State v. MartinState v. Martin
JUDGMENT: VACATED AND DISCHARGED
Criminal Appeal from the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas Case No. CR-13-572966-B
RELEASED AND JOURNALIZED: March 5, 2015
Robert L. Tobik, Cuyahoga County Public Defender, BY: Jeffrey Gamso, Assistant Public Defender, 310 Lakeside Avenue, Suite 200, Cleveland, Ohio 44113
ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLEE
Timothy J. McGinty, Cuyahoga County Prosecutor, BY: Maxwell Martin, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, The Justice Center, 8th Floor, 1200 Ontario Street, Cleveland, Ohio 44113
EILEEN T. GALLAGHER, J.:
{¶2} On March 29, 2013, Martin and codefendant Quandrell Porter (“Porter“) were each charged with one count of rape and one count kidnaping. The indictment alleged that the rape and kidnaping offenses occurred on March 19, 1993. At that time, Martin, Porter, and the victim, M.L., were students at Cleveland Job Corps, a residential education and vocational training program for economically disadvantaged youth.
{¶3} Prior to trial, Martin filed a motion to dismiss the charges as barred by the statute of limitations and because he was prejudiced by the 20-year delay before indictment. The court heard arguments from both sides, but did not hold an evidentiary hearing.1 The facts were largely undisputed. The court denied the motion, and the case proceeded to trial.
{¶4} The facts giving rise to this case are as follows: On March 19, 1993, M.L. and several other students were drinking 40-ounce bottles of beer at a park located near the Job Corps campus. M.L., who was highly intoxicated, told her friend Augustine Gayton (“Gayton“) that she was going to use the restroom. Gayton testified that a student named Joe Ford (“Ford“) escorted M.L. to the bathroom because she was having difficulty walking due to her intoxication. Gayton watched Ford enter the women‘s restroom with M.L.
{¶5} After some time passed and M.L. did not return, Gayton went to the restroom to check on her friend. As she approached the entrance, several male students walked out of the bathroom laughing. According to a Cleveland police report, Gayton asked Ford what happened and he replied: “Roosevelt Martin, * * * and I got her drunk and bumped her.” Gayton entered
{¶6} Gayton reported M.L.‘s condition to Job Corps staff, who assisted M.L. into the building. Shortly thereafter, Gayton accompanied M.L. to Mount Sinai Hospital, where a nurse collected evidence of the rape in a rape kit, including seminal fluid from a condom found inside M.L.‘s vagina. The hospital immediately provided the evidence to the Cleveland Police Department.
{¶7} The crime was reported to Cleveland police on March 20, 1993. Officers in the sex crimes unit left messages at Job Corps for M.L. to call sex crime detectives to discuss the rape. However, because M.L. did not return their phone calls, the detectives closed the case without having interviewed either the victim or the two named suspects. (Tr. 12). The last notation in the 1993 police report states, in its entirety:
On 3/21/93 while assigned to the sex crime unit car 8174, received an assignment to do a follow-up investigation c/w the above mentioned crime. The following are the results of that investigation.
Numerous attempts and messages have been left for the victim to call c/w this case. The victim has not returned any calls. No further investigative leads.
The state concedes that the Cleveland police sex crimes unit closed the case on March 31, 1993. (Tr. 12).
{¶8} A few weeks later, Martin, who was a resident of Illinois, returned home for Easter break without restraint. Job Corps personnel telephoned his grandmother on April 15, 1993 to ascertain his whereabouts because he was “AWOL,” which simply meant he was absent. Martin‘s grandmother told Job Corps that he would return to Cleveland after Easter. However, Job Corps terminated Martin‘s enrollment on April 26, 1993 due to “excessive AWOL,” and
{¶9} Twenty years later, scientists at the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation (“BCI“) tested the rape kit taken from M.L. and found DNA that matched Martin‘s DNA. Consequently, on March 29, 2013, the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor indicted Martin for the rape and kidnaping of M.L. that occurred on March 19, 1993. On April 24, 2013, a detainer was sent to the Champaign County Sheriff in Urbana, Illinois. The state of Illinois took Martin into custody on May 19, 2013, and returned him to the state of Ohio for arraignment that same day.
{¶10} A jury found Martin guilty of rape and not guilty of kidnaping. The court sentenced Martin to an indefinite prison sentence of 5 to 25 years. The court also classified him as a sexually oriented offender under Megan‘s law and a Tier III sex offender under the Adam Walsh Act. Martin now appeals and raises five assignments of error.
Statute of Limitations
{¶11} In the first assignment of error, which we find dispositive of this appeal, Martin argues the trial court erred in denying his motion to dismiss. He contends the trial court should have dismissed the indictment as barred by the statute of limitations.
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{¶14} However, the 20-year statute of limitations is not absolute.
