Title: State v. Sanders

State: ohio

Issuer: Ohio Supreme Court

Document:

[Cite as State v. Sanders, 92 Ohio St.3d 245, 2001-Ohio-189.] 
 
 
THE STATE OF OHIO, APPELLEE, v. SANDERS, N.K.A. HASAN, APPELLANT. 
[Cite as State v. Sanders (2001), 92 Ohio St.3d 245.] 
Criminal law — Murder of correctional officer during prison riot — Death 
penalty upheld, when — Authorities in lawful charge of prison have no 
duty to “negotiate in good faith” with inmates who have seized the 
prison and taken hostages — Failure of authorities to negotiate is not an 
available defense to inmates charged with the murder of a hostage. 
(No. 98-1209 — Submitted February 27, 2001 — Decided July 18, 2001.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Hamilton County, No. C-960253. 
__________________ 
SYLLABUS OF THE COURT 
The authorities in lawful charge of a prison have no duty to “negotiate in good 
faith” with inmates who have seized the prison and taken hostages, and the 
failure of those authorities to negotiate is not an available defense to 
inmates charged with the murder of a hostage. 
__________________ 
 
MOYER, C.J.  During the 1993 prison riot at the Southern Ohio 
Correctional Facility (“SOCF”) at Lucasville, Correctional Officer Robert 
Vallandingham was murdered on the orders of appellant, Carlos Sanders (n.k.a. 
Siddique Abdullah Hasan).  Sanders was convicted of aggravated murder and 
sentenced to death. 
Facts 
 
In 1993, the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (“DRC”) 
ordered that all prison inmates be tested for tuberculosis.  Sanders was the 
acknowledged imam (spiritual leader) of a group of Muslims at SOCF.  He 
protested DRC’s order, claiming that the testing method violated Islamic law.  On 
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April 5, 1993, Arthur Tate, Jr., SOCF’s warden, met with Sanders.  When Tate 
explained that the test was to be administered to all inmates, Sanders replied:  
“You do what you have to do and we’ll do what we have to do.”  Shortly 
thereafter, the warden informed Sanders in writing that all inmates would be 
tested. 
 
On April 11, 1993, Muslim inmates staged an uprising and took control of 
unit L-6 of cellblock “L” (“L-Block”) of the prison.  Sanders planned and led the 
takeover. 
 
Several 
guards, 
including 
Vallandingham, 
were 
taken 
hostage. 
Vallandingham had locked himself into a restroom, but inmates battered down the 
door and captured him.  Sanders handcuffed Vallandingham and led him away.  
Other hostages included Officers Clark, Dotson, Hensley, and Nagel.  Sanders 
ordered that all hostages be taken to Unit L-6 and that captured guards be 
protected for the time being. 
 
Three factions emerged as the dominant forces in L-Block: the Muslims, 
led by Sanders; the Aryan Brotherhood, a white racist group, led by Jason Robb 
and George Skatzes; and the Black Gangster Disciples, a prison gang, led by 
Anthony Lavelle.  Each faction controlled its own section of L-Block; the 
Muslims controlled unit L-6, and also the hallways. 
 
The rioters held L-Block until they surrendered on April 21.  DRC 
representatives opened negotiations with the inmates, who periodically threatened 
to kill hostages if their demands were not met. 
 
On Wednesday, April 14, there was a meeting of inmate leaders, including 
Lavelle, Robb, and Sanders.  The group discussed killing a guard and, without 
dissent, decided to do it.  But after the meeting, Lavelle told Sanders that he did 
not think that killing a guard would accomplish anything.  Sanders agreed that 
they should “hold off” on killing a guard that day. 
January Term, 2001 
3 
 
Later that day, news media quoted a DRC employee’s statement 
suggesting that the inmates were bluffing.  This infuriated the inmates.  Another 
leadership meeting followed; Sanders, Robb, Skatzes, and Lavelle were there.  
Also present were inmate Roger Snodgrass, inmate David Lomache, who helped 
care for injured guards, and Muslim inmate Reginald Williams.  (Lavelle, 
Snodgrass, Lomache, and Williams later turned state’s evidence and recounted the 
discussion in trial testimony.)  To prove that they were serious, the group decided 
to issue an ultimatum and, if the authorities failed to comply, to kill a guard. 
 
According to Snodgrass and Williams, Sanders and Robb were “the 
decision makers” and led this meeting.  While accounts differed on whether a 
formal vote was taken, the testimony indicated that Sanders supported killing a 
guard.  According to Lavelle, “[W]e all agreed that a person from each group * * 
* would participate” in the killing, and Sanders pledged that his security officers 
would select a Muslim inmate to take part. 
 
On the night of April 14, around 9:00 or 10:00 p.m., inmate Miles Hogan 
overheard Skatzes and inmate Stanley Cummings tell Sanders “about somebody 
that was supposed to kill a correctional officer [and] had backed out of it.”  
Sanders said he was “sick of the m***********s saying they was going to do 
something and then back[ing] out of it at the last minute.”  Cummings said he 
“would make sure this got done,” and Sanders replied: “Well somebody’d better 
do it.” 
 
Another meeting was held on Thursday morning, April 15.  Reginald 
Williams did not attend this meeting, but he was nearby when it broke up.  He 
heard Muslim inmate James “Namir” Were proclaim loudly that “he would take 
care of it.”  Sanders told Were to calm down. 
 
That morning, inmate Kenneth Law was in L-6 when he saw inmates 
Alvin Jones and Darnell Alexander escort a bound, blindfolded Vallandingham to 
the L-6 shower area.  Then Law heard Sanders tell Were to “take care of his 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
4 
business” if Sanders “didn’t get back with [Were] in half an hour.”  Sanders then 
left. 
 
Were, Jones, and Alexander proceeded to the shower area where 
Vallandingham was being held.  Kenneth Law followed them.  When they 
arrived, Were told Jones and Alexander to “take care of your business.”  As Were 
and Law looked on, Jones and Alexander strangled Vallandingham.  His body 
was later dumped outside. 
 
After the murder, another meeting was held.  Someone reported a rumor 
that Vallandingham was not dead.  Were said that “if it is not done right, you 
don’t have anybody to blame but [Were].”  According to Lavelle, Were addressed 
this remark specifically to Sanders. 
 
Later, Kenneth Law overheard an inmate ask Sanders: “Why was the 
guard killed?’  Sanders said: “It was one or many.” 
 
Inmate Bruce Harris had been locked in a cell on Sanders’s orders.  On 
April 21, the last day of the takeover, Harris disrupted a prayer session by 
shouting and throwing things from his cell.  According to inmate Stacy Gordon, 
Sanders ordered Harris killed for this.  Gordon, Reginald Williams, and other 
Muslim inmates proceeded to kill Harris. 
 
On April 21, 1993, the inmates surrendered, bringing the riot to an end. 
Indictment, Trial, and Sentence 
 
The Scioto County Grand Jury returned a series of indictments against 
various inmates for crimes committed during the takeover and siege.  One of these 
indictments charged Sanders with two aggravated murder counts with regard to 
Robert Vallandingham and one aggravated murder count with regard to Bruce 
Harris.  All three counts carried death specifications.  Sanders was also charged 
with various counts against other officers. 
 
After two changes of venue, the case was tried to a jury in Hamilton 
County.  The state withdrew several felonious and assault counts. 
January Term, 2001 
5 
 
The jury convicted Sanders of the aggravated murder of Vallandingham, 
with three death specifications: murder while under detention, R.C. 
2929.04(A)(4); course of conduct, R.C. 2929.04(A)(5); and felony-murder 
(kidnapping), R.C. 2929.04(A)(7).  He was acquitted of the aggravated murder of 
Harris and of one count of felonious assault upon Dotson, and convicted of all 
other counts.  After a penalty hearing, the jury recommended, and the judge 
imposed, a death sentence for the aggravated murder of Robert Vallandingham.  
The court of appeals affirmed the judgment of the trial court in all respects. 
 
Sanders’s appeal is now before us.  We have considered each of his thirty-
four propositions of law.  We have also independently reviewed his death 
sentence, as R.C. 2929.05(A) requires, by reweighing the felony-murder 
aggravating circumstance against the mitigating factors and measuring the 
sentence in this case against sentences imposed in similar cases.  We conclude 
that Sanders’s convictions and death sentence should be affirmed. 
I. Jury Issues 
 
In his eighth, ninth, tenth, twelfth, and thirteenth propositions of law, 
Sanders raises issues pertaining to the selection and conduct of the jury. 
A. Motion to Dismiss Venire 
 
On voir dire, a venireman said he could not be fair because Sanders’s 
name and garb reminded him of Louis Farrakhan, whom the venireman regarded 
as an anti-white, anti-American racist.  The venireman was excused for cause.  
However, when the venireman gave these responses, nine other veniremen were 
in the courtroom.  Four of those nine served on the jury.  Sanders’s request that 
the venire be dismissed was overruled.  In his eighth proposition, Sanders claims 
that the venireman’s statements biased these jurors, invalidating the jury’s verdict. 
 
However, nothing in the record indicates that the statements at issue 
biased the other veniremen.  The usual way to find out whether a venireman 
harbors bias is voir dire, and Sanders could have asked that the trial court either 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
6 
question the other veniremen on this point, or permit the parties to do so.  But 
Sanders made no such request. 
 
We decline to presume that the other veniremen were biased by hearing 
the remarks at issue.  Although bias was presumed in similar circumstances in 
Mach v. Stewart (C.A.9, 1997), 137 F.3d 630, we find Mach distinguishable.  
There, the venireman made repeated, definite statements of opinion concerning a 
matter germane to the trial—a matter in which she also appeared to be an expert.  
In this case, the venireman expressed only personal opinions, did not speak at 
length, and was immediately excused for cause.  See State v. Doerr (1998), 193 
Ariz. 56, 62, 969 P.2d 1168, 1174; Lucero v. Kerby (C.A.10, 1998), 133 F.3d 
1299, 1308-1309. 
 
Sanders also argues that the trial court should have given either a 
cautionary instruction to neutralize the effect of the venireman’s statements or 
questioned the other veniremen to determine whether the comments had affected 
their impartiality.  However, at trial he did not ask the court to take such 
measures.  Thus, he has waived his claim that such measures should have been 
taken. 
 
Sanders’s eighth proposition is overruled. 
B. Excusal for Cause 
 
The trial court excused a venireman for cause because she stated on voir 
dire that she could not do without a cigarette for any length of time.  In his ninth 
proposition, Sanders claims that excusing the venireman for this reason was error.  
However, an erroneous excusal for cause, on grounds other than the venireman’s 
views on capital punishment, is not cognizable error, since a party has no right to 
have any particular person sit on the jury.  Unlike the erroneous denial of a 
January Term, 2001 
7 
challenge for cause, an erroneous excusal cannot cause the seating of a biased 
juror and therefore does not taint the jury’s impartiality.1 
 
In any event, excusing this venireman was within the trial court’s 
discretion.  Crim.R. 24(B) provides: 
 
“A person called as a juror may be challenged for the following causes: 
 
“* * * 
 
“(14) That he is otherwise unsuitable for any other cause to serve as a 
juror.” 
 
The venireman admitted that she is an “inveterate” smoker who “get[s] 
very upset” when she cannot smoke and that it would be “almost impossible to go 
for any length” without a cigarette.  It is likely that such a juror would be 
inattentive during trial and bring an attitude less than judicious to deliberations, 
and would thus be “unsuitable” to serve as a juror under Crim.R. 24(B)(14). 
 
