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Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Ind. Decisions - More on yesterday's CA decision on murder charge filed 12 years later
Yesterday's Court of Appeals decision In Ralph Barnett v. State of Indiana (see ILB entry here - 2nd case) is the subject of a lengthy story today by Shawn McGrath in the Anderson Herald Bulletin. Some quotes:
In an opinion issued Tuesday, the Indiana Court of Appeals reversed a Pendleton Correctional Facility inmate’s voluntary manslaughter conviction because the state waited too long to bring the case to trial.Madison Superior Court 3 Thomas Newman Jr. sentenced Ralph Barnett, 54, to 30 additional years in prison on Class A felony voluntary manslaughter in March 2006 for stabbing to death fellow inmate 29-year-old Ricky L. Combs in January 1993. Originally charged with murder, a jury found him guilty of the lesser crime.
In his opinion, Appellate Court Judge James S. Kirsch writes that the Madison County Prosecutor’s Office erred in waiting until July 2005 — 12 years after the slaying — to file a murder charge against Barnett, despite knowing he was a likely suspect.
“Repeatedly, throughout the record, the State concedes that the investigators and prosecutors on Barnett’s case made a mistake by waiting 12 years to prosecutor him,” Kirsch writes. “While there is no direct evidence that the delay was intentional, there is no evidence that the delay was justified.”
Because the prosecutor’s office waited so long to file the murder charge, several potential witnesses — including the prison’s chief internal investigator and an Indiana State Police detective on the case — had died when the case finally went to trial, endangering Barnett’s ability to get a fair trial.
“The State, without plausible explanation or justification, delayed for more than 12 years in bringing charges in this case,” Kirsch writes. “There is no explanation for why the prosecutor, now deceased, allowed a case to sit in his office for over a year and a half without looking at it or why he returned it to the investigator instead of leaving it for his successor.
“Here, Barnett was clearly prejudiced by the State’s unexplained and unjustified delay — whether intentional or negligent — in bringing the charges.” * * *
Further clouding the investigation, six knife-like weapons, all similar, were found on Barnett’s and Combs’ cell block, but guards didn’t document which weapon was discovered in which cell.
“Barnett was the only suspect questioned about Combs’ death at the time it happened in 1993,” Kirsch writes. “No additional evidence was sought or discovered to cause the state to bring charges at anytime after the initial investigation. It is undisputed that Barnett stabbed Combs. The issues are whether Barnett acted in self-defense and whether another inmate (or more than one) with a knife may have also stabbed Combs causing the fatal stab wound.”
Posted by Marcia Oddi on May 30, 2007 08:56 AM
Posted to Ind. App.Ct. Decisions