The period of limitation shall not run during any time when the accused purposely avoids prosecution. Proof that the accused departed this state or concealed the accused‘s identity or whereabouts is prima-facie evidence of the accused‘s purpose to avoid prosecution.
In other words, evidence that the accused departed the state creates a presumption that he purposely left the state to avoid prosecution and tolls the statute of limitations. However, this presumption is rebuttable, and the accused may demonstrate that he had no intention of avoiding prosecution. State v. Taylor, 9th Dist. Lorain No. 97CA006804, 1998 Ohio App. LEXIS 2791 (June 24, 1998).
{¶15} Martin was a resident of Illinois when he became a student at Cleveland Job Corps. It is undisputed that the state of Ohio, through the Cleveland Police Department, became immediately aware that Martin was a named suspect in the rape, and that he was living at the Job
{¶16} Yet, Cleveland detectives never came to the Job Corps facility to interview the victim, the two named suspects, or any other witness who was present at the scene. The police investigation consisted of several attempts to contact the victim by phone. The state conceded that “since the victim had not returned any calls, the Cleveland police sex crimes unit closed out the case as no further investigative leads.” (Tr. at 13).
{¶17} The state acknowledged that Job Corps conducted an investigation into the rape allegations, but it is not clear what the investigation entailed. (Tr. at 75, 82.) Nevertheless, it is undisputed that Martin continued to live at the Job Corps facility until he returned home to Illinois for Easter break,3 approximately four weeks after the rape. The police report indicates that the investigation of M.L.‘s rape concluded on March 21, 1993, and, as previously stated, the state concedes that the Cleveland police closed M.L.‘s rape investigation on or before March 31, 1993. (Tr. 12). Martin did not return home to Illinois for over two weeks after the police had concluded their investigation. Under these circumstances, his departure cannot be characterized as flight to avoid prosecution because the record is void of any attempt to contact him, let alone evidence of avoidance during the entire time the police conducted their investigation.
{¶18} What is more, the state knew how to contact Martin in Illinois. They knew he was a resident of Job Corps and that Job Corps would have his contact information. Indeed Job Corps called Martin‘s grandmother on April 15, 1993 because he was AWOL. This is not a case where
{¶19} The state had no difficulty locating Martin after he was indicted on March 29, 2013. A summons was issued on April 1, 2013, after the indictment was returned. A detainer was sent to Illinois police to arrest Martin on April 24, 2013. Police took Martin into custody and delivered him to Cuyahoga County on May 19, 2013, less than two months after he was indicted. The police knew where Martin was and could have apprehended him during the limitations period if the police had properly followed-up with the investigation in 1993. As previously stated, the statute of limitations is intended “to discourage inefficient or dilatory law enforcement rather than to give offenders the chance to avoid criminal responsibility for their conduct.” Climaco, 85 Ohio St.3d 582 at 586, 709 N.E.2d 1192. In this case, it was dilatory law enforcement that caused the statute of limitations to expire, not Martin‘s lawful return to his home state. Therefore, the trial court erred in determining the statute of limitations tolled when Martin returned to Illinois. The statute of limitations expired before the state indicted Martin, and the court should have dismissed the indictment accordingly.
{¶20} The first assignment of error is sustained.
Conviction vacated and trial court is ordered to carry this judgement into execution and discharge appellant.
It is ordered that appellant recover from appellee costs herein taxed.
The court finds there were reasonable grounds for this appeal.
It is ordered that a special mandate issue out of this court directing the common pleas court to carry this judgment into execution.
EILEEN T. GALLAGHER, JUDGE
MELORY J. STEWART, J., CONCURS; FRANK D. CELEBREZZE, JR., A.J., DISSENTS WITH SEPARATE OPINION
{¶22} The state relied on the presumption that appellant‘s return to Illinois was evidence of avoidance of prosecution. The state established that appellant left Ohio on or about April 15, 1993, with knowledge that the gang rape of an intoxicated girl had been reported to police and for which he was a suspect. Therefore, the state made a prima facie case showing that
{¶23} The majority recognizes that it is appellant‘s burden to rebut this presumption. The majority holds that appellant successfully did so, but there is no evidence in the record to support this conclusion.
{¶24} The state set forth the date of incident as March 19, 1993. A few weeks later, appellant left Ohio. He did not return to Cleveland even though he was supposed to, and went
{¶25} Accordingly, I would affirm the decision of the trial court denying appellant‘s motion to dismiss and uphold his convictions and sentence for these terrible crimes. The state legislature has also recently taken to proposing legislation that will hopefully prevent numerous other individuals from escaping punishment for terrible sexual crimes. The Cleveland Plain Dealer Editorial Board, Ohio rape legislation a step toward justice for survivors: editorial (Feb.13,2015),TheClevelandPlainDealer, http://www.cleveland.com/opinion/index.ssf/2015/02/rape_legislation_needs_to_offe.html (accessed February 17, 2015).