Moreover, the trial court was under no obligation to accommodate the 
juror with smoking breaks, as Sanders suggests.  Frequent breaks would have 
prolonged the trial and disrupted the presentation of evidence.  Moreover, the 
juror could not take smoking breaks outside the jury room after submission of the 
case, for “R.C. 2945.33 and Crim.R. 24(G) clearly contemplate that jurors in 
capital cases generally must not be permitted to separate during their * * * 
deliberations.”  State v. Davis (1992), 63 Ohio St.3d 44, 47-48, 584 N.E.2d 1192, 
1195-1196.  Sanders’s ninth proposition is overruled. 
C. Representativeness of Jury 
 
In his tenth proposition, Sanders contends that the Hamilton County Jury 
Commissioner used a procedure that placed nearly three-fourths of minority 
                                                          
 
1. 
See, e.g., United States v. Cornell (C.C.D.R.I.1820), 25 F. Cas. 650, 656; United States v. 
Brooks (C.A.8, 1999), 175 F.3d 605, 606; Jones v. State (Tex.Crim.App.1998), 982 S.W.2d 386, 
392 (citing cases); State v. Mendoza (1999), 227 Wis.2d 838, 863, 596 N.W.2d 736, 748, fn. 15 
(citing cases).  Contra United States v. Salamone (C.A.3, 1986), 800 F.2d 1216; People v. Lefebre 
(Colo.2000), 5 P.3d 295. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
8 
veniremen in the second half of the venire.  This, according to Sanders, denied 
him equal protection, due process, and the right to trial by an impartial jury. 
 
Sanders contends that, although he was not entitled to a petit jury that 
reflected a representative cross-section of the community, see, e.g., Lockhart v. 
McCree (1986), 476 U.S. 162, 173-174, 106 S.Ct. 1758, 1765, 90 L.Ed.2d 137, 
147-148, he was entitled to a “fair possibility” of obtaining such a jury.2  See 
Williams v. Florida (1970), 399 U.S. 78, 100, 90 S.Ct. 1893, 1906, 26 L.Ed.2d 
446, 460; United States ex rel. Teague v. Lane (C.A.7, 1985), 779 F.2d 1332, 
1334 (Cudahy, J., dissenting).  And he claims that the system used by the jury 
commissioner “precluded the possibility of securing a representative jury.” 
 
Sanders’s claim centers on the method used to assign juror numbers.  The 
jury commissioner gave numbers to prospective jurors based on the order in 
which they returned their completed questionnaires, i.e., the first to do so was 
designated Juror No. 1, and so forth.  However, when a venireman returned the 
questionnaire, the jury commissioner (or his subordinate, the jury coordinator) 
would review it; if he found any omissions, he would return it to the venireman 
for completion.3  Thus, a venireman would be assigned a number only after 
returning a completed questionnaire. 
 
According to Sanders, this system clusters minority jurors near the end of 
the venire, where they are less likely to be called for voir dire and hence less 
likely to become jurors.  (Sanders’s argument seems to assume that prospective 
jurors were called for voir dire in order of their juror numbers.  Although the 
record does not make that clear, the state has not disputed it.) 
                                                          
 
2. 
Sanders does not claim that the venire failed to reflect a fair cross-section of the 
community, as required by Duren v. Missouri (1979), 439 U.S. 357, 99 S.Ct. 664, 58 L.Ed.2d 579. 
3. 
They also returned questionnaires to veniremen who asked them to.  Jury coordinator 
Robert Grauvogel testified that “sometimes somebody will come back in and say, I don’t know 
whether I answered this question right, so we have to go back and find theirs and give it back and 
they answer again.” 
January Term, 2001 
9 
 
At trial, Sanders argued that minority jurors cluster at the end of the venire 
because they are likely to fill out questionnaires more slowly.  He presented no 
proof of this at the hearing.  His claim thus appears to rest on unadulterated racial 
stereotyping.  Without proof, Sanders’s assumption that minority jurors fill out 
jury questionnaires more slowly than the rest of the population simply deserves no 
credence. 
 
On appeal, Sanders drops this argument and suggests instead that the real 
problem was the practice of returning questionnaires to jurors for correction, thus 
moving those jurors to the end of the list.  He contends that the commissioner 
thereby “decided who went to the back of the venire” and hints that the 
commissioner may have discriminated against black veniremen. 
 
However, this argument is inconsistent with the evidence and the trial 
court’s findings.  There was no showing that the jury commissioner manipulated 
the questionnaires so as to push black veniremen (or any others) to the end of the 
list.  The jury coordinator testified that he and the commissioner returned 
questionnaires only to veniremen who had either failed to complete the forms or 
asked to have them returned so they could correct an answer.  Hence, no 
“decisions” were being made by the jury officials.  Rather, the ordering was 
decided by factors beyond their control.  And the trial court evidently accepted 
this testimony, for it found that there had been no “systematic attempt on 
anybody’s part * * * to keep any person off the jury.” 
 
We therefore reject Sanders’s claim that the system used by the jury 
commissioner precluded the possibility of securing a representative jury.  His 
tenth proposition of law is overruled. 
D. Demonstration Outside Courthouse 
 
During the trial, demonstrators opposing capital punishment picketed the 
courthouse.  One juror reported to the bailiff that, during a lunch break, a 
demonstrator pointed him out and said, “There he goes” or “there goes one.”  The 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
10 
judge had two demonstrators brought in and warned them not to intimidate or 
speak to jurors. 
 
Defense counsel requested a chance “to ask [the jurors] some questions or 
[for] the court [to] ask them.”  The judge then questioned the jury. 
 
The judge told the jurors that he had warned the demonstrators not to 
speak to them, and that the demonstrators were “harmless people” with 
“absolutely no connection” to the parties.  He asked:  “Now does anybody feel, 
because of that incident, if you were involved in that incident, that you could not 
continue with this trial and be fair and honest with all the issues that you’re going 
to be confronted with?”  Nobody answered. 
 
He then asked the juror who had reported the incident whether he had any 
problem; he said he had none.  The judge asked another juror, who said the same.  
Finally, he asked, “Does anybody have any problem?”  Again, no juror spoke.  
The judge declared the subject closed, and trial proceeded. 
 
Sanders contends that this procedure was inadequate.  In his twelfth 
proposition of law, he argues that this incident constituted an extraneous influence 
on the jury and that, under Remmer v. United States (1954), 347 U.S. 227, 74 
S.Ct. 450, 98 L.Ed. 654, the court had a duty to conduct a deeper, more 
individualized inquiry.  Sanders asks us to remand to the trial court for a Remmer 
hearing.  See United States v. Davis (C.A.6, 1999), 177 F.3d 552, 557. 
 
The scope of voir dire is generally within the trial court’s discretion, 
including voir dire conducted during trial to investigate jurors’ reaction to outside 
influences.  State v. Henness (1997), 79 Ohio St.3d 53, 65, 679 N.E.2d 686, 697.  
See, generally, Annotation (1992), 3 A.L.R.5th 963, Section 2(a).  Thus, we must 
determine whether the trial judge abused his discretion in conducting the inquiry 
as he did. 
 
In our view, he did not.  Although the judge directly questioned only two 
jurors, he also asked: “Does anybody have any problem?”  This was directed at all 
January Term, 2001 
11 
the jurors, and the judge could reasonably assume that those who did not speak up 
were unaffected.  Hence, he did not abuse his discretion by stopping there.  In 
Henness, we upheld a judge’s refusal to question each juror individually as within 
the trial court’s discretion.  79 Ohio St.3d at 65, 679 N.E.2d at 696-697.  See, 
also, United States v. Spinella (C.A.5, 1975), 506 F.2d 426, 428-429. 
 
United States v. Davis, supra, cited by Sanders, is distinguishable.  There, 
a juror in a drug trafficking trial was dismissed after informing the court that one 
of his employees had discussed his jury service with him; the juror felt 
intimidated after his employee told him that “members of the community * * * 
were discussing his role in the proceedings.”  Id., 177 F.3d at 556.  Moreover, the 
juror admitted that he had discussed his fears with the other jurors.  Yet the trial 
judge made no attempt at all to determine what effect the extraneous contact had 
upon the other jurors.  Nor did he instruct the other jurors to disregard what the 
dismissed juror had told them.  Id. at 556. 
 
Here, in contrast, the trial judge asked the jurors whether the incident with 
the demonstrators had affected them.  Moreover, he acted to allay possible 
prejudice by warning the demonstrators not to speak to the jurors, by telling the 
jurors he had done so, and by informing the jurors that the demonstrators had no 
connection to either party in the case. 
 
Given the facts before the trial court, and the actions the court took, we 
find no abuse of discretion in its failure to go further still and interrogate each 
juror individually.  Accordingly, we overrule Sanders’s twelfth proposition of 
law. 
E. Sleeping Juror 
 
The record indicates that one or more jurors may have fallen asleep during 
the trial.  During a sidebar conference at trial, defense counsel alleged that Juror 
No. 3 appeared to have fallen asleep while the prosecution was playing tape-
recorded phone conversations between inmate negotiators and DRC negotiators.  
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
12 
Counsel asserted that the juror’s eyes were shut for about an hour and fifteen 
minutes, and that the juror was motionless for half an hour.  Counsel noted that 
the defense had “previously commented about this problem” (apparently off the 
record) during Kenneth Law’s testimony.  The judge said: “[O]bviously I’ve been 
watching her myself, and I’ll make some determination what to do while we still 
have alternate jurors.”  Later that day, the judge told the jury he was keeping the 
courtroom temperature low “because there’s too much sleeping going on.  And 
I’m not going to tolerate it anymore.  I know it’s tedious, but you’re going to have 
to all be alert.” 
 
In his thirteenth proposition, Sanders contends that having a juror asleep 
during trial denied him due process, and that the trial judge should have replaced 
Juror No. 3.  Alternatively, Sanders contends that the trial court should at least 
have examined the juror to determine whether she really was sleeping and what 
she missed. 
 
However, Sanders did not request either remedy at trial, nor did he express 
dissatisfaction with the trial judge’s handling of the matter.  See United States v. 
Kimberlin (C.A.7, 1986), 805 F.2d 210, 244; United States v. Newman (C.A.1, 
1992), 982 F.2d 665, 670.  Moreover, “[t]here is no per se rule requiring an 
inquiry in every instance of alleged [juror] misconduct.”  United States v. 
Hernandez (C.A.11, 1991), 921 F.2d 1569, 1577; see, also, Newman, 982 F.2d at 
670.  Thus, in the absence of plain error, this claim is waived.  See, generally, 
State v. Childs (1968), 14 Ohio St.2d 56, 43 O.O.2d 119, 236 N.E.2d 545. 
 
We find no plain error.  A trial court “has considerable discretion in 
deciding how to handle a sleeping juror.”  United States v. Freitag (C.A.7, 2000), 
230 F.3d 1019, 1023; see, also, United States v. Bradley (C.A.3, 1999), 173 F.3d 
225, 230.  There is no evidence that the juror missed large or critical portions of 
the trial.  See Freitag, supra, at 1023; United States v. Barrett (C.A.9, 1983), 703 
F.2d 1076, 1083, fn. 13.  The taped conversations between inmate and DRC 
January Term, 2001 
13 
negotiators were not critical.  (The defense also alleged that a juror had fallen 
asleep during Law’s testimony, but nothing in the record shows which juror 
allegedly slept or what part of Law’s testimony that juror allegedly missed.) 
 
Moreover, the trial judge was watching the situation, and he admonished 
the jury to be alert.  Compare United States v. McFerren (Apr. 8, 1998), C.A.6 
No. 96-5458, unpublished opinion, 1998 WL 180514 (affirming conviction where 
judge “kept a watchful eye on the jury” and, when necessary, admonished jurors 
to stay awake). 
 
For the foregoing reasons, we do not find plain error.  Sanders’s claim is 
therefore waived, and we overrule his thirteenth proposition of law. 
II. Guilt Phase Issues 
A. Weight/Sufficiency of Evidence 
 
In his thirtieth proposition of law, Sanders contends that his conviction 
was against the manifest weight of the evidence.  See, generally, State v. 
Thompkins (1997), 78 Ohio St.3d 380, 387, 678 N.E.2d 541, 546-547.  Pursuant 
to R.C. 2953.02, we can overturn a conviction as being against the manifest 
weight of the evidence in a capital case, but only where the crime was committed 
after January 1, 1995.  See State v. Smith (1997), 80 Ohio St.3d 89, 102-103, 113, 
684 N.E.2d 668, 683-684, 690-691. 
 
