State v. Honsch

Citations

• 349 Conn. 783

Syllabus

Convicted of murder in connection with the disappearance and death of his daughter, E, the defendant appealed to this court. In September, 1995, E's body was discovered in New Britain. E's remains were wrapped in trash bags and sleeping bags, and, although the police were initially unable to identify E, they collected hairs from E's body, as well as a hair and palm prints from the trash bags. At about the same time the police discovered E's body, the defendant told a family member that he was leaving the country imminently to take a job and that E and the defendant's wife, M, had already departed the country. In October, 1995, M's body was found in Massachusetts, and the police were unable to identify her remains at that time. In October or November, 1995, E and M were reported missing, but authorities were unable to locate them. In 2014, law enforcement officers executed a search warrant at the defendant's home in Ohio, where he was using his new wife's last name, and collected samples of his DNA and hair, as well as his finger and palm prints. DNA tests linked the defendant to, among other things, palm prints on the trash bags used to wrap E's remains. The commonwealth of Massachusetts subsequently charged the defendant with, and he was 784 OCTOBER, 2024 349 Conn. 783 State v. Honsch convicted of, M's murder. Thereafter, the state of Connecticut charged the defendant with murdering E in Connecticut. Before trial, the defen- dant moved to dismiss the case for lack of territorial jurisdiction because the state, which conceded that the actual location of E's murder was unknown, had failed to establish that E was murdered in Connecticut. The trial court, however, applied a permissive presumption, consistent with § 1.03 (4) of the Model Penal Code, that the death of a homicide victim occurred in the state where the body was found and, accordingly, denied the motion to dismiss. The trial court also denied the defendant's request for a jury instruction that the presence