STATE OF OHIO v. TACOTA FIELDS
C.A. CASE NO. 2016-CA-76
IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF OHIO SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT CLARK COUNTY
September 22, 2017
2017-Ohio-7745
T.C. NOS. 15-CR-642; 16-CR-193
(Criminal Appeal from Common Pleas Court)
OPINION
Rendered on the 22nd day of September, 2017.
ANDREW P. PICKERING, Atty. Reg. No. 0068770, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, 50 E. Columbia Street, Suite 449, Springfield, Ohio 45502
Attorney for Plaintiff-Appellee
MARK WIECZOREK, Atty. Reg. No. 0082916, 9415 Montgomery Road, Suite D, Cincinnati, Ohio 45242
Attorney for Defendant-Appellant
FROELICH, J.
{¶ 1} After his two criminal cases were consolidated for trial in the Clark County Court of Common Pleas, Tacota Fields was found guilty by a jury of murder with a firearm specification, felony murder with a firearm specification, tampering with evidence, felonious assault, and improperly discharging a firearm at or into a habitation. Fields
{¶ 2} Fields appeals from his convictions, claiming that his convictions were based on insufficient evidence and were against the manifest weight of the evidence and that cumulative errors deprived him of a fair trial. For the following reasons, the trial court‘s judgment will be affirmed.
I. Evidence at Trial
{¶ 3} The charges against Fields arose out of three separate incidents in August 2013. The two murder charges, the felonious assault charge, and the tampering with evidence charge stemmed from the shooting death of Schuyler Mollett on August 8, 2013; Fields was indicted on those four charges in Case No. 15CR642. The other two charges, indicted in Case No. 16CR193, were based on allegations that Fields fired multiple gun shots at two different locations in Springfield, Ohio, on August 2, 2013. The State alleged that Fields shot at a residence (Count One) and a church on Springfield-Jamestown Road (Count Two). Fields was acquitted of the charge related to the church, and we will not discuss the evidence related to that charge.
{¶ 4} The State presented 40 witnesses at trial. They can be generally grouped as eyewitnesses to the shootings, Mollett‘s friends, Fields‘s friends, law enforcement officers, and experts from the Montgomery County Coroner‘s Office and the Bureau of Criminal Investigation. The State‘s evidence at trial established the following facts.
A. Events Leading Up to the Shootings
{¶ 5} In 2013, Fields had a group of friends, which included Dustin Frey, Elijah Hall,
{¶ 6} Fields was in a romantic relationship with Hailey Wright. Hall and Simpson testified that Fields would complain that Wright had cheated on him (Fields), that Wright would lie to him, and that she would hang around people that Fields did not like. During the relevant time period, Fields lived with Wright and Frey.
{¶ 7} Schuyler Mollett also had a close group of friends, who called themselves the Ratchet Clique. The group consisted of Mollett, Joseph Litteral, Darren Milo, Bryant Mollett (Schuyler Mollett‘s cousin), and Justin Robothom. One of the friends also included Jeremy, who was then about 16 years old. Tiffany Ogle, who lived with Mollett on Stanton Street, described the group as “friends who hung out and played pool.”
{¶ 8} In March 2013, Fields and his friends were at Forest Lake, a campground with a pool hall located west of Springfield. There, an argument ensued between Fields‘s group and the Ratchet Clique, particularly between Fields and Jeremy. The confrontation ended when the owner of Forest Lake kicked out both groups.
{¶ 9} Both groups relocated to a Wal-Mart in Springfield. There, Fields “went after” Jeremy and knocked Jeremy down. In response, Robothom punched Fields in the face, and Fields ran away. Other members of the groups also fought; Frey “got jumped” and four or five Ratchets hit him while he was on the ground. The altercation broke up within five to ten minutes, after someone shouted that the police had been called.
{¶ 10} A third altercation between the groups occurred later that night, because Fields wanted to fight Robothom, who had punched him at Wal-Mart. While driving around, members of Fields‘s group saw a vehicle with Ratchet Clique members, and
{¶ 11} Sometime after the March 2013 altercations, Fields and Frey went to Troy, where Fields purchased a two-tone black and green 9mm handgun. Fields kept the gun in his truck, a blue GMC Sonoma with HD headlights and graphics on the side.
B. Shooting of the Hoefers’ Residence
{¶ 12} In August 2013, Brandy Hoefer had a residence on East McCreight Avenue in Springfield. She lived there with her sister, Katelyn, her mother, her boyfriend, and her son. The Hoefers’ residence was diagonally across the street from the home where Fields, Wright, and Frey resided.