However, we can treat Sanders’s manifest-weight claim as a challenge to 
the legal sufficiency of the evidence.  See State v. Powell (1990), 49 Ohio St.3d 
255, 260, 552 N.E.2d 191, 197.  “[T]he relevant question is whether, after 
viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational 
trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a 
reasonable doubt.”  (Emphasis sic.)  Jackson v. Virginia (1979), 443 U.S. 307, 
319, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 2788-2789, 61 L.Ed.2d 560, 573; State v. Jenks (1991), 61 
Ohio St.3d 259, 574 N.E.2d 492, paragraph two of the syllabus. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
14 
 
The state’s evidence showed that Sanders was the leader of the Muslim 
inmates at SOCF; that he planned and led the takeover; that, at a meeting of 
inmate leaders, Sanders supported killing a guard; that the leaders decided to do 
so; that Sanders ordered James Were to execute that decision; and that, as a result, 
Were and others killed Vallandingham. 
 
Inmates Stacey Gordon and Reginald Williams testified that, before the 
riot, Sanders approached them to discuss his plan to take over part of the prison.  
Four guards testified that at the outset of the riot, Sanders said he was “running 
this” or “in charge.” 
 
During the takeover and siege, Sanders ordered certain inmates punished 
and others protected.  There was abundant evidence that Muslim inmates obeyed 
Sanders even when he ordered them to kill.  For instance, Sanders ordered 
Muslim inmates to kill inmate Johnny Fryman.  Sanders and other inmates 
attacked Fryman, stabbed him, and left him for dead (although he lived to testify 
against Sanders). 
 
The Muslim inmates also obeyed Sanders when he ordered them not to 
kill, as when he saved the life of inmate Miles Hogan.  When Sanders learned that 
certain inmates had been murdered without his authorization, he became upset 
and shouted: “Who ordered that?” 
 
Lomache, Lavelle, and Snodgrass testified that Sanders was at the April 
14 meeting and agreed that a guard should be killed if demands were not met.  
Snodgrass quoted Sanders as saying: “Look, this is our bargaining chips[,] we got 
to keep him safe.”  (Emphasis added.) 
 
On the night before the murder, Hogan overheard inmates Skatzes and 
Cummings tell Sanders “about somebody that was supposed to kill a correctional 
officer [and] had backed out of it.”  According to Hogan, Sanders complained that 
he was “sick” of people “saying they was going to do something and then 
January Term, 2001 
15 
back[ing] out of it at the last minute.”  Cummings said he “would make sure this 
got done,” and Sanders replied: “Well somebody’d better do it.” 
 
This evidence shows Sanders’s complicity in Vallandingham’s murder.  It 
proved that he intended to kill Vallandingham and that he engaged in prior 
calculation and design.  The evidence here is clearly sufficient to support the 
verdict.  Sanders’s thirtieth proposition is overruled. 
B. Expert Assistance 
 
An indigent defendant has a due process right to hire expert assistance at 
state expense where he can make “a particularized showing (1) of a reasonable 
probability that the requested expert assistance would aid in his defense, and (2) 
that denial of the requested expert would result in an unfair trial.”  State v. Mason 
(1998), 82 Ohio St.3d 144, 694 N.E.2d 932, syllabus.  Sanders’s first proposition 
of law claims that he was improperly denied the assistance of experts on 
audiotape analysis and hypnosis. 
 
Audiotape-analysis expert.  Having received copies of the “tunnel tapes” 
in discovery, Sanders sent one to Steve Cain, a forensic scientist, who set forth his 
findings in a document entitled “Preliminary Lab Report.”  Cain found 
“anomalies” in the tape: discontinuities in ongoing speech, abrupt ends to 
conversations, and changes in background noise.  In Cain’s opinion, these 
anomalies suggested that someone might have edited the original recording, but to 
determine whether editing had occurred, Cain needed to examine the original. 
 
Sanders filed a motion for expert assistance, with Cain’s report attached, 
asking the court to appoint an expert in tape-recording analysis.  The trial court 
denied the motion. 
 
At trial, FBI agent Mark A. Hopper testified that the persons monitoring 
the recorders would have turned them off when conversation stopped, listened 
periodically for further conversation, and turned the recorders back on when they 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
16 
heard conversation.  Hopper had helped to set up the equipment but did not 
observe the monitoring. 
 
The court of appeals held that expert assistance was unnecessary because 
the discontinuities in the conversations were explained by the fact that the 
recorders were turned on and off.  However, Cain’s report identified three 
instances where, in his opinion, a discontinuity was apparently not accompanied 
by a starting or stopping of the recorder. 
 
Nevertheless, we find no error in the trial court’s denial of the motion.  
Although Cain’s report did show a possibility that the tape was edited, Sanders 
did not show how the alleged edits could have affected his case.  His motion did 
not explain how the allegedly edited version of Tunnel Tape 61 differed from the 
actual conversation or how it would tend to falsely implicate him in the offenses 
charged.  Hence, he did not make a “particularized showing” that the requested 
expert could help his defense.  Mason, 82 Ohio St.3d 144, 694 N.E.2d 932, 
syllabus. 
 
Hypnosis expert.  Sanders filed a motion for the appointment of an expert 
on hypnotically refreshed testimony and a motion to prohibit such testimony.  He 
attached statements from two such experts who had read a transcript of an 
investigator’s interview with Correctional Officer Michael Hensley.  One expert 
believed that Hensley had been hypnotized to refresh his memory.  This expert 
based his conclusion on the fact that Hensley’s psychologist had told him that 
looking at prisoners or mug shots might trigger his memory.  The second thought 
it possible that Hensley had been hypnotized, leading to false memories. 
 
The trial court held a hearing on Sanders’s motion.  At the hearing, 
Hensley testified that he had not been hypnotized.  Correctional Officer Darrold 
Clark also testified that he had not been hypnotized.  Sanders theorized that 
Hensley and Clark might have been hypnotized without knowing it, but he 
submitted no evidence that this had happened.  The court found that Sanders had 
January Term, 2001 
17 
failed to show that the two guards had been hypnotized, and thus denied the 
motion for expert assistance. 
 
Since no evidence supported Sanders’s theory that Hensley or Clark had 
been hypnotized, Sanders failed to show a reasonable probability that a hypnosis 
expert would aid his defense or that denial of an expert would result in an unfair 
trial.  We find no error in the denial of the motion. 
C. Prejudicial Evidence 
 
In his eleventh proposition of law, part A(2)(3) of his fifth proposition, 
and part B of his seventeenth, Sanders contends that the state introduced 
irrelevant, unfairly prejudicial evidence against him. 
 
The state introduced a great deal of evidence of various assaults and 
murders committed by other inmates.  In many cases, Sanders was not involved in 
these particular crimes.  Sanders argues that this evidence was irrelevant. 
 
Inmate Roger Snodgrass admitted that he helped kill two inmates.  
Snodgrass’s participation in the riot and vulnerability to criminal charges went to 
his credibility, and the state was entitled to “draw the sting” of cross-examination 
by bringing out facts discrediting Snodgrass on direct.  See State v. Tyler (1990), 
50 Ohio St.3d 24, 34, 553 N.E.2d 576, 590. 
 
Inmate Keith Lamar’s murders of suspected informants in L-6 was also 
relevant.  There was testimony that Sanders ordered certain inmates locked up for 
their own protection because he knew that Lamar was killing “snitches.”  This 
showed Sanders’s power to make life-or-death decisions. 
 
Similarly, we find relevant the assault on inmate Andre Stockton.  Muslim 
inmate Reginald Williams testified that when another Muslim assaulted Stockton, 
Williams made him stop because Sanders had not ordered it. 
 
The assaults on the prison guards during the takeover tell the story of the 
takeover, explaining how the prisoners came to be in control, and were a 
necessary piece of stage-setting. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
18 
 
Moreover, evidence of the widespread assaults and killings that took place 
during the riot showed that a dangerous situation prevailed in L-Block.  The 
existence of a dangerous situation, combined with the fact that Sanders was 
obeyed when he ordered that certain people not be harmed, showed how far his 
influence with the rioting prisoners extended; in fact, it showed that Sanders 
possessed power over life and death.  That supports the state’s claim that, by 
ordering Vallandingham killed, he caused Vallandingham to be killed.  The 
numerous assaults on guards and inmates also tended to show that when Sanders 
issued orders to kill, he could assume that they would be carried out.  That tends 
to show Sanders’s murderous intent. 
 
Evidence of the terror experienced by the kidnapped guards indicates that 
the guards would be unlikely to forget what they had undergone, which goes to 
their credibility as witnesses. 
 
Since reasonable bases exist to hold that all the evidence at issue was 
relevant, the ultimate decision on relevance rested in the trial judge’s broad 
discretion.  Hence, its admission did not amount to plain error, since under 
Crim.R. 52(B) plain error must be “obvious” as well as outcome-determinative.  
See State v. Keith (1997), 79 Ohio St.3d 514, 518, 684 N.E.2d 47, 54.  Because no 
plain error occurred, Sanders’s failure to object at trial waived these claims. 
 
In his fourteenth proposition, Sanders claims that the state used an 
excessive number of gruesome photographs of the two murder victims, 
Vallandingham and Bruce Harris.  Sanders did not object at trial, waiving this 
issue. 
 
Sanders contends that numerous crime-scene and autopsy photos of Bruce 
Harris were repetitive, showing the same things from slightly different angles or 
distances.  However, these photos were not prejudicial, since the jury acquitted 
Sanders of murdering Harris.  Sanders further claims that the autopsy photos of 
January Term, 2001 
19 
Vallandingham are cumulative.  But the photos in question were not so gruesome 
as to arouse prejudice. 
 
Admission of these photos does not reach the level of plain error.  Thus, 
Sanders’s failure to object at trial waives this issue. 
 
Sanders’s eleventh and fourteenth propositionsof law, parts (A)(2) and (3) 
of his fifth proposition of law, and part B of his seventeenth proposition of law are 
overruled. 
D. Exclusion of Defense Evidence 
 
Sanders’s fifteenth proposition of law and parts C(4) and C(5) of his first 
proposition allege that defense evidence was wrongly excluded. 
 
During the siege, FBI agents tape-recorded conversations in L-Block with 
equipment placed in tunnels underneath the cellblock.  At trial, these were 
referred to as “tunnel tapes.”  During Sanders’s testimony, the defense attempted 
to introduce Tunnel Tape 61, which recorded an inmate meeting.  The defense 
had originally attempted to play this tape during the cross-examination of inmate 
Roger Snodgrass, a state’s witness.  However, the tape was not played then 
because there was no machine available to play it.  The defense contended that the 
state had altered the tape in such as way as to frame Sanders. 
 
The trial judge ruled that Sanders could play the tape but said that Sanders 
could not “comment” on the tape during his testimony.  The judge then clarified 
his ruling: “If [Sanders] wants to testify that that’s not his voice * * * or that’s the 
voice of Gordon or that’s the voice of someone else because he recognizes it, I’ll 
let him do that.”  (Emphasis added.)  However, the judge added, because Sanders 
was not an expert, he could not say that the tape was “faked.” 
 
Sanders claims that the trial court “deprived the defense of an opportunity 
to play the tape and impeach the State’s witnesses, who had previously testified 
about this meeting.” 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
20 
 
However, the trial court did not prevent Sanders from playing the tape.  
Moreover, Sanders was free to identify voices and explain how the tape differed 
from the actual conversation. 
 
Furthermore, Sanders did not attempt to authenticate the tape by 
proffering “evidence sufficient to support a finding that the matter in question is 
what its proponent claims.”  Evid.R. 901(A); see, also, Evid.R. 901(B)(1).  
Sanders did not show that the tape he wanted to play was either the original tape 
or the same copy of that tape that the state had given him in discovery.  Thus, he 
laid no foundation from which the jury could find that the state was responsible 
for any alleged alterations of the recording. 
 
