her pajamas, and begins fondling her genitals as she sleeps. Doe awakens and begins screaming, which brings her family running and sends Ault scrambling out of the house. Doe's parents immediately call the police to report the intrusion. The police arrive and discover distinctive muddy footprints on the floor. After Doe gives them a physical description of her assailant, two of the officers who know Ault suspect that he is the assailant. Doe selects Ault from a photographic lineup as her attacker.

  Police are let into Ault's home by his roommate. The roommate gives the police permission to search the premises at 5:00 a.m. The police leave, and Ault returns to his house at 6:45 a.m. When the officers return to Ault's home, Ault answers the door, wearing only a pair of shorts. The deputies ask him to accompany them to the station for questioning, and after his initial refusal, Ault agrees to go with them after he gets dressed. While they are waiting for him to dress, an officer observes a pair of large, muddy tennis shoes and connects them to the footprints in Doe's home. The officer asks Ault if they are his, and he says they are not. To ensure the safety of the potential evidence, the shoes are brought to the police station. Ault is arrested. Later that afternoon, the officers obtain a search warrant to inspect Ault's clothing in his home and find a pile of damp clothes that match Doe's description. Ault is convicted for child molestation and second-degree burglary.

  Ault appeals, contending that the tennis shoes found at the house should be suppressed because the officers did not have permission to enter. The state counters that the officers had probable cause to search the house. In any case, they inevitably would have found the shoes during that search under the warrant at the same time they found the incriminating damp clothes.33 The court reverses Ault's conviction. The convicted child molester thus gets a free pass on his sexual assault of the child.

  Gun Suppressed because Police Should Have Waited for the Suspect to Reach for His Gun before Drawing Their Own

  Calvin Moore gets into a heated dispute in public involving a handgun.34 The police station receives an anonymous phone tip about the disturbance. The caller describes how the handgun is clearly visible and expresses concern for the safety of the people in the area. The man's possession of the handgun is illegal. The station radios the information to two nearby officers on patrol. When the two officers arrive at the scene, they find Moore standing on the street corner described by the caller and wearing clothing matching the caller's description. When they step out of their vehicle and walk toward Moore, he starts to walk away from them. Given the accuracy of the caller's description, they approach Moore, draw their guns, and call out, “Police, don't move.”35 Moore continues to walk away, but as the officers follow, he finally comes to a halt. Moore is the right man; he is carrying a gun. He is arrested and charged with criminal possession of a weapon. He is convicted of illegal gun possession. On appeal, however, a majority of the appellate panel grants his claim and suppresses the gun.36 The court reasons that because the officers stopped Moore with their weapons drawn, they no longer had any justification for searching Moore's jacket for a weapon.37

  Gun Suppressed because a Murder Suspect Put the Gun in His Car Just before Being Arrested

  Miguel Torres, known by his alias Poppo, is living in New York City. For some time, the police have been closely watching Torres because they have linked him to several homicides.38 The police receive an anonymous phone tip that Poppo is getting his hair cut at a barber shop at 116th Street and Third Avenue in Manhattan. He is wearing a white sweater and carrying a gun in a shoulder bag.39 Two plainclothes officers see Torres, who is wearing a white sweater and carrying a green nylon shoulder bag, leave the barber shop accompanied by another man. Before the officers can reach the suspects, Torres and his friend enter Torres's black Cadillac Eldorado. Given that the caller was correct about Torres's location, the officers assume the caller may also be right about Torres having an illegal handgun in his shoulder bag. Knowing this, the detectives move toward the vehicle with their guns drawn and identify themselves as police officers. They order the two men out of the Eldorado. The men get out of the car, but they leave the shoulder bag behind on the front seat. The officers frisk the two suspects. One officer reaches into the front seat and pulls out Torres's green nylon bag, which the officer finds to be unusually heavy. The detective feels around the outside of the bag and notices the outline of a gun, which turns out to be a Rossi revolver loaded with five rounds of ammunition. The detectives arrest Torres and charge him with criminal possession of a firearm.

