Love Me or I'll Kill You

by Lee Butcher

  Paula was angry with him, Santiago said, because she found a telephone number in the van. Paula assumed it was a girlfriend’s number. “She started arguing with him, saying there was another girl,” Santiago said. “She was very jealous. That’s why he wanted a couple of drinks.” Santiago said Paula was always jealous of Chino. “Like, my friends talk to him, my girlfriends, and stuff like that,” Santiago said. “She used to get jealous.”

  Instead of being submissive, Santiago said, Paula baited Chino into getting angry. She would push him until he exploded. Santiago testified that was why Chino knocked so many holes in the walls with his fist. “She was pushing him to a certain point and [he] didn’t want to hit her, you know,” Santiago said. “So he hit the wall and walked off.”

  In March 2001, about four months before the robberies, Santiago testified that Paula and Chino had a fight that resulted in Paula getting a black eye. She asked Chino about it, and he said that he had slapped Paula’s face.

  “I told her she can’t take that from him,” Santiago said. “It could be anything, but don’t hit her. I don’t go for that. You don’t hit a woman. Because look at his size compared to her. I mean, she’s so small.”

  After this fight, Santiago said, Paula telephoned and asked her to stop by. She found Paula in the bedroom with Ashley. Paula was crying and packing her things because she wanted to go to New York. Santiago bought Paula a one-way ticket to New York, because she couldn’t afford the return fare.

  “She wanted to leave,” Santiago said. “She didn’t want to come back. Chino came back before I took her to the airport, but they didn’t speak.”

  Where was the helpless woman who was dominated by Chino? Pruner wondered. It seemed to him that Paula was in charge. Chino bought her a membership in a health club and a vehicle to get around in. Was that domination? And every time Paula went to New York, who paid for it? Chino or his mother always picked up the tab. The facts convinced them that Chino, far from dominating Paula, tried his best to do whatever would make her happy.

  “Did you ever feel that Paula was under Nestor’s control?” Athan asked.

  “No.”

  “Never?”

  “No.”

  Lissette testified that Chino was suicidal and that he wanted fast money. “He’d tell me, ‘Ma, I’m going to rob a bank.’ I said, ‘Go ahead. I’ll see you in jail.’ I thought it was a joke.”

  Paula had said she wanted to work, but that Chino wouldn’t let her. Santiago disputed this. “Paula didn’t want to work, because they didn’t want to leave Ashley with nobody,” Santiago said. “Chino wanted her to work. When she came down here the first time, she told Chino she already had a job. That’s why I gave him the money for her to come down.”

  Athan asked, “What kind of tastes did she have in personal items?”

  “They wanted everything expensive, you know. All they wore were Polo and Tommy (Hilfiger), and stuff like that.”

  “Did she ever describe her tastes about Tommy or Polo?”

  “Yes. A lot of times when something comes out, they get it.”

  “How about the clothing for Ashley?”

  “Well, Ashley was The Gap. I’m not sure. Paula is the one that usually goes shopping.”

  Pruner cross-examined. “Since her (Paula’s) arrest, she indicated that your son told you during the car ride that they had committed a bank robbery, and at that point, you became angry and started to chastise them, telling them it was stupid, asking them why they did that.”

  “When Chino called me on the phone and told me he had robbed a bank, yeah, I told him. I was screaming at him on the phone.”

  The inconsistencies in the testimony, police interviews and depositions mounted. Paula had said earlier that Chino told Lissette about the robbery while she drove them from the Regency to the Crossings. In a previous deposition, Lissette said she learned about the robbery from the Regency manager. The truth was as illusive as a coin in a carnival shell game.

  Pruner turned his attention to the timeline to build his case that the pursuit after the robbery had not ended, and that Paula had not found even a momentary “safe haven.”

  “You picked them up at the Regency Apartments?” he asked.

  Santiago said she did.

  “How long did it take you before you dropped them off at the Crossings?”

  “Well, it depends. Five minutes.”

  “Did you go straight down Kennedy?”

  “Kennedy, yeah, and then I turned on Church.”

  Pruner backtracked to when Chino had called Santiago from the Regency and established that it took her about ten minutes to get there. The ASA had no further questions. He had established that only fifteen minutes had passed between the time Chino telephoned his mother and she dropped them off at the Crossings.

  Ashley. Think about Ashley.

  Concern about what would happen to her daughter was what kept Paula from killing herself. Now Chino was dead and Paula was in jail. What was to happen to Ashley?

  Santiago, who had kept the little girl with her almost every day, had no legal right to be Ashley’s guardian. For several weeks Ashley stayed with her. Santiago visited Paula in jail frequently, and Paula, who had never liked her, started to become friendly with Chino’s mother. Santiago wanted to raise Ashley, but a custody dispute arose between her and Paula’s parents.

  Deeann Athan, Paula’s attorney, noticed that this changed the nature of testimony given by Chino’s relatives. Before the custody dispute, Athan found that they supported her contention that Paula was battered by Chino. This changed after the custody dispute.

  “They were testifying for the defense,” Athan said. “They were talking about how violent, domineering, and abusive Nestor (Chino) was. After the custody dispute, I found witnesses I thought were defense witnesses turning up on the state’s witness list.”