Sanders tried to introduce Tunnel Tape 60, which recorded another 
meeting in which David Lomache spoke vehemently in favor of the rioters’ 
objectives.  (Lomache admitted making this speech but claimed that he had been 
“acting.”)  The defense tried to use the tape as a prior inconsistent statement to 
impeach Lomache’s testimony that he had not been in favor of the riot. 
 
The trial court excluded the tape.  Sanders argues that the trial court, by 
refusing to let him play the tape, denied him the opportunity to subject the state’s 
case to adversarial testing. 
 
However, although the tape itself was excluded, the defense was allowed 
to confront Lomache on cross-examination with a transcript of the tunnel tape.  
Indeed, defense counsel got Lomache to admit that he made a “pep rally” speech 
at the meeting and that he had feared that these statements might cause him to be 
prosecuted for his involvement in the riot.  Since Lomache’s testimony was 
subjected to adversarial testing, we reject Sanders’s Sixth Amendment claim. 
 
At trial, the defense attempted to introduce a record of inmate attendance 
at religious services in SOCF.  The defense proffered the attendance record to 
show that “two of the people they alleged are Muslims never attended Muslim 
services.”  The defense did not state which two inmates it was referring to.  The 
January Term, 2001 
21 
trial judge, finding the exhibit’s relevance “tenuous,” excluded it.  Sanders claims 
that this was error. 
 
Sanders contends that the exhibit impeached the credibility of certain 
inmates by showing that they “lied about being Muslim.”  But since the defense 
never identified the inmates in question, we are unable to determine whether it 
had any impeachment value as to those inmates.  In any event, because the exhibit 
covered only a limited period (December 1992-March 1993), it did not show that 
any given inmate never attended services. 
 
Trial courts have broad discretion in determining the relevance or 
irrelevance of evidence.  See State v. Hymore (1967), 9 Ohio St.2d 122, 128, 38 
O.O.2d 298, 302, 224 N.E.2d 126, 130.  The trial judge here did not abuse his 
discretion by excluding the attendance record: his finding that it had “tenuous” 
relevance was reasonable under the circumstances. 
 
Sanders’s fifteenth proposition of law is overruled. 
E. Assigning Blame for the Riot 
 
SOCF Deputy Warden David See testified for the state.  On cross-
examination, Sanders attempted to ask See about a series of TB tests performed 
on SOCF inmates in 1982 and 1983.  The state objected.  According to Sanders’s 
proffer, See conducted the 1982-1983 tests in a “non-confrontational” manner, 
and See described that method to Tate a few days before the riot and “suggested 
that this would be a more peaceful means of resolving the matter.”  The trial judge 
ruled the proffered testimony irrelevant and sustained the objection.  He also 
sustained the state’s objection to Sanders’s attempt to cross-examine Tate 
regarding prison conditions that may have contributed to the riot. 
 
At trial, the state introduced portions of tape-recorded phone conversations 
between inmates and DRC negotiators.  The defense asked that other parts of 
these “negotiation tapes” be played to show that “the prison administration did not 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
22 
take the inmates seriously and did not negotiate in good faith.”  The trial court 
denied the request. 
 
Sanders challenges these rulings by the trial court in his part C(4) of his 
first and in his sixteenth propositions of law.  He argues essentially that, if the 
state was permitted to show that he was responsible for the riot, then the defense 
had a right to show that the prison administration also bore some responsibility 
for it. 
 
However, the guilt phase of the trial was not supposed to be a free-floating 
inquiry into who should bear the most blame for the riot.  Its purpose was to 
determine whether Sanders was guilty of the murder of Vallandingham and the 
other crimes he was charged with.  The relevance of either side’s evidence must 
be evaluated with that in mind. 
 
Evidence that Sanders instigated and led the riot was not introduced for 
the purpose of showing that Sanders, as opposed to the prison administration, was 
“responsible” for the riot.  Instead, it was introduced to show that he was an 
inmate leader whose orders were obeyed—a fact that was directly relevant to his 
culpability for Vallandingham’s murder. 
 
On the other hand, evidence that the prison administration may have 
contributed to the tensions that led to the riot was utterly irrelevant to the guilt 
phase.  It did not negate the evidence showing that Sanders organized and led the 
riot, nor did it negate the evidence showing that Sanders ordered the murder of 
Vallandingham.  It may explain why Sanders did what he did, but it provides 
neither justification nor excuse for his acts. 
 
Nor was DRC’s alleged refusal to “negotiate in good faith” relevant in the 
guilt phase.  Let us be clear: The authorities in lawful charge of a prison have no 
duty to “negotiate in good faith” with inmates who have seized the prison and 
taken hostages, and the “failure” of those authorities to negotiate is not an 
available defense to inmates charged with the murder of a hostage. 
January Term, 2001 
23 
 
For these reasons, the trial court did not err in excluding the proffered 
evidence from the guilt phase of trial.  Sanders’s sixteenth proposition of law is 
overruled. 
F. Failure to Admonish Witnesses 
 
The trial judge ordered a separation of witnesses pursuant to Evid.R. 615 
but refused a defense request that he admonish witnesses not to discuss their 
testimony with other witnesses.  In his eighteenth proposition, Sanders claims that 
this refusal was error.  However, the trial court has discretion to grant or deny 
such a request.  See State v. Richey (1992), 64 Ohio St.3d 353, 364-365, 595 
N.E.2d 915, 926.  At trial, Sanders “failed to demonstrate any need for the 
measures he requested,” id. at 365, 595 N.E.2d at 926; Richey, supra, and he now 
“fails to cite specific instances of preventable discussions, or any prejudice from 
the lack of such orders.”  Id.  Sanders’s eighteenth proposition is overruled. 
G. Discovery Issues 
 
At trial, Sanders asked for material from DRC files concerning certain 
inmate-witnesses.  Inmates violating prison rules can be disciplined by a Rules 
Infraction Board (“RIB”); Sanders asked for any RIB hearing records involving 
the inmate-witnesses.  The prosecution did not review the RIB files, taking the 
position that it had no duty to disclose those files to the defense because they were 
not in the possession of the prosecution.  At trial, Sanders argued that either the 
state or the trial court had a duty at least to review the RIB files and determine 
whether they contained Brady material.  In part C(3) of his first proposition of 
law, Sanders contends that the court’s refusal to order the prosecutor to review the 
RIB records was error. 
 
Usually, “it is the state that decides which information must be disclosed,” 
and that decision “is final.”  Pennsylvania v. Ritchie (1987), 480 U.S. 39, 59, 107 
S.Ct. 989, 1002, 94 L.Ed.2d 40, 59.  See, also, State v. Patterson (1971), 28 Ohio 
St.2d 181, 182, 57 O.O.2d 422, 423, 277 N.E.2d 201, 203.  In this case, however, 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
24 
the prosecution did not review the requested RIB files, claiming that the files were 
not in its possession.  The state’s citation of State v. Lawson (1992), 64 Ohio 
St.3d 336, 595 N.E.2d 902, to support its defense of lack of access is inapposite.  
In Lawson, the defendant sought disclosure of FBI records, which were outside 
the state’s possession because they belonged to a separate sovereign, the United 
States.  Id. at 344, 595 N.E.2d at 909.  But the prosecutor and DRC are agents of 
the same sovereign, the state of Ohio. 
 
Prosecutors have “a duty to learn of any favorable evidence known to the 
others acting on the government’s behalf in the case, including the police.”  
(Emphasis added.)  Kyles v. Whitley (1995), 514 U.S. 419, 437, 115 S.Ct. 1555, 
1567, 131 L.Ed.2d 490, 508.  The Brady obligation thus extends to information 
held by state or local agencies involved in the investigation or prosecution at 
issue.  United States v. Morris (C.A.7, 1996), 80 F.3d 1151, 1169. 
 
Yet even so, in order to invoke a right to disclosure, or a concomitant 
prosecutorial duty to search records, a defendant must make a preliminary 
showing that the requested files actually contain material, exculpatory 
information.  See United States v. Brooks (C.A.D.C.1992), 966 F.2d 1500, 1503-
1504; United States v. Santiago (C.A.9, 1995), 46 F.3d 885, 894-895; United 
States v. Burnside (N.D.Ill.1993), 824 F.Supp. 1215, 1254.  He “may not require 
the trial court to search through [a state agency’s] file without first establishing a 
basis for his claim that it contains material evidence.”  Pennsylvania v. Ritchie, 
supra, 480 U.S. at 58, 107 S.Ct. at 1002, 94 L.Ed.2d at 58, fn. 15. 
 
Here Sanders’s request was not supported by facts to indicate that any 
material exculpatory or impeaching information actually was in the specified 
records.  The request itself did not identify any such information.  Rather, Sanders 
made a broad request for any information related to “misconduct,” “bad acts,” or 
“antisocial acts” by any inmate who was to be a witness.  We note that, assuming 
that such material existed, much of it would likely have been unusable as 
January Term, 2001 
25 
impeachment.  Specific instances of a witness’s misconduct could not be proved 
by extrinsic evidence, and could be raised on cross-examination only if clearly 
probative of truthfulness or untruthfulness.  Evid.R. 608(B). 
 
“[A] specific request will sometimes require the trial court to review the 
contested matter in camera to determine whether it is material or exculpatory 
despite representations to the contrary by the prosecutor.”  (Emphasis added.)  
State v. Lawson, 64 Ohio St.3d at 344, 595 N.E.2d at 909.  But Sanders did not 
make a specific request, and he submitted no facts to the trial court that would 
indicate that impeachment material actually existed in the RIB files.  We therefore 
conclude that neither the trial court nor the prosecutors were required to review 
the RIB files for Brady material. 
 
In his twenty-eighth proposition, Sanders contends that the trial court 
should have given him access to the grand jury testimony of inmates involved in 
the riot.  Sanders failed to raise these issues in the court of appeals.  He thereby 
waived them.  Sanders’s twenty-eighth proposition is overruled. 
H. Instructions 
 
Sanders’s third, nineteenth, twentieth, twenty-first, and thirty-third 
propositions of law allege error in the guilt-phase instructions.  However, all these 
claims were waived at trial by failure to object, and none of the alleged errors 
amounts to plain error. 
 
In his twenty-first proposition, Sanders contends that the trial judge erred 
in defining the R.C. 2929.04(A)(7) felony-murder specification to the count 
charging him with the felony-murder of Vallandingham under R.C. 2903.01(B).  
The judge did not instruct that, to find the felony-murder specification, the jury 
must determine whether the defendant committed aggravated murder while 
committing kidnapping and that he did so with prior calculation and design.  
Instead, Sanders argues, the court’s instruction allowed the jury to find the 
specification based on the existence of prior calculation and design alone. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
26 
 
It is true that the trial court mistakenly omitted the element of committing 
aggravated murder during kidnapping from its instruction on the felony-murder 
specification to the felony-murder count.4  However, the felony-murder count to 
which the specification was attached was predicated on the commission of murder 
during a kidnapping, and the jury was instructed that it must find Sanders guilty 
of kidnapping in order to find him guilty of aggravated murder on that felony-
murder count.  Thus, the instruction on the specification presupposed that the jury 
had already found Sanders guilty of kidnapping, since without having so found, 
the jury could not have convicted him of the felony-murder count to which the 
specification was attached. 
 
Plain error exists only when it is clear that the verdict would have been 
otherwise but for the error.  State v. Long (1978), 53 Ohio St.2d 91, 7 O.O.3d 178, 
372 N.E.2d 804.  In this case, had the judge instructed correctly, the verdict would 
have been precisely the same, since the jury did find Sanders guilty of murder 
during kidnapping by returning a verdict of guilt on the felony-murder count (as 
well as the separate count alleging the kidnapping of Vallandingham).  Thus, the 
error was not plain error, and Sanders waived it by failing to object. 
 