  Torres pleads guilty to third-degree criminal possession of a weapon. In jail, however, he changes his mind and appeals his case to the higher court of appeals. The court grants Torres's request to suppress the gun, with a majority of the panel concluding that entering into a suspect's vehicle is a “significant encroachment” upon that person's rights.

  DECISION MAKERS WHO ARE BLIND TO JUSTICE

  Murderer—“King” of Prison—Paroled to Reduce Capacity Kills Ten More

  In 1966, Kenneth Allen McDuff, a convicted burglar, and his friend Roy Green finish a job pouring concrete at a construction site in Temple, Texas, and decide to drive to Fort Worth.40 While driving, McDuff spots a teenage girl, Edna Sullivan, talking with two boys, Robert Brand and Mark Dunman, at a baseball diamond. As McDuff and Green approach them, McDuff pulls out his .38 pistol and forces the teenagers to hand over their wallets, and ends up sexually assaulting Sullivan and killing the three teens.41 Green, riddled with guilt, turns himself in and describes the entire episode to police. McDuff is arrested and convicted and receives a death sentence for the murders, in part because the jury concludes that McDuff is likely to kill again. McDuff is twice scheduled to go to the electric chair, but both times he receives a stay of execution a few days before.42

  In 1989 there is overcrowding in Texas prisons. The parole board knows of McDuff's criminal history and is aware of the trial jury's opinion that he is likely to murder again. The board selects McDuff for release on parole, even though other less serious and less dangerous offenders could have been released instead. When US Marshal Parnell McNamara in Waco, Texas, learns of McDuff's parole he asks, “Have they gone crazy?”43

  Three days after McDuff's release, police discover the body of Sarafia Parker. A witness had seen her together with McDuff in his pickup truck before she was murdered. It is possible that she is his first post-parole victim.44 In 1991 McDuff kidnaps Brenda Thompson and ties her up in his vehicle. When McDuff comes upon a Waco Police Department checkpoint, Thompson kicks at the windshield to get the attention of the officers, but McDuff speeds away. McDuff later physically and sexually tortures Thompson, putting out cigarettes on her skin and raping her before killing her. He then continues in this pattern, killing at least nine other people.

  Sexual Predator Sent for Treatment Judged No Longer a Danger and Released to Murder Twenty People

  In 1968 William Bonin begins sexually assaulting young men.45 Bonin continues to prey on vulnerable kids as he kidnaps and sodomizes several youngsters. In 1969 the police catch him in the act and arrest him. Bonin tells authorities when they capture him that “they were lucky they had caught him because he felt that he might have killed the boy” this time.46 He pleads guilty to molestation, forced oral copulation, and kidnapping. Believing Bonin is very sick and dangerous, the court sends him to Atascadero State Hospital for treatment. In 1971 doctors determine that treatment is ineffective for Bonin, so they ship him to the nearby prison.47 But in 1974 doctors at the prison decide that Bonin is no longer a danger, so they release him.

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sp; Within a year of his release, he rapes a young man and is arrested for the attack. While in police custody, Bonin tells authorities he will kill his future victims to ensure that they can never testify against him. The court again convicts him for forcible oral copulation, but just a few years later a parole board releases him a second time.48

  Again, within a year, police arrest Bonin for molesting another teenage boy. In 1979 Bonin begins a killing spree around southern California. His first victim is seventeen-year-old Markus Grabs. Bonin binds him in ignition wire and drives him to his house, where he proceeds to sodomize and beat him, finally stabbing him seventy-seven times. Bonin leaves Grabs's body on the side of a Malibu freeway. Three weeks later, the body of fifteen-year-old Donald Hyden is found in a trash bin off the Ventura Freeway. It is determined that Hyden has been raped and strangled with a ligature. His murderer also cut his throat and made an attempt to castrate the young man. Over the next year, Bonin murders at least twenty-one victims using similar methods. Most of his victims are young male hitchhikers or schoolboys.49 After abusing and murdering them, he usually dumps their bodies along one of the freeways in southern California, which earns him the moniker the Freeway Killer. In the spring of 1980 the Los Angeles Police Department arrest him in a parking lot, where they catch him sodomizing a fifteen-year-old boy.

  Teacher Who Raped Fourteen-Year-Old Who Kills Herself Gets Thirty Days as Judge Blames Victim for the Rape

  In 2007 Cherice Moralez is a fourteen-year-old freshman at Billings Senior High School in Montana.50 Moralez takes a business class taught by Stacey Rambold, a forty-nine-year-old who would like to have sex with Moralez.51 Between October and December 2007, Rambold rapes Moralez on three separate occasions. Moralez's attitude and behavior begin to change. Her liveliness diminishes, and she begins to get into trouble at school. The problem is finally revealed during a meeting of Moralez's church group, where she tells the group leader about the rapes. Moralez's mother is notified, and she calls the police. On October 31, 2008, Rambold is arrested and charged with three felony counts of sexual intercourse without consent with a minor.

  As the case is pending, Moralez has trouble dealing with her classmates at school: “It was all dark looks.”52 Moralez falls into a depression and kills herself.53 Judge G. Todd Baugh presides over the case in December 2010. Rambold is told to complete a Sexual Offender Treatment Program, in lieu of punishment, but Rambold is kicked out of the program for having an affair. Now forced back into court, Rambold pleads guilty to one of the three counts of rape, and the prosecution recommends that he receive a twenty-year prison sentence with ten years suspended. However, Judge Baugh has sympathy for Rambold because he believes that the rapist has “suffered enough” already.54 Further, the judge concludes that Moralez “was older than her chronological age,” that she was “as much in control of the situation” as Rambold, and that the rape “wasn't this forcible beat-up thing.”55 Baugh gives Rambold a sentence of thirty days in jail. The mandatory minimum for the offense is two years.

  Probation for Aggressor Who Kills Another in a Fight the Aggressor Started

  On June 6, 2006, two brothers, Isaiah and Evan Eskew, attend Wirt High School's graduation ceremony in Gary, Indiana.56 Evan, there to see a friend graduate, once dated Deanna Edwards, who is also at the ceremony with her current boyfriend, Tywon Newsome. Although Evan Eskew and Newsome have not seen each other in several years, tensions linger over insults Eskew made three years earlier. When the ceremony is almost over, the Eskew brothers head to their car and retrieve a handgun. A physical brawl ensues between the Eskew brothers and Newsome. When Evan accidentally drops the gun during the struggle, Isaiah picks it up, aims at Newsome's head, and fires twice, grazing Newsom's lip and left ear. Isaiah then fires again at Newsome. This time the bullet rips through Newsome's chest and punctures his lung. Evan flees from the parking lot, and Isaiah, after beating Newsome up a bit more, also leaves. Isaiah goes to the emergency room for medical attention. During questioning by police, he tells officers what transpired and is immediately taken into custody. Newsome dies from the gunshot wound. Isaiah, who did the shooting, pleads not guilty to murder and unlawful possession of a firearm. He faces a potential sentence of forty-five to sixty-five years in prison.

  At trial, the jury finds Isaiah guilty of reckless homicide and illegal possession of a firearm on school property. While the judge could give a sentence of eleven years, he gives a sentence of probation instead. For killing Newsome, Isaiah is required to speak once a year to groups of young people.

  Mississippi Governor Pardons Murderers Who Worked for His Family

  Joseph Ozment and three other individuals rob a convenience store in Hernado, Mississippi, and kill the lone employee.57 An anonymous tipster later informs police that he saw the robbers flee in a getaway car, and ten days later, Ozment and his accomplices are arrested and charged with armed robbery and murder. During his confession to police, Ozment states, “I pulled out my pistol because the man was still moving on the floor. I didn't want him to be able to identify me or the other guy so I shot him twice…. I shot him in the head.”58 Ozment makes a deal with the state and testifies against his accomplices to avoid getting the death penalty. He pleads guilty to murder, armed robbery, and conspiracy to commit armed robbery and is given a life sentence.

  In 2001 Anthony McCray and his wife have been arguing while dining in a café in McComb, Mississippi.59 McCray leaves the café, then returns with a gun. He shoots his wife in the back, killing her. After his arrest, McCray insists that his shooting of his wife was accidental, but multiple witnesses make it clear that this is not true. McCray pleads guilty and is sentenced to life in prison.

  Ozment and McCray, along with more than two hundred other offenders in prison, are assigned to work at the Mississippi governor's mansion, and because of that service, Governor Haley Barbour gives the men full pardons when he leaves the governor's office in 2012.

  DEFENSES FOR THE GUILTY

  By the Time a Rape Victim Recovers from the Trauma Enough to Cooperate with Police to Identify her Rapist, the Statute of Limitations Has Run Out

  On the evening of March 16, 1978, teenager Lori Kustudick makes plans to meet her friends for an early St. Patrick's Day party at a dance club known as the Some Other Place Lounge.60 Kustudick waits for her friends, passing the time by having a few drinks and talking to a few familiar faces, but her friends never appear. Around 2:30 a.m. a young man (later identified as Herbert Howard) approaches Kustudick's table. He offers her a ride home. While his friend drives, Howard rapes and savagely beats Kustudick. Among other injuries he cracks her skull and tortures her with a burning cigarette. Despite the serious injuries she escapes the car and runs to freedom. At 4:04 a.m. Officer Hartmann of the Cook County Sheriff's Department spots Kustudick running diagonally across an intersection, completely naked. Kustudick, in a state of shock, tells the officer, “I want to go home; I just want to go home.” He wraps her in a blanket and rushes her to Lutheran General Hospital. The police build a case against Howard, but his victim is both mentally and physically compromised and is unable to help them.61 Without sufficient evidence against Howard, the authorities must release him.

  After years of therapy, Kustudick comes to understand that only by facing what happened to her can she move past it. She is now ready and able to do what she can to bring about justice. The police provide Kustudick a book of mug shots as “a big thick, thick book…like a couple of the yellow pages from Chicago together.”62 She is easily able to identify Howard, who happened to be the same person who was the prime suspect of police back at the time of the offense. However, the prosecutors soon determine that Howard cannot be tried. In Illinois, all rape prosecutions have a five-year statute of limitations. Because the statute of limitations has expired, the state is powerless to pursue Howard for his vicious rape and beating.

  When a Killer Gets a Manslaughter Verdict, He Walks Free under the Statute of Limitations

  In 1974, Cl
aude Nix, a trucker from South Carolina and father of six, drives a truck headed north on US Highway 13.63 He is just south of Harrington, Delaware, en route to Albany, New York. At the time, the United States is in the throes of the 1970s energy crisis, and independent truckers are on strike protesting the increase in diesel fuel prices. As a result of the truckers’ strike, industries along the East Coast, including Pennsylvania, Delaware, New York, and New Jersey, have been forced to lay off workers because materials are not being delivered. The strike is affecting thousands of people, and many are upset with the striking truckers.

  Many of the striking truckers are upset with those who are still driving. In Pennsylvania, a bridge along the turnpike is dynamited, and hotels frequented by truckers receive bomb threats. In West Virginia, National Guard troops ride with truckers to protect them. As Nix drives along US 13, a shot is fired from a passing car. The bullet penetrates the driver's side window and kills Nix. Police commence a massive investigation into Nix's murder. The investigation progresses but slowly. In 1987 the police finally have enough evidence and witnesses to arrest Lester Cane, a thirty-eight-year-old house painter living south of Dover, Delaware. The police charge Cane with second-degree murder on March 2, 1987. At trial, the jury is instructed that they can convict Cane either of second-degree murder or of the lesser offense of manslaughter, or they can acquit him. The jury convicts Cane of manslaughter. While there is no statute of limitations for murder, there is a five-year statute of limitations for manslaughter. Thus, when the jury convicts Cane of the lesser offense, the defense counsel files a motion to have the conviction completely invalidated.