{¶ 13} Katelyn Hoefer and Hailey Wright were friends. Wright testified that Fields did not want Wright to be friends with Katelyn due to a past relationship he had with Katelyn. By August 2013, Wright would come by Katelyn‘s home “all the time.” Katelyn indicated that Wright and Fields were dating when she (Katelyn) first met Wright, but Wright‘s relationship with Fields was “on and off.” Katelyn testified that Wright would “sometimes” come by when she was having problems “in her relationship.” Katelyn stated that Fields came to the Hoefers’ residence once during a party, saw Wright in the basement with others, and left; Wright testified that Fields was angry to find her smoking
{¶ 14} Wright testified that one night in early August 2013, Fields told her that he was going to the gym. After he left, Wright heard gunshots, but did not investigate. When Fields returned a couple hours later, Wright told Fields about the gunshots she had heard. Fields responded that he had done it, because Wright was “hanging out over there all the time.”
{¶ 15} Betty Lynne Herzog was friends with Brandy Hoefer and was at Brandy‘s home nearly every day. On the night of August 2, 2013, Brandy had gone to a nearby Walgreens store, and Herzog and another friend of Brandy were at Brandy‘s home, waiting for Brandy to return. Herzog looked out the front door to see if Brandy were coming, and then decided to sit on a couch in the front living room to wait. Shortly after sitting down, three bullets came through the front storm door and “three or four more shots” came after that. Herzog went back to the front door, but did not see anyone. Herzog called the police.
{¶ 16} Officer Andrew Bronsord responded to the Hoefers’ address. The officer observed two bullet holes in the storm door and bullet holes in the front of the house. Bullets struck interior walls, a couch, and a playpen. Officer Bronsord recovered a bullet from behind the couch. Officer Jerome Klark later responded to the Hoefers’ address and collected a partial full metal jacket from under the front window of the residence.
C. Shooting of Schuyler Mollett
{¶ 17} During the evening of August 8, 2013, Wright and Fields drove in Fields‘s truck to an auto parts store to get a steering wheel cover. On the way home, Wright
{¶ 18} Wright got in the driver‘s seat of Fields‘s truck. Soon after, she heard several gunshots. Thinking Fields might have been shot, Wright drove down a street and an alley toward the church‘s parking lot. Wright saw “the dead body,” who she recognized as the person they had just seen while driving. Wright testified that she “sped home,” driving down Stanton Avenue. She did not see Fields on her way home.
{¶ 19} When Wright arrived at her home, she told Frey that Fields had shot somebody. Frey testified that Fields came home about five minutes after Wright. Wright described Fields as shirtless, sweaty, and “bent over with his hands on his knees with the gun sticking out of the back of his pants.” Frey similarly testified that Fields was breathless and was not wearing a shirt. Fields told Wright that they “had to get out of town.” Fields gave the two-tone 9mm gun to Frey, who put it in his trunk. Fields took the battery out of his cell phone, packed a bag, and left with Wright. Wright testified that
{¶ 20} Fields and Wright went to Fields‘s mother‘s home in Xenia, where they stayed overnight. Wright testified that Fields “made up a story and tried to get me to go over it multiple times just in case we got caught.” Wright testified that, about a week after the shooting, Fields confessed to Wright that he had shot Mollett over “the whole issue from Forest Lake.” Fields had stated to Wright that he pulled the gun as Mollett ran away. Wright testified that Fields altered the decorations and headlights on his truck after the murder. Wright did not notify the police of the murder or Fields‘s confession in August 2013.
{¶ 21} Frey testified that he returned the gun to Fields a couple of days after the murder. Kevin Simpson testified that Fields later traded the 9mm gun as part of the purchase of a motorcycle.
D. Police Investigation
{¶ 22} Initially, the police did not connect the shooting at the Hoefers’ residence on August 2 with the murder of Schuyler Mollett on August 8.
{¶ 23} The police were contacted immediately after the shooting on August 8. At 9:47 p.m., the police received multiple reports of a shooting and spoke with numerous witnesses. Jerry Payton, Jr., who lives on Stanton, testified that he was returning home from the grocery store, when he heard four or five gunshots beside the church at Stanton and Limestone. Payton saw a “dark figure” firing a gun at a 45 degree angle. Payton called 911, and “right after he called,” he saw a pickup truck come out of the alley and turn onto Stanton.