Also in his twenty-first proposition, Sanders contends that the judge erred 
in defining the course-of-conduct specification.  If the record is correct, the judge 
did err by twice substituting the word “intent” for “attempt.” 
 
However, we do not find plain error.  The verdict forms correctly stated 
the elements of the specification.  Counsel for both parties correctly stated its 
elements in argument.  Finally, the evidence supports a finding of the 
specification.  Thus, it is not clear that the outcome of the guilt phase would have 
                                                          
 
4. 
We note that the judge did include the element of committing aggravated murder during 
kidnapping when he defined the felony-murder specification attached to the other Vallandingham 
aggravated-murder count. 
January Term, 2001 
27 
been otherwise—i.e., that the jury would have failed to find Sanders guilty of the 
specification—had it not been for the error.  There is no plain error. 
 
Sanders claims two other instructional errors in his twenty-first 
proposition.  First, he contends that the trial court’s instructions allowed the jury 
to infer the existence of prior calculation and design upon finding purpose to kill.  
However, the trial judge explained that prior calculation and design “means that 
the purpose to kill * * * was reached by a complete process of reasoning in 
advance of the actual killing, * * * including a studied consideration of the 
method and means with which to kill.”  This was a clear, correct explanation of 
the concept of prior calculation and design. 
 
Sanders further contends that the judge confused the jury by “equating” 
prior calculation and design with premeditation.5  Sanders contends that the term 
“premeditation,” as Ohio courts defined it before 1974, includes momentary or 
instantaneous deliberation.6  Therefore, Sanders claims, the jury could have found 
prior calculation and design under this instruction even if it believed that Sanders 
had killed on the spur of the moment. 
 
However, the trial court specifically instructed that “acting on the spur of 
the moment or after momentary consideration of the purpose to kill is not enough 
to amount to the kind of prior calculation and design necessary for this kind of 
aggravated murder.”  (Emphasis added.) 
 
Moreover, it is unlikely that the judge’s use of the word “premeditation” 
caused the jury to ignore or misapply this correct instruction.  The judge never 
told the jury that “premeditation” includes instantaneous deliberation, and we see 
no reason to suppose that the jury was familiar with the history of the term 
                                                          
 
5. 
The judge stated:  “You may have heard on mystery stories or something somewhere else 
about premeditated murder.  Well, this is prior calculation and design.  Whether it is premeditated 
murder, I don’t know.  But I am going to tell you what we understand under the law prior 
calculation and design is.” 
6. 
State v. Taylor (1997), 78 Ohio St.3d 15, 18-19, 676 N.E.2d 82, 88. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
28 
“premeditation” as construed in Ohio courts before 1974.  Finally, the evidence 
did not suggest in any way that Sanders decided to order Vallandingham’s death 
on the spur of the moment. 
 
For these reasons, it is not clear that the jury’s verdict would have been 
otherwise but for the alleged error.  Sanders’s claim is therefore not plain error 
under Long. 
 
In his third proposition of law, Sanders alleges that the trial court gave a 
deficient instruction on complicity.  He argues that the court failed to make clear 
that complicity in an offense requires the specific mental state required for that 
offense.  Thus, he contends, the instruction may have allowed the jury to find him 
guilty of complicity, and therefore of aggravated murder, without finding that he 
specifically intended to kill Vallandingham. 
 
However, instructions must be read as a whole.  State v. Price (1979), 60 
Ohio St.2d 136, 141, 14 O.O.3d 379, 382, 398 N.E.2d 772, 775.  The trial judge 
made several strong statements that Sanders could be convicted of aggravated 
murder only if the state proved that he harbored the specific purpose to kill 
Vallandingham.  He also explained how the jury could determine whether purpose 
existed, thus underlining that purpose was necessary to a conviction. 
 
We find that the possibility of jury confusion with respect to this issue 
does not reach the level of plain error.  Sanders’s third proposition is waived. 
 
In his nineteenth proposition, Sanders claims that the robbery instruction 
equated robbery with stealing.  However, the complete instruction states all the 
elements of robbery, including the use or threat of force. 
 
He further argues that the judge in effect directed a verdict on the  “deadly 
weapon” element of felonious assault and the “property” element of theft by 
instructing that a PR-24 (a police baton or nightstick) is a deadly weapon and that 
keys are property.  However, it is far from clear that a differently instructed jury 
January Term, 2001 
29 
would have acquitted Sanders of these crimes, and no plain error exists here.  
Long, 53 Ohio St.2d 91, 7 O.O.3d 178, 372 N.E.2d 804. 
 
In his twentieth proposition, Sanders contends that the kidnapping 
instruction was flawed because the trial court instructed the jury with respect to 
the “released unharmed in a safe place” language of R.C. 2905.01(C). 
 
If a kidnapper releases his victim unharmed in a safe place, that fact 
reduces the offense of kidnapping from a first-degree to a second-degree felony.  
R.C. 2905.01(C).  It is not an element of the offense; rather, the accused must 
plead and prove it in the fashion of an affirmative defense.  See State v. Cornute 
(1979), 64 Ohio App.2d 199, 18 O.O.3d 152, 412 N.E.2d 416, syllabus.  As 
Sanders points out, since he did not claim that Vallandingham was released 
unharmed in a safe place, that was not properly an issue. 
 
Sanders argues that the instruction prejudiced him because an affirmative 
defense concedes the act constituting the crime.  However, this argument fails, 
since the jury was never told that Sanders had conceded committing the act. 
 
Sanders further argues that the “released in a safe place unharmed” 
language was prejudicial because, by emphasizing that Vallandingham was killed, 
it “effectively created an improper aggravating circumstance.”  But Sanders’s 
claim that the jury may have treated Vallandingham’s death as an aggravating 
circumstance rests wholly upon speculation.  Thus, it is not clear that the outcome 
would have been otherwise but for the error, and we therefore cannot find plain 
error.  Sanders’s twentieth proposition is waived, and we therefore overrule it. 
 
Finally, Sanders’s thirty-third proposition, which claims that the statutory 
reasonable-doubt instruction is unconstitutional, is waived.  We find no plain 
error.  See State v. Van Gundy (1992), 64 Ohio St.3d 230, 594 N.E.2d 604. 
 
Since none of the claimed instructional errors amounts to plain error, 
Sanders’s claims are waived by his failure to object at trial.  Consequently, his 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
30 
third, nineteenth, twentieth, twenty-first, and thirty-third propositions of law are 
overruled. 
I. Jury View 
 
Sanders requested that the jury be brought to SOCF to view the scene of 
the riot.  The state argued that the premises had changed so much since then that a 
jury view would not be helpful.  The trial court agreed and denied the motion. 
 
A trial court has broad discretion in such matters.  State v. Zuern (1987), 
32 Ohio St.3d 56, 58, 512 N.E.2d 585, 588.  In part C(2) of his first proposition, 
Sanders argues that the trial judge here abused that discretion, but we disagree.  
The decision had a rational basis. 
 
Sanders further contends that denial of a view denied him a meaningful 
opportunity to present a complete defense.  We disagree.  Denial of a view did not 
“significantly [undermine] fundamental elements of the defendant’s defense.”  
United States v. Scheffer (1998), 523 U.S. 303, 315, 118 S.Ct. 1261, 1267-1268, 
140 L.Ed.2d 413, 422. 
III. Penalty Phase Issues 
A. Exclusion of Mitigation 
 
In his second proposition of law, and in part D of his first proposition, 
Sanders argues that the trial court should have permitted him to introduce penalty-
phase testimony on pre-riot “conditions” at SOCF to show the mental and 
emotional stress inflicted on inmates. 
 
In the penalty phase, Sanders called Joseph R. Rowan, a correctional and 
criminal justice consultant.  Rowan had been an expert witness in lawsuits 
concerning SOCF and had studied reports and depositions about the riot.  Sanders 
asked him what problems existed at SOCF before the riot.  The state objected. 
 
In response, the defense made a proffer of Rowan’s testimony.  Rowan 
stated that “psychological brutality” at SOCF, the fruit of poor administration, 
caused the riot.  He stated that the warden could have prevented the riot with a 
January Term, 2001 
31 
different approach to the issue of TB testing.  Finally, Rowan said that a public 
statement by a DRC employee, which angered the inmates, was “the major 
triggering factor” in Vallandingham’s murder. 
 
The defense argued that the riot’s causes were relevant in mitigation 
because the state claimed that Sanders had started the riot.  The defense wished to 
contradict that by showing that the inmates had intended not to riot but to stage “a 
short-lived demonstration in L-6,” which “got out of control.”  The defense 
offered to show that prison conditions made SOCF “ripe for disturbance” that, 
once started, would inevitably become “uncontrollable.”  However, the trial court 
excluded Rowan’s testimony, holding that the causes of the riot were “irrelevant” 
and “not a mitigating factor.” 
 
In our view, the trial court erred: Rowan’s testimony was relevant 
mitigation.  The Eighth Amendment allows a capital defendant to introduce “any 
aspect of [his] character or record and any of the circumstances of the offense that 
the defendant proffers as a basis for a sentence less than death.”  (Emphasis 
added.)  Lockett v. Ohio (1978), 438 U.S. 586, 604, 98 S.Ct. 2954, 2965, 57 
L.Ed.2d 973, 990.  See, also, State v. McGuire (1997), 80 Ohio St.3d 390, 403, 
686 N.E.2d 1112, 1122-1123.  R.C. 2929.04(B) also requires the sentencer to 
consider “the nature and circumstances of the offense.” 
 
Since Vallandingham’s murder was a direct result of the riot, we think that 
the riot and its causes are “circumstances of the offense” and therefore relevant to 
mitigation.  Hence, Sanders had a right to show in the penalty phase why the 
prisoners rioted.  Additionally, the fact that Sanders may have acted in anger 
caused by the DRC employee’s statement is relevant mitigation. 
 
It is true, as we explain supra, that the causes and motivations of the riot 
do not justify or excuse the riot, much less the murders committed during the riot.  
Thus, the trial court quite properly excluded it from the guilt phase.  But a court 
may not exclude relevant mitigation, as a matter of law, from the penalty phase on 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
32 
the ground that the asserted mitigating factor fails to justify or excuse the crime.  
Eddings v. Oklahoma (1982), 455 U.S. 104, 113-114, 102 S.Ct. 869, 876-877, 71 
L.Ed.2d 1, 10-11. 
 
This error does not require a new sentencing hearing, however.  We have 
held that, when independently reviewing a death sentence pursuant to R.C. 
2929.05(A), we may “consider proffered evidence that the jury was erroneously 
not allowed to consider.”  State v. Williams (1996), 74 Ohio St.3d 569, 578, 660 
N.E.2d 724, 733.  Thus, we can cure the trial court’s error by considering 
Rowan’s proffered testimony in our independent review, infra. 
B. Guilt-Phase Evidence in Penalty Phase 
 
Sanders contends that the trial court should not have permitted the 
reintroduction of all guilt-phase evidence in the penalty phase.  See State v. Getsy 
(1998), 84 Ohio St.3d 180, 201, 702 N.E.2d 866, 887; but, compare, State v. 
Woodard (1993), 68 Ohio St.3d 70, 78, 623 N.E.2d 75, 81; and see, generally, 
R.C. 2929.03(D)(2).  However, Sanders did not object, so this issue is waived. 
C. Opinions of Victim’s Family 
 
In part C of his seventeenth proposition, Sanders complains that 
Vallandingham’s mother was allowed to address the judge at the final sentencing 
hearing and request a death sentence.  Permitting the statement was improper.  
See, e.g., State v. Huertas (1990), 51 Ohio St.3d 22, 27, 553 N.E.2d 1058, 1065.  
However, since only the judge heard the request—the jury having rendered its 
sentencing recommendation and been dismissed—and since a trial judge is 
presumed to have considered only the competent and material evidence, the 
impropriety does not reach the level of plain error.  See State v. Post (1987), 32 
Ohio St.3d 380, 384, 513 N.E.2d 754, 759. 
D. Penalty-Phase Instructions 
 
In State v. Brooks (1996), 75 Ohio St.3d 148, 661 N.E.2d 1030, we held 
that a jury need not unanimously reject the death penalty before it may consider a 
January Term, 2001 
33 
life sentence.  Instead, “the jury, when it cannot unanimously agree on a death 
sentence, [is required] to move on in their deliberations to a consideration of 
which life sentence is appropriate, with that determination to be unanimous.”  Id. 
at 162, 661 N.E.2d at 1042. 
 
