State v. Walker

Citations

• 2020 Ohio 1581

Syllabus

EVIDENCE - PROSECUTOR – OTHER-ACTS – MURDER -INTENT – COUNSEL – SENTENCING – CONSECUTIVE SENTENCES: The prosecutor's comment to the effect that she was not lying was not improper and did not deny defendant a fair trial where the comment was a direct response to defense counsel's comments implying that the police had done a slip-shod investigation and the state had fabricated facts because it had insufficient evidence. It was not improper for the prosecutor to comment on defendant's lack of remorse the prosecutor's comment about defendant crying in court did not deprive the defendant of a fair trial, much less rise to the level of plain error. The trial court did not err in permitting the victim's family to testify as to other acts of domestic violence between defendant and the victim where defendant's entire defense was that the shooting of the victim was an accident, and evidence of threats and prior acts of domestic violence was admissible to show motive, intent and lack of accident. The state's evidence was sufficient to show that defendant purposely killed the victim where it showed that defendant had threatened and beaten the victim in the past, defendant's claim that the shooting was accidental did not match the scientific evidence, defendant did not report the shooting for almost three days, defendant tampered with the scene of the crime, defendant deleted his texts to the victim from his phone, and the details of defendant's story were inconsistent and changed over time. Defendant was not denied the effective assistance of counsel where counsel failed to hire a crime scene reconstruction expert, because the decision whether to present expert testimony was tactical and counsel provided defendant with a diligent and thorough defense. The court engaged in the requisite analysis and made the findings necessary to justify the imposition of consecutive sentences.