{¶ 24} Kelly Hileman testified that she heard six or seven gunshots while in her
{¶ 25} Tiffany Ogle, who lived with Mollett on Stanton, testified that their backyard faced the alley and church parking lot. On August 8, she and Mollett were watching a movie, when she fell asleep sometime after 8:55 p.m. Ogle remembered that Mollett briefly woke her and said he was going out. When Ogle awoke later, she walked toward the bathroom. Ogle passed her back door on the way to the bathroom and saw police lights. Ogle looked through the window blinds and saw yellow police tape. When she opened the door, she saw Mollett on the ground.
{¶ 26} Amber Brown testified that she lived downstairs from Ogle. On August 8, Brown was looking out the back window, waiting for a friend, when she saw a dark truck with bright orange and red pinstripes and blue headlights coming from Mason Street through the alley. Brown walked away from the window and heard four gunshots followed by two gunshots. Brown went back to the window and saw taillights heading toward Madison Avenue.
{¶ 27} Britney Sloat, who lived at Stanton Avenue and Olive Street, was walking to her car on August 8 when she saw a “frantic” man running without a shirt on. She described the man as 5‘6” or 5‘7” and slim; Sloat only saw the right side of the man‘s face. Sloat testified that the man ran across Olive Street to a field where a house had been torn
{¶ 28} Numerous police officers responded to the scene of Mollett‘s shooting and secured it. Mollett was deceased when the police arrived; Dr. Robert Shott of the Montgomery County Coroner‘s Office testified that Mollett had been shot six times, several of which entered his back, and that Mollett died from the multiple gunshot wounds. Springfield Police Officer Jeff Steinmetz collected five spent 9mm bullet casings from the scene. Analyses by Heather Williams and Joshua Barr of BCI later determined that the cartridges found by Officer Steinmetz were all fired by the same weapon. The following day, Mollett‘s mother found an additional bullet casing near where her son was shot; that casing was also found to have been fired from the same gun.
{¶ 29} A K-9 unit from the Clark County Sheriff‘s Office attempted to track the suspected shooter. The police canine tracked the suspect eastward on Stanton for several blocks (past the intersection with Olive), but lost the scent in a park.
{¶ 30} The police investigation faltered. Wright testified that, while intoxicated, she told a friend about the murder sometime around December 2014. In November 2015, Katelyn Dillon, a friend of Mollett, posted a status on Facebook that said “RIP Schuyler. I wish you had justice for you.” Dillon received a response to that post, which prompted her to send a threatening Facebook message to Wright.
{¶ 31} Wright testified that after receiving the threatening message from Dillon, she
{¶ 32} On November 17, 2015, at Detective Jordan‘s request, Wright made a recorded telephone call to Fields. Fields subsequently sent Wright several text messages that stated he was “responsible for how you feel and what you feel, and it‘s my duty to make it go away.” On November 20, 2015, Wright made a second phone call to Fields. Fields did not confess the murder in either telephone call.
{¶ 33} Detective Jordan also began to look into the shooting at the Hoefers’ residence and the fights at Forest Lake, Wal-Mart, and on Light Street. He asked BCI to compare bullets and cartridges that had been collected from the Hoefers’ residence and the scene of Mollett‘s murder. Joshua Barr of BCI determined that the bullet cartridges found at the murder scene and the bullet jacket found at the Hoefers’ home were fired from the same gun.
{¶ 34} On December 2, 2015, Fields was arrested in Xenia. The officers found a shotgun and an assault rifle at his home, but no 9mm handgun. At the time of his arrest, Fields drove a blue GMC Sonoma pickup; the truck did not have striping down the sides.
{¶ 35} Detective Jordan and Officer Steinmetz went to the farm where Fields and his friends liked to shoot weapons. They collected several bullet casings, but none of
II. Sufficiency and Manifest Weight of the Evidence
{¶ 36} Fields‘s first and second assignments of error claim that his convictions were against the manifest weight of the evidence and based on insufficient evidence.
{¶ 37} A sufficiency of the evidence argument disputes whether the State has presented adequate evidence on each element of the offense to sustain the verdict as a matter of law. State v. Wilson, 2d Dist. Montgomery No. 22581, 2009-Ohio-525, ¶ 10, citing State v. Thompkins, 78 Ohio St.3d 380, 386, 678 N.E.2d 541 (1997). “The relevant inquiry is whether, after viewing the evidence in a light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime proven beyond a reasonable doubt.” State v. Jenks, 61 Ohio St.3d 259, 574 N.E.2d 492 (1991), paragraph two of the syllabus.