In his fourth proposition of law, Sanders contends that the trial court gave 
a penalty-phase instruction that was inconsistent with Brooks.  The court 
instructed: “[I]t is necessary that all twelve of you agree on any verdict that you 
return.  You cannot have a decision in this second hearing if it’s seven to five * * 
* or eleven to one.  Whichever punishment you select must be twelve to zero.”  
However, the trial court did not specifically instruct that a solitary juror may 
block a recommendation of death.  See id., 75 Ohio St.3d at 162, 661 N.E.2d at 
1042; but, compare, Jones v. United States (1999), 527 U.S. 373, 381-384, 119 
S.Ct. 2090, 2098-2100, 144 L.Ed.2d 370, 381-384 (federal Constitution does not 
require court to instruct jury of the consequences of its inability to agree 
unanimously on a sentencing recommendation).  However, he did not object to 
that instruction at trial.  The alleged error was thus waived, and we therefore 
decline to consider it. 
 
In his twenty-fifth proposition, Sanders alleges three errors in the penalty-
phase instructions.  None of these issues was raised at trial, and so they are 
waived.  None of the alleged errors amounts to plain error. 
 
Sanders argues that the trial court incorrectly instructed the jury that 
mitigating factors “may be considered * * * as lessening or reducing the degree of 
* * * blame or punishment.”  However, this was not plain error:  The jury 
instructions, “taken as a whole, indicate that the penalty phase * * * was for a 
determination of punishment—not for the assessment of ‘blame’ or culpability.”  
State v. Woodard, supra, 68 Ohio St.3d at 77, 623 N.E.2d at 80. 
 
The trial court also failed to specifically instruct the jury to consider the 
defendant’s history, character, and background.  However, the judge did instruct 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
34 
the jury to consider “any other factors that are relevant to the issue of whether or 
not the defendant should be sentenced to death.”  It is likely that the jury 
considered Sanders’s history, character, and background under this catchall 
category, especially since defense counsel argued that Sanders’s childhood “cries 
out for mercy.”  Thus, the omission of a specific history, character, and 
background instruction was not clearly outcome-determinative.  Hence, it was not 
plain error under Long, 53 Ohio St.2d 91, 7 O.O.3d 178, 372 N.E.2d 804. 
 
Finally, the trial court did not tell the jury that it need not make unanimous 
findings as to the existence of mitigating factors.  See Mills v. Maryland (1988), 
486 U.S. 367, 108 S.Ct. 1860, 100 L.Ed.2d 384 (jury may not be instructed that it 
must unanimously agree on a mitigating factor before that factor may be weighed 
against aggravating circumstance); McKoy v. North Carolina (1990), 494 U.S. 
433, 110 S.Ct. 1227, 108 L.Ed.2d 369 (same).  However, Sanders cites no 
language that “could reasonably be taken to require unanimity as to the presence 
of a mitigating factor.”  Coe v. Bell (C.A.6, 1998), 161 F.3d 320, 338.  Without 
such language, Mills is not violated.  Id.  See, also, Scott v. Mitchell (C.A.6, 
2000), 209 F.3d 854, 875-876.  Thus, we do not find plain error as to this issue. 
 
In his twenty-sixth proposition, Sanders complains that the trial court 
instructed the jury that “[i]f the facts and the law warrant a recommendation for 
the death penalty, then it is your duty to make that finding uninfluenced by your 
power to recommend a lesser penalty.”  Sanders argues that this instruction was 
erroneous because it can never be the jury’s duty to recommend death.  Since he 
did not raise that objection at trial, the issue is waived absent plain error. 
 
However, R.C. 2929.03(D)(2) provides that, if the jury finds, unanimously 
and beyond a reasonable doubt, that the aggravating circumstances outweigh the 
mitigating factors, the jury “shall recommend * * * that the sentence of death be 
imposed.”  (Emphasis added.)  See State v. Allen (1995), 73 Ohio St.3d 626, 638-
January Term, 2001 
35 
639, 653 N.E.2d 675, 687.  Hence, we cannot find that the trial court committed 
plain error as to this issue. 
 
Sanders’s fourth, twenty-fifth, and twenty-sixth propositions of law are 
waived, and are therefore overruled. 
E. Sentencing Opinion 
 
In his twenty-seventh proposition of law, Sanders argues that the trial 
court’s sentencing opinion improperly considered his leadership of the Muslims 
during the riot as a nonstatutory aggravating circumstance. 
 
After a brief summary of the verdicts and facts, the opinion contains a 
heading: “The Aggravating Circumstances.”  The first sentence under that 
heading begins, “The Aggravating Circumstances were:” and the opinion then 
correctly states, in list form, the three specific circumstances found by the jury. 
 
Next comes a paragraph about Sanders and his behavior in the riot; it is 
here that the opinion mentions that Sanders was leader of the Muslims.  Then, 
under a new heading, “The Mitigating Factors,” the possible mitigating factors are 
set forth; then the opinion explains why the aggravating circumstances outweigh 
the mitigating factors. 
 
The opinion’s structure suggests that only the specific, numbered factors 
listed immediately after the “Aggravating Circumstances” heading were the 
“aggravating circumstances” referred to in the heading.  The facts recounted in 
the subsequent paragraph were not part of that list.  We conclude that the trial 
court did not mistake those facts for aggravating circumstances. 
 
Sanders also claims that the trial court failed to consider his history, 
character, and background as mitigating.  But the court’s failure to specifically 
mention history, character, and background does not indicate that it failed to 
consider that factor. 
 
Sanders’s twenty-seventh proposition of law is overruled. 
F. Settled Issues 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
36 
 
We summarily overrule Sanders’s twenty-fourth proposition on authority 
of State v. Durr (1991), 58 Ohio St.3d 86, 93, 568 N.E.2d 674, 682.  See, also, 
Mapes v. Coyle (C.A.6, 1999), 171 F.3d 408, 414-415.  We summarily overrule 
his thirty-fourth proposition.  See, e.g., State v. Mills (1992), 62 Ohio St.3d 357, 
371-372, 582 N.E.2d 972, 985-986. 
IV. Prosecutorial Misconduct 
 
Sanders’s fifth proposition claims that his convictions and death sentence 
should be reversed for prosecutorial misconduct in both phases of the trial. 
A. Guilt Phase 
 
In parts A(5) and A(6) of his fifth proposition, Sanders contends that the 
state made improper jury arguments. 
 
In the state’s guilt-phase rebuttal argument, the prosecutor accused 
defense counsel of telling the jury “an absolute flat-out lie.”  The defense 
objected.  The judge thereupon instructed the jury to disregard the prosecutor’s 
statement.  He expressly pointed out that the prosecutor’s statement was improper 
and irrelevant, and that “there’s nothing to indicate that [defense counsel was] a 
liar.”  He emphatically added that counsel’s statements were not evidence. 
 
In part A(6)(1) of his fifth proposition, Sanders contends that it was 
misconduct for the prosecutor to accuse defense counsel of lying.  He is correct.  
See State v. Keenan (1993), 66 Ohio St.3d 402, 405-406, 613 N.E.2d 203, 206-
207 (prosecutor may not impute insincerity to opposing counsel).  But this remark 
was followed by a strong curative instruction.  Hence, the misconduct did not 
deny a fair trial.  See State v. Hawkins (1993), 66 Ohio St.3d 339, 348, 612 
N.E.2d 1227, 1234. 
 
In part A(6)(4) of his fifth proposition, Sanders accuses the prosecutor of 
denigrating defense counsel for making objections.  “It is improper to denigrate 
defense counsel in the jury’s presence for making objections.”  Keenan, supra, 66 
Ohio St.3d at 406, 613 N.E.2d at 207.  However, the prosecutor did not do that.  
January Term, 2001 
37 
He did complain to the judge that “I’ve only got a limited amount of time.  Every 
time he objects I lose time.”  But this was not an attack on opposing counsel for 
objecting; it was an appeal to the court for more time to argue. 
 
The remainder of part A(6) is waived, as is the whole of part A(5), 
because Sanders did not object at trial to the misconduct alleged therein. 
 
In part A(3) of his fifth proposition, Sanders accuses the state of 
presenting perjured testimony.  The state may neither suborn perjury, Mooney v. 
Holohan (1935), 294 U.S. 103, 55 S.Ct. 340, 79 L.Ed. 791, nor introduce 
testimony it knows or should know is false without correcting it.  Napue v. Illinois 
(1959), 360 U.S. 264, 79 S.Ct. 1173, 3 L.Ed.2d 1217. 
 
Sanders argues that Kenneth Law’s testimony was “unreliable.”  Law had 
been indicted with death specifications as a principal offender in Vallandingham’s 
aggravated murder.  The jury in Law’s case failed to reach a verdict on the 
aggravated murder charge but convicted him of kidnapping Vallandingham.  Law 
then entered into a plea agreement with the state: he pled guilty to conspiracy to 
commit murder and agreed to testify against three co-defendants, and the state 
dismissed the death specifications. 
 
At Sanders’s trial, Law testified that he did not participate in 
Vallandingham’s murder but watched while two other inmates killed 
Vallandingham.  Sanders argues that, because the state had originally indicted 
Law as a principal offender in the aggravated murder of Vallandingham, and 
because Law’s testimony was inconsistent with Law’s being a principal offender, 
we should conclude that Law’s testimony was false and that the state knowingly 
presented false testimony. 
 
Sanders’s claim is untenable.  There is nothing in the record to show that 
Law’s testimony was false.  Law’s previous indictment on aggravated murder 
charges is not enough to justify Sanders’s accusation of perjury; an indictment, 
which is “a mere accusation,” State ex rel. Lipschutz v. Shoemaker (1990), 49 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
38 
Ohio St.3d 88, 90, 551 N.E.2d 160, 162, may issue upon probable cause alone.  
See, e.g., State v. Van Meter (1998), 130 Ohio App.3d 592, 601, 720 N.E.2d 934, 
940; State v. Hayes (1994), 99 Ohio App.3d 530, 533, 651 N.E.2d 62, 64.  In any 
event, the jury in this case knew that Law had been indicted as a principal 
offender in the murder and could assess his credibility in light of that knowledge.  
Hence, there was no due process violation.  See Overton v. United States (C.A.5, 
1971), 450 F.2d 919, 920; Tapia v. Tansy (C.A.10, 1991), 926 F.2d 1554, 1563. 
 
In part A(1) of his fifth proposition, Sanders contends that the prosecution 
made improper comments during opening statement.  Sanders did not object to 
the alleged misconduct at trial.  Hence, the issues raised here are waived.  The 
issues raised in part A(4), alleging that the state improperly cross-examined 
Sanders, are also waived for the same reason. 
 
In part A(2)(2) of his fifth proposition, Sanders contends that the 
prosecution improperly led its own witnesses on direct examination.  It was 
within the trial court’s discretion to permit leading questions on direct, however, 
and Sanders does not make a persuasive case that the court abused that discretion. 
 
Parts A(2)(1) and A(2)(2) of Sanders’s fifth proposition were not 
preserved at trial.  Part A(2)(3) is discussed, and overruled, in conjunction with 
Sanders’s eleventh proposition, supra. 
B. Penalty Phase 
 
Sanders’s assertions of guilt-phase prosecutorial misconduct were waived 
at trial, and none of them amounts to plain error. 
 
