State v. Crawford, 2013 Ohio 1659

Crawford was convicted of aggravated robbery and felony murder after a bench trial for the March 6, 2011 killing of Navario Banks; twelve counts were charged with codefendants and a forfeiture specification.
Evidence included testimony from Banks’s ex-girlfriend Moorer, police and crime-scene investigators, and cooperating codefendants Robinson and Cassel who pleaded guilty to reduced charges in exchange for testimony.
Crawford’s motion to suppress cell phone records, including his own and codefendants’, was denied; a separate suppression challenge to Banks’s 911 call was resolved as invited error.
Cell-phone records and witness testimony, including Cassel and Robinson, were used to establish Crawford’s involvement and complicity in the aggravated robbery that led to Banks’s death.
The trial court's verdict found Crawford guilty of aggravated robbery (Count 7) and felony murder (Count 3) with firearm and repeat-violent-offender specifications; a clerical error later appeared in the sentencing journal entry.
On appeal, the court affirmed the convictions and remanded for correction of the clerical error to reflect felony murder conviction on Count 3 and not Count 2.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Did Crawford have standing to suppress others' cell records?	Crawford was aggrieved; he had privacy in conversations.	Crawford lacked standing to challenge others' records; phones records belong to third parties.	No standing; suppression denied.
Was the admission of evidentiary materials proper and did it affect verdict?	Evidentiary rulings supported the verdict; impeachment via Evid.R. 607 was proper.	Some evidence was inadmissible or improperly referenced.	No reversible error; evidentiary rulings affirmed.
Was there sufficient evidence to support complicity and felony murder?	Crawford aided and abetted the robbery; murder was a proximate result of the robbery.	No direct or forensic link tying Crawford to the crime.	Sufficient evidence to support aiding and abetting and felony murder.
Did the journal entry contain a clerical error regarding the felony-murder counts?	Count 3 felony murder based on aggravated robbery; Count 2 mis-stated in the entry.	No substantive error; any issue was raised on appeal as clerical.	clerical error; remanded to correct the entry to reflect Count 3 felony murder and not Count 2.
Are Crawford's convictions against the manifest weight of the evidence?	Cell-phone records and witness testimony collectively establish a grave, coherent narrative.	Major witnesses were conflicted and there was no physical evidence tying Crawford to the crime.	Convictions not against the weight of the evidence.

State v. Burnside, 100 Ohio St.3d 152 (2003-Ohio-5372) (mixed question of law and fact standard for suppression appeals)
Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (1967) (reasonable expectation of privacy; telephone records generally not private)
Smith v. Maryland, 442 U.S. 735 (1979) (no reasonable expectation of privacy in telephone numbers dialed)
State v. Dennis, 79 Ohio St.3d 421 (1997) (Fourth Amendment rights are personal; cannot be vicariously asserted)
Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. 128 (1978) (standing requires being aggrieved by the search; not just via evidence)
State v. Holmes, 30 Ohio St.3d 20 (1987) (surprise and affirmative damage requirements for impeaching one’s own witness under Evid.R. 607)