{¶ 38} In contrast, an argument based on the weight of the evidence “challenges the believability of the evidence and asks which of the competing inferences suggested by the evidence is more believable or persuasive.” Wilson at ¶ 12; see Eastley v. Volkman, 132 Ohio St.3d 328, 2012-Ohio-2179, 972 N.E.2d 517, ¶ 19 (” ‘manifest weight of the evidence’ refers to a greater amount of credible evidence and relates to persuasion“). When evaluating whether a conviction is against the manifest weight of
{¶ 39} Because the trier of fact sees and hears the witnesses at trial, we must defer to the factfinder‘s decisions whether, and to what extent, to credit the testimony of particular witnesses. State v. Lawson, 2d Dist. Montgomery No. 16288, 1997 WL 476684 (Aug. 22, 1997). The fact that the evidence is subject to different interpretations does not render the conviction against the manifest weight of the evidence. Wilson at ¶ 14. A judgment of conviction should be reversed as being against the manifest weight of the evidence only in exceptional circumstances. Martin at 175.
{¶ 40} On appeal, Fields claims that his convictions for murder, felony murder, and felonious assault were based on insufficient evidence and against the manifest weight of the evidence because of discrepancies in the witnesses’ testimony. He emphasizes that the witnesses on August 8 provided inconsistent testimony regarding the clothing of the man who was running and the truck that drove away from the church. Fields also notes that the police dog lost the man‘s scent in a park (near tire tracks), but Wright‘s and Frey‘s testimony indicated that Fields had run home. Fields argues that the only evidence connecting Fields to the murder was Wright‘s testimony, and Wright admitted during her testimony that she was a liar. Fields states that there was no physical evidence connecting him to the murder, and the police failed to follow-up on several leads.
{¶ 42} In reaching its verdict, the jury was free to believe all, part, or none of the testimony of each witness and to draw reasonable inferences from the evidence presented. State v. Baker, 2d Dist. Montgomery No. 25828, 2014-Ohio-3163, ¶ 28. It was the province of the jury to weigh the evidence and determine whether the State had proven, beyond a reasonable doubt, whether Fields shot and killed Schuyler Mollett on August 8, 2013. The jury heard substantial evidence from which it could have
{¶ 43} Fields next challenges his conviction for tampering with evidence, which was based on Fields‘s concealment of the gun by giving it to Frey. He argues that Frey‘s testimony, upon which the conviction was primarily based, was inconsistent and unbelievable.
{¶ 44}
{¶ 45} Finally, Fields challenges his conviction for improperly discharging a firearm at or into a habitation. Fields emphasizes that the State‘s evidence related to the shooting at the Hoefers’ residence was similar to that related to the shooting of a church
{¶ 46} In weighing the evidence, the jury must consider each charge separately. The State presented evidence that the same gun fired shots at the Hoefers’ residence and was used to kill Mollett. Although no one saw the person who fired shots at the Hoefers’ residence, Wright testified that Fields left their residence shortly before the shooting, and when he returned, Fields indicated that he shot at the Hoefers’ residence because Wright was “hanging out over there all the time.” Fields‘s conviction for improperly discharging a firearm at or into a habitation was based on the sufficient evidence, and the jury did not lose its way in finding him guilty of that offense.
{¶ 47} Fields‘s first and second assignments of error are overruled.
III. Cumulative Errors
{¶ 48} In his third assignment of error, Fields claims that cumulative errors at trial deprived him of a fair trial. Fields states, “In the present matter, errors from the inception of this trial, including hearsay testimony, leading questions, and allowing the State to present recorded telephone conversations that were not properly authenticated, deprived the Appellant of a fair trial.”
{¶ 49} The cumulative error doctrine provides that a conviction may be reversed “where the cumulative effect of errors in a trial deprives a defendant of the constitutional right to a fair trial[,] even though each of numerous instances of trial court error does not individually constitute cause for reversal.” State v. Garner, 74 Ohio St.3d 49, 64, 656 N.E.2d 623 (1995); see State v. Moody, 2d Dist. Montgomery No. 26926, 2016-Ohio-8366, ¶ 129. Fields‘s first and second assignments of error challenged only the weight
{¶ 50} Fields‘s third assignment of error is overruled.
IV. Conclusion
{¶ 51} The trial court‘s judgment will be affirmed.
DONOVAN, J. and WELBAUM, J., concur.
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Andrew P. Pickering
Mark Wieczorek
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Hon. Douglas M. Rastatter