Proposition 5(B)(1)(1): In the penalty phase, Sanders contends, the 
prosecutor referred to “nonstatutory aggravating circumstances” by mentioning 
the riot and the fact that it occurred during Easter week.  However, the prosecutor 
did not say that these were aggravating circumstances, nor did he urge the jury to 
weigh them as aggravating circumstances. 
January Term, 2001 
39 
 
Proposition 5(B)(1)(2): The prosecutor predicted that Sanders’s mitigating 
evidence would not “move that scale one inch from what he’s already done.”  
Sanders finds in this statement the implication that the defense needed to present 
mitigation that outweighed the aggravating circumstances.  His reading of this 
statement is extremely strained.  A more natural reading is that Sanders’s 
mitigation was entitled to no weight at all, a claim that implies nothing about the 
burden of persuasion. 
 
Proposition 5(B)(2): Sanders complains that the state asked inmate-
witness Thomas Hurst about the murder of inmate Pop Svette.  However, the brief 
iteration of this murder, without any details, was not highly prejudicial, since the 
jury had already heard extensive evidence in the guilt phase about several 
murders.  It was not outcome-determinative plain error. 
 
Proposition 5(C)(1) and 5(C)(2): In penalty-phase closing argument, the 
prosecutor asked the jury to “imagine” Vallandingham’s feelings, and his “terror” 
and “desperation.”  This was improper, see State v. Combs (1991), 62 Ohio St.3d 
278, 283, 581 N.E.2d 1071, 1077, but counsel did not object, and it was not plain 
error. 
 
The prosecutor’s comparison between Sanders and his sister, who was a 
“law-abiding, hard-working, upstanding member of her community” despite a 
similar background and upbringing, was not plain error.  See, e.g., State v. 
Murphy (1992), 65 Ohio St.3d 554, 572, 605 N.E.2d 884, 900. 
 
Sanders’s fifth proposition of law is overruled. 
V. Right-to-Counsel Issues 
 
In his sixth proposition of law, Sanders contends that he received 
ineffective assistance of counsel in both the guilt and penalty phases.  Sanders’s 
first, seventh, and twenty-ninth propositions also implicate the effectiveness of his 
counsel. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
40 
 
Ineffective-assistance claims are governed by a two-prong test first 
articulated in Strickland v. Washington (1984), 466 U.S. 668, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 
L.Ed.2d 674.  First, the appellant must show that counsel’s performance “fell 
below an objective standard of reasonableness,” id. at 688, 104 S.Ct. at 2064, 80 
L.Ed.2d at 693, and “made errors so serious that counsel was not functioning as 
the ‘counsel’ guaranteed the defendant by the Sixth Amendment.”  Id. at 687, 104 
S.Ct. at 2064, 80 L.Ed.2d at 693.  A reviewing court must strongly presume that 
“counsel’s conduct falls within the wide range of reasonable professional 
assistance,” and must “eliminate the distorting effects of hindsight, * * * and * * * 
evaluate [counsel’s] conduct from counsel’s perspective at the time.”  Id. at 689, 
104 S.Ct. at 2065, 80 L.Ed.2d at 694. 
 
Second, the appellant must demonstrate prejudice—i.e., “a reasonable 
probability that, were it not for counsel’s errors, the result of the trial would have 
been different.”  State v. Bradley (1989), 42 Ohio St.3d 136, 538 N.E.2d 373, 
paragraph three of the syllabus.  “A reasonable probability is a probability 
sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome.”  Strickland at 694, 104 S.Ct. 
at 2068, 80 L.Ed.2d at 698. 
A. Guilt Phase 
 
Proposition 6(A)(1): Sanders’s two trial attorneys sometimes disagreed 
with each other’s judgments in open court, occasionally going so far as to 
countermand each other’s decisions.  Sanders argues that these disagreements 
rendered his attorneys ineffective. Nevertheless, Sanders must show specific 
errors by counsel that undermine confidence in the reliability of the verdict.  
Strickland, supra. 
 
During voir dire, lead counsel questioned a prospective juror regarding her 
death-penalty views, then challenged her for cause; however, the trial court 
denied the challenge.  Two days later, the court recalled this juror for further 
questions.  Lead counsel, believing he had already established cause, declined to 
January Term, 2001 
41 
question further.  Co-counsel, however, did question the juror.  After he was 
finished, the trial court excused the juror for cause. 
 
Sanders contends that co-counsel erred by getting this biased juror 
excused because otherwise Sanders would have had a reversible error to raise on 
appeal.  However, Sanders’s co-counsel had no professional obligation to create 
error before the trial court.  It was perfectly proper for co-counsel to dissuade the 
court from committing error prejudicial to his client. 
 
Another prospective juror, who opposed capital punishment, was excused 
due to high blood pressure.  Co-counsel agreed that this juror should be excused 
and offered to waive any objection.  However, lead counsel disagreed and placed 
an objection on the record.  Sanders contends that co-counsel erred by 
acquiescing in excusal and thereby waiving the issue. 
 
Assuming that co-counsel’s acquiescence was enough to effect waiver in 
the face of lead counsel’s objection, it was not ineffective to acquiesce in the 
juror’s removal.  Because the erroneous excusal of a prospective juror on grounds 
unrelated to her views on the death penalty is not cognizable error (see discussion 
of eleventh proposition, supra), the waiver did not harm Sanders’s position on 
appeal.  Moreover, the asserted cause for excusal—the juror’s health—was clearly 
legitimate.  Finally, the excusal did not compromise the impartiality of the jury 
that actually sat on this case, and Sanders’s assumption that this juror would have 
been favorable to the defense is pure speculation. 
 
During trial, co-counsel filed a motion to strike Kenneth Law’s testimony, 
even though lead counsel had instructed co-counsel not to.  Lead counsel then 
withdrew the motion.  Sanders does not state whether filing the motion or 
withdrawing it was the unprofessional error contemplated by Strickland, nor does 
he explain what prejudice he suffered from either action. 
 
Sanders also claims in his sixth proposition that he received ineffective 
assistance due to specific errors by his trial counsel. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
42 
 
Proposition 6(B)(1)(1) and 6(B)(1)(2): Sanders takes issue with counsel’s 
failure to inquire into racial and religious attitudes at voir dire, since Sanders is 
black and a Muslim charged with murdering a white.  But trial counsel, who saw 
and heard the jurors, were in the best position to determine whether such voir dire 
was needed.  State v. Bradley, 42 Ohio St.3d at 143, 538 N.E.2d at 381. 
 
Proposition 6(B)(2): A defense attempt to subpoena FBI originals of 
tunnel tapes was quashed due to counsel’s failure to follow correct procedures.  
Sanders, however, does not show how this lapse was prejudicial. 
 
Proposition 6(B)(3) and (B)(4): Sanders’s counsel filed pretrial motions 
challenging the jury selection process and claiming bias in the grand jury.  At 
hearings on these motions, counsel presented witnesses but were unable to prove 
key factual claims.  Sanders contends that this was due to inadequate preparation.  
It is equally likely, however, that the defense claims were incorrect.  There is no 
way to tell from the record, so the ineffective assistance claim fails. 
 
Proposition 6(C)(1): Sanders claims that trial counsel “conceded guilt” by 
suggesting that Sanders would be in prison “when this case is over.”  But since 
Sanders was already a prisoner, and would remain one regardless of the trial 
outcome, this statement did not concede guilt. 
 
Proposition 6(C)(2), (C)(3), and (C)(4): Sanders takes issue with 
counsel’s failure to ask witnesses whether they had talked to other witnesses, to 
object to certain evidence and arguments, to seek dismissal of a juror who 
allegedly fell asleep, and to request a hearing on how courthouse picketing may 
have influenced the jury. 
 
As to the juror, Sanders’s counsel did bring the matter to the trial court’s 
attention.  As to the picketing, the trial court held a sufficient hearing.  The other 
issues involved tactical judgments, and Sanders does not establish either attorney 
error or prejudice. 
January Term, 2001 
43 
 
Proposition 6(E): Sanders claims that his counsel should have objected to 
allegedly erroneous instructions.  But his claims were not supported by existing 
law at the time of the trial, and counsel had no duty to press “untested or rejected 
legal theories.”  State v. McNeill (1998), 83 Ohio St.3d 438, 449, 700 N.E.2d 596, 
607. 
B. Penalty Phase 
 
Proposition 6(D): Sanders claims that counsel failed to adequately 
investigate mitigation.  But the record does not indicate the extent of counsel’s 
investigation.  See State v. Hutton (1990), 53 Ohio St.3d 36, 48-49, 559 N.E.2d 
432, 446.  The defense actually presented significant mitigation.  Since the record 
does not show whether further investigation could have developed anything more, 
Sanders can show neither attorney error nor prejudice. 
 
Finally, Sanders contends that counsel should have objected to the en bloc 
readmission of guilt-phase evidence in the penalty phase.  We find no prejudice; 
there is not a reasonable likelihood that the jury would have returned a different 
recommendation but for the readmission of allegedly prejudicial evidence.  
Moreover, we find that counsel’s failure to object did not fall below an objective 
standard of reasonable representation in light of then-existing law.  See State v. 
Woodard (1993), 68 Ohio St.3d 70, 78, 623 N.E.2d 75, 81. 
C. Appeal 
 
In his twenty-ninth proposition, Sanders claims that he received 
ineffective assistance on appeal.  He lists twenty-two issues that his counsel failed 
to advance in the court of appeals.  However, raising every possible error is not 
required for effective appellate assistance.  Jones v. Barnes (1983), 463 U.S. 745, 
103 S.Ct. 3308, 77 L.Ed.2d 987.  None of Sanders’s new claims is so strong that 
competent counsel would have felt compelled to raise it; indeed, they are not 
notably stronger than the issues appellate counsel did raise.  Hence, Sanders’s 
twenty-ninth proposition is overruled. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
44 
D. Compensation 
 
In part B(1) of his first proposition of law, Sanders complains that his 
counsel were inadequately compensated and that this violated his right to counsel.  
However, Sanders still must show that he received ineffective assistance under the 
performance-and-prejudice standard established in Strickland, 466 U.S. 668, 104 
S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674.  This issue is not an independent ground for an 
ineffective-assistance claim. 
E. Interference with Counsel 
 
Sanders’s trial attorneys were from Cincinnati. In early 1995, DRC 
transferred Sanders from the Warren Correctional Institution at Lebanon, near 
Cincinnati, to the Mansfield Correctional Institution.  This move increased the 
distance the lawyers had to travel to see Sanders.  Defense counsel estimated that 
it took two and one-half hours to drive one way between Cincinnati and 
Mansfield; thus, each lawyer had to invest a minimum of five hours per visit. 
 
In his seventh proposition, and part B(2) of his first, Sanders appears to 
contend that the state denied him effective assistance of counsel by incarcerating 
him so far from his lawyers.  However, Sanders was returned to Lebanon about a 
month before the trial began and was housed in the Hamilton County Jail during 
trial.  Moreover, Sanders appears to concede that his attorneys actually did visit 
him at Mansfield, despite the extra distance.  See State v. Coleman (1999), 85 
Ohio St.3d 129, 143-144, 707 N.E.2d 476, 489-490. 
 
Sanders invokes Geders v. United States (1976), 425 U.S. 80, 96 S.Ct. 
1330, 47 L.Ed.2d 592, which held that the trial court denied the defendant 
effective assistance when it forbade him to speak to his attorney during a 
seventeen-hour overnight recess, at a point in the trial when the defendant was on 
the stand.  However, the judge in Geders totally “cut off communication” between 
lawyer and client “about anything” during the recess.  Id. at 91, 96 S.Ct. at 1336 
and 1337, 47 L.Ed.2d at 600 and 601.  In contrast, the state here did not 
January Term, 2001 
45 
completely cut off attorney-client communication.  Sanders’s counsel did in fact 
visit him at Mansfield. 
 
Sanders also complains—in his seventh proposition, part C(1) of his first, 
and part A(2) of his sixth—that his counsel had insufficient time to prepare for 
trial.  Lead counsel was appointed nearly two months before trial to replace 
Sanders’s previous lead counsel, who had withdrawn.  His request for more 
preparation time was denied.  However, co-counsel had been on the case fifteen 
months before trial, providing continuity.  Compare State v. Reynolds (1998), 80 
Ohio St.3d 670, 673-674, 687 N.E.2d 1358, 1365.  Moreover, the previous lead 
counsel agreed to assist Sanders’s lawyers during portions of the trial.7  A trial 
court has broad discretion over continuance requests, State v. Unger (1981), 67 
Ohio St.2d 65, 21 O.O.3d 41, 423 N.E.2d 1078, syllabus, and the court here did 
not abuse its discretion. 
F. Presumption of Prejudice 
 
Finally, Sanders urges us to hold that the combined circumstances of this 
case amount to state interference with counsel’s ability to render effective 
assistance.  Hence, we are urged to presume prejudice “without inquiry into the 
actual conduct of the trial.”  United States v. Cronic (1984), 466 U.S. 648, 660, 
104 S.Ct. 2039, 2047, 80 L.Ed.2d 657, 668.  However, we decline to do so. 
 
“[T]he right to the effective assistance of counsel is recognized not for its 
own sake, but because of the effect it has on the ability of the accused to receive a 
fair trial.  Absent some effect of challenged conduct on the reliability of the trial 
process, the Sixth Amendment guarantee is generally not implicated. * * * 
Moreover, because we presume that the lawyer is competent to provide the 
guiding hand that the defendant needs, * * * the burden rests on the accused to 
demonstrate a constitutional violation.”  Cronic, 466 U.S. at 658, 104 S.Ct. at 
                                                          
 
7. 
This attorney did not participate in the courtroom proceedings in the trial, but the record 
does not show whether he gave out-of-court assistance. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
46 
2046, 80 L.Ed.2d at 667; see, also, id. at 659, 104 S.Ct. at 2047, 80 L.Ed.2d at 
668, fn. 26. 
 
Nonetheless, Cronic recognized that some circumstances are so likely to 
prejudice the defendant that no showing of prejudice is necessary.  These include 
“the complete denial of counsel * * * at a critical stage of [the] trial” and the 
complete failure of counsel “to subject the prosecution’s case to meaningful 
adversarial testing.”  466 U.S. at 659, 104 S.Ct. at 2047, 80 L.Ed.2d at 668.  
“Ineffectiveness is also presumed when counsel ‘actively represented conflicting 
interests.’ “ Id. at 661, 104 S.Ct. at 2048, 80 L.Ed.2d at 669, fn. 28, quoting 
Cuyler v. Sullivan (1980), 446 U.S. 335, 350, 100 S.Ct. 1708, 1719, 64 L.Ed.2d 
333, 347.  Also included are such extreme cases as Powell v. Alabama (1932), 
287 U.S. 45, 53 S.Ct. 55, 77 L.Ed. 158, where defense counsel was appointed 
only a few minutes before the trial commenced.  See Cronic, 466 U.S. at 659-661, 
104 S.Ct. at 2047-2048, 80 L.Ed.2d at 668-669 (discussing Powell). 
 
“Apart from circumstances of that magnitude, however, there is generally 
no basis for finding a Sixth Amendment violation unless the accused can show 
how specific errors of counsel undermined the reliability of the finding of guilt.”  
Cronic, 466 U.S. at 659, 104 S.Ct. at 2047, 80 L.Ed.2d at 668, fn. 26.  It is clear 
to us that no “circumstances of that magnitude” were present in this case.  Sanders 
was vigorously defended by two attorneys, one appointed two months before trial, 
the other fifteen months before trial. They were not representing conflicting 
interests.  They had investigative assistance and they subjected the state’s case to 
adversarial testing.  Sanders’s counsel were not denied “the opportunity to 
participate fully and fairly in the adversary factfinding process.”  Herring v. New 
York (1975), 422 U.S. 853, 858, 95 S.Ct. 2550, 2553, 45 L.Ed.2d 593, 598. 
 
The circumstances offered by Sanders to justify a presumption of 
prejudice, such as concerns about attorney compensation, disagreements between 
lead counsel and co-counsel, and his transfer from Lebanon to Mansfield, do not 
January Term, 2001 
47 
approach the magnitude necessary to relieve him of his Strickland burden to show 
that his counsel committed specific errors that caused prejudice to his case. 
 
Sanders’s first, sixth, seventh, and twenty-ninth propositions of law are 
overruled. 
VI. Judicial Bias 
 
In his thirty-first proposition, Sanders contends that the trial judge was 
biased against the defense.  The presence of a biased judge on the bench is, of 
course, a paradigmatic example of structural constitutional error, which if shown 
requires reversal without resort to harmless-error analysis.  See Arizona v. 
Fulminante (1991), 499 U.S. 279, 309-310, 111 S.Ct. 1246, 1265, 113 L.Ed.2d 
302, 331. 
 
In this case, Sanders cites six occasions when the judge criticized defense 
counsel before the jury.  He cites four occasions when the judge questioned 
prosecution witnesses in a manner that Sanders perceives as improperly favorable 
to the prosecution, and two when the judge raised a sua sponte objection to 
defense evidence and argument.  Sanders also claims that the judge made 
“opinionated remarks” in the jury’s presence. 
 
However, “[s]harp words spoken by a trial court to counsel do not by 
themselves establish impermissible bias.  There is a ‘modicum of quick temper 
that must be allowed even judges.’ “  United States v. Donato (C.A.D.C.1996), 99 
F.3d 426, 434, quoting Offutt v. United States (1954), 348 U.S. 11, 17, 75 S.Ct. 
11, 15, 99 L.Ed. 11, 17. 
 
The judge rebuked defense counsel outside the jury’s presence after 
counsel accused the DRC of “playing games” with the rioters during negotiations.  
This rebuke does not show bias.  Nor does the judge’s refusal of requested sidebar 
conferences. 
 
Sanders also claims that the judge’s unfavorable rulings prove bias.  This 
is incorrect.  See, e.g., In re Disqualification of Hunter (1988), 36 Ohio St.3d 607, 
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522 N.E.2d 461.  We think that the incidents cited by Sanders fall far short of 
establishing actual bias on the part of the trial judge. 
 
Sanders also contends that the judge’s behavior in the presence of the jury 
displayed a pro-prosecution bias, thus influencing the jury against Sanders. 
 
We disagree.  In this case, the guilt phase alone produced nearly five 
thousand three hundred pages of transcript; the entire transcript is over five 
thousand six hundred pages long.  The judge’s occasional impatience did not 
pervade the trial, and the incidents described in Sanders’s brief probably left little 
impression on the jury.  See United States v. Centracchio (C.A.7, 1985), 774 F.2d 
856, 859-860 (seventeen incidents were “all but lost” in two-thousand-page 
transcript); compare United States v. Filani (C.A.2, 1996), 74 F.3d 378 (judge 
argumentatively questioned testifying defendant sixteen times in sixty transcript 
pages, challenging his defense theory and personal credibility). 
 
Sanders’s thirty-first proposition is overruled. 
VII. Cumulative Error 
 
In his thirty-second proposition, Sanders contends that the effect of the 
errors alleged in this case, even if individually harmless, cumulatively denied him 
a fair trial.  See State v. DeMarco (1987), 31 Ohio St.3d 191, 31 OBR 390, 509 
N.E.2d 1256.  He makes no persuasive showing of cumulative error.  This 
proposition is overruled. 
VIII. Independent Sentence Review 
 
In Sanders’s twenty-second proposition of law, he contends that the death 
sentence is not appropriate in this case. 
 
R.C. 2929.05(A) requires us to review Sanders’s death sentence 
independently.  We must determine whether the evidence supports the jury’s 
finding of aggravating circumstances, whether the aggravating circumstances 
outweigh the mitigating factors, and whether the death sentence here is 
proportionate to those we have affirmed in similar cases.  Id. 
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49 
Aggravating Circumstances 
 
The aggravating circumstances are that Sanders committed aggravated 
murder (1) while a prisoner in a detention facility, (2) as part of a course of 
conduct involving the purposeful killing of, or attempt to kill, two or more 
persons, and (3) while committing the crime of kidnapping.  See, respectively, 
R.C. 2929.04(A)(4), (5), and (7).  We find that the evidence supports Sanders’s 
conviction of all three specifications. 
Mitigating Factors 
 
In mitigation, Sanders adduced evidence of his history, character, and 
background. 
 
Sanders’s sister testified about his childhood.  His mother never married 
the father of her four children.  She had her first child at age thirteen; when she 
had Sanders, her third, she was seventeen.  Sanders’s mother worked to support 
the children; as a result, Sanders and his siblings were frequently left in the care 
of the eldest child, who was only four years older than Sanders. 
 
Sanders had no relationship with his father, who lived with the family for 
only four or five years and did not work.  The father would occasionally stop by 
to “discipline” his sons.  Once, Sanders watched as his father beat Sanders’s 
brother Walter with a belt and made him bleed.  When Walter fled, his father 
threatened him with a gun. 
 
Sanders got little or no moral instruction at home.  He began getting into 
trouble at age nine and was briefly in a foster home at age ten or eleven.  After 
Sanders was returned to his family, he and his brother Walter were caught 
burglarizing a gun store.  Sanders was then just twelve.  He spent eight years in a 
juvenile detention facility.  When he was released, his sister found him 
“hardened.”  About fifteen months later, Sanders was arrested for a robbery 
involving a gun, the crime that ultimately sent him to SOCF. 
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Sanders’s sister described him as a “loving,” “kind, considerate,” and 
“sensitive” brother.  She believed that his conversion to Islam was sincere and had 
made him more humble. 
 
Five SOCF inmates testified to Sanders’s good character.  One testified 
that Sanders had stepped in to prevent a young inmate from homosexual rape.  
Another witness told how he had been unjustly accused of being a “snitch,” and 
Sanders “went to bat for” him on numerous occasions.  Three inmates testified 
that Sanders had spoken out against the racist anti-white teachings of a rival 
Islamic sect.  Inmates described Sanders as humble, pious, quiet, studious, and 
generous.  It was even testified that Sanders used his influence to discourage 
violence. 
 
Sanders’s final witness was Niki Schwartz, a lawyer who mediated 
between DRC and the rioters in the last days of the siege.  Schwartz had dealt 
with Sanders, Robb, and Lavelle in their capacities as leaders of the three inmate 
factions.  He testified that Robb was the lead negotiator and that Sanders was not 
“in complete control” of the riot.  Moreover, Schwartz described Sanders as a 
“peacemaker” and did not believe that he was trying to prolong the crisis. 
Independent Weighing 
 
It is clear that Sanders had a bad upbringing, with insufficient supervision 
and moral instruction and some exposure to violence.  This may, to some degree, 
account for his criminal career.  Yet, worse backgrounds than his have been 
afforded little weight.  State v. Campbell (1994), 69 Ohio St.3d 38, 54-55, 630 
N.E.2d 339, 353-354; State v. Murphy, 65 Ohio St.3d at 585-586, 605 N.E.2d at 
908; State v. Cooey (1989), 46 Ohio St.3d 20, 41, 544 N.E.2d 895, 919; State v. 
Holloway (1988), 38 Ohio St.3d 239, 245-247, 527 N.E.2d 831, 837-839. 
 
There is evidence to suggest that Sanders has partly overcome his 
background and developed some good character traits: a loving nature, kindness, 
courage, generosity, and racial tolerance.  Yet Sanders was also capable of 
January Term, 2001 
51 
viewing human lives as “bargaining chips.”  And the claims by penalty-phase 
witnesses that Sanders was a “peacemaker” who deprecated violence are hardly 
consistent with the crimes proven against him in