  Athan, who felt that the cards were already stacked against Paula, was particularly upset about testimony for the state to be given by one of Chino’s relatives. She said to Mark Ober, “If you bring him in to testify, I’ll impeach him with his deposition.” The state dropped the prospective witness.

  Paula’s mother was granted custody of Ashley. She adopted the little girl and took her to live in New York—but not in the big city. She had lost one child to its temptations and wasn’t about to lose Ashley the same way.

  On April 9, 2003, Judge Padgett struck Athan’s motion to use battered spouse syndrome as a defense. She resubmitted it on April 14. The judge took it under advisement.

  The hearing on April 9 was to hear Athan’s motion to suppress Paula’s interview with Detective Black following her arrest on July 6, 2001. Athan maintained that the confession to the bank robbery was made without an attorney being present to represent Paula.

  Patricia Turpin, assistant state attorney, conducted the direct examination. Black identified an audiotape of the interview and said Paula signed a Miranda consent form stating she understood her rights. After having the tape entered into evidence, Turpin received permission from the court to play parts of it.

  On the tape Black identified himself, other law enforcement officers present, and Paula. “We’re gonna read you your constitutional rights,” Black said on the tape. “You have the right to remain silent. Do you understand that?”

  “Yes,” Paula answered.

  Paula said she understood that anything she said could be used against her in court, and that she had a right to talk to a lawyer before answering any questions. Paula affirmed that she understood all of her rights, and that she could invoke them at any time.

  A section of the tape that Athan considered crucial to her motion to strike was played.

  Paula said, “Um, I don’t know. I’ve never been in this situation. I don’t know if I should talk to a lawyer first.”

  “If you wish, you can,” Black said. “We mentioned that. If you wanted to talk with one, you have that opportunity.”

  “Yeah, I wanna cooperate, but I don
’t really—I don’t wanna go to jail.”

  “Well, you know, the point of going to jail is on the basis of evidence.... You have to make that decision. I can’t make it for you. You know, I’m not going to lie to you. There’s a possibility you will go to jail . . . but you would go to jail even if you didn’t talk to us right now, okay?”

  “Do you have a lawyer here?”

  “No, we don’t have one here,” Black said. “That’s the only problem.”

  “Okay. I’ll go with it.”

  Judge Padgett interrupted. “Are we going to listen to the whole interview?”

  “No, Your Honor,” Turpin replied. “There is just a little more that will be important.”

  On the tape Paula told Black a little about her background and said she had not used drugs or alcohol in the past twenty-four hours. Paula said she had not been hit in the head or experienced anything else that would impair her memory.

  Turpin questioned Black when the tape session concluded. The detective said he had not coerced or intimidated Paula. Turpin noted the “significant” pause from the time he told her there were no lawyers available and her agreeing to continue. Why was that? Turpin asked.

  “Because I didn’t want her to think that I wanted her to answer either way,” Black said. “I wanted to do what she wanted to do.... There was no intent on my part to intimidate her. . . .”

  The detective testified that Paula wanted to cooperate. Then Turpin entered the Miranda documents that Paula had signed into evidence.

  On cross-examination Athan reviewed the traumas that Paula experienced during the hours before she was interviewed. Specifically, Athan mentioned the bank robbery, the escape, the dye pack explosion, being a few feet away when Lois was killed, a shoot-out with police, breaking into Isaac Davis’s apartment and taking him hostage, Chino trying to convince her to take her life before he shot himself in the head.

  “As soon as he’s (Chino) dead, she’s coming out the door with her hands up, right?” Athan asked.

  “Yes.”

  “So knowing all that she’s been through that day,” Athan said, “you must have had some concerns as to her mental state . . . as well?”

  Black said there was some concern, but that Paula did “quite well.”

  Athan wanted him to discuss Paula’s demeanor. “She sounds a little meek on the tape,” she said. “Would you agree with that?”

  “Oh, definitely, yes.”

  Black said he realized that the interview was Paula’s first experience with the police. Athan showed him a copy of the form Paula had signed consenting to the interview. Black identified it as a standard form used by the TPD.

  Athan received permission to approach the witness. “On the top of that form, it’s got a check mark, ‘Consent to be interviewed concerning an offense of,’ and then there’s a blank line,” Athan noted.

  “Right.”

  “And nothing has been filled in that blank?”

  Black agreed.

  “Isn’t it the usual custom for police officers, detectives, to fill in the offense for which they’re interrogating the suspect . . . ?” Athan asked.

  “It’s optional, but normally it is filled in.”

  Athan asked Black why it was left blank. The detective said he didn’t know what the charges against Paula would be, or even if she would be charged. Athan attacked that position.

  “You’re telling Ms. Gutierrez . . . that we want information,” she asked. “Is that what you said?”

  “Yes, in regard to specific items; one, the bank robbery, and, two, the death of Officer Marrero.”

  “You’re saying . . . you hadn’t decided whether or not she was going to be arrested for any of that?”

  “It’s not my decision,” Black said. “It’s the state attorney’s decision.”

  “But Ms. Gutierrez was . . . in custody?”

  Black said yes, and admitted that Paula was handcuffed when she was arrested and taken to police headquarters. The handcuffs were removed when Paula was brought into the conference room to be interviewed. The handcuffs weren’t put back on until Paula was transported to jail, Black testified.

  “Was she free to leave?” Athan asked.

  “No, she was not. No, she is not.”

  “So she is in custody?”

  Black said that was true and verified that Paula knew she was in custody and couldn’t leave. At no time was Paula left alone without a guard, Black said. Black verified that among them, he and Detectives Hevel and Lease were “very experienced.”

  “Nobody is on her side in that room, right?” Athan asked.

  Black testified that this was obvious. Athan wondered why the interview was on audiotape rather than videotape.

  “Is there any reason why . . . so we could see what you were doing, what she was doing, how people looked?”

  Black said the video equipment had not been available. He added that in his years as a detective, he had never videotaped an interview. Black answered yes to Athan’s questions about Paula understanding her right to an attorney and, if she couldn’t afford an attorney, one would be appointed to represent her. Black agreed that he told Paula she could exercise her rights at any point.

  Athan attacked the detective for not allowing Paula to see a lawyer when she said, “I don’t know if I should talk to a lawyer first.”

  “You don’t have to give her advice about a lawyer because that’s not your job, correct?”

  “That’s correct.”

  Athan mentioned Paula’s long pause before continuing. “We don’t have the videotape,” she said. “Could you tell if she was thinking about it?”

  “It was obvious she was thinking about it.”

  After Paula understood that Black couldn’t give her advice about whether or not she needed a lawyer, she said, “‘I want to cooperate, but I don’t really want to go to jail?’ . . . And you say, ‘Well, you know, the point of going to jail is on the basis of evidence.’ And that’s what you’re trained to tell her, correct?”

  “And that’s the facts.”

  Athan questioned him about what he meant when he told Paula there was a “good possibility” that she would go to jail, with or without a lawyer. Black said he couldn’t give percentages, but he thought Paula’s chances of being jailed were better than fifty-fifty.

  The detective admitted that the reason Paula asked if a lawyer was available was so she could consult with him. “And you say, ‘We don’t have one here,’” Athan said. “And then you say, ‘That’s the only problem.’

  “What’s the problem with that?” Athan asked.

  “If she wanted to talk with one . . . there was no possibility of getting an attorney then.”

  “No possibility of getting an attorney?” Athan asked, surprised.

  “Not then.”

  “Well, do we mean in five minutes, ten minutes, a day? What are we talking about ‘not then’?”

  Black testified that there was “no way” an attorney could be obtained in the time allotted for the interview. Under more questioning, Black said that a lawyer could not have been obtained in a half hour.

  “You just told her that if [she] couldn’t afford an attorney, one would be appointed to her without cost of any kind; is that correct?” Athan asked.

  Black agreed, and Athan asked him if he knew Hillsborough County had a public defender office. Black said he knew that, but had no way of knowing if there were attorneys available then. Athan showed the detective Defense Exhibit 2, which was an aerial photograph of downtown Tampa.

  Athan pointed out the location of the police department headquarters and the public defender’s office on the photograph. The buildings were three to four blocks away. Surely, Athan said, a public defender could have been called.

  “I guess . . . she could have called,” Black said. “I wouldn’t have called for her.... She also had the knowledge that she didn’t have to talk to us without an attorney.”

  “Would you agree that the whole si
tuation is at least a little coercive?” Athan asked.

  Black disagreed, and said Paula was free to speak or not, but that he and the other detectives did nothing to force her to make a statement.

  Athan hammered away. “She’s a young woman, no experience with police, having gone through a horrendous and terrifying day, and now she finds herself in a room with three detectives being questioned,” Athan said. “Do you find that at all coercive? Just in and of itself, not that anyone is coercing her to do anything.”

  Black said he didn’t believe so. Paula was an intelligent woman who indicated that she was fully aware of her situation. Athan asked him what he meant when he told Paula “that’s the only problem,” when he said there was no attorney there.

  “What’s the problem about that?” she asked. “What’s the problem about letting her exercise her right to speak to a lawyer before she’s questioned?”

  Black said there was no problem, and that Paula could speak or not speak. She had chosen to make the statement.

  “Was there a problem in your mind?” Athan asked.

  “The only problem was she wanted to know if there was an attorney there now,” Black said. “There wasn’t one there now. That is the only problem.”

  Black said he didn’t believe he could have found an attorney for Paula within an hour because it was a Friday afternoon. He said a lot of people had taken time off.

  “Are you aware that the office of the public defender has, since 1996 at least, given Tampa police and other law enforcement agencies notice that we are on call twenty-four hours a day?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Didn’t you understand that if she wanted an attorney right then and there, all you had to do is pick up the phone and say, ‘Would you walk over those four blocks and send a lawyer over?’”

  Black doggedly maintained that Paula only had asked if an attorney was available; she didn’t say she wanted to speak to one.

  “Detective Black, a member of the office of the public defender could have been available within ten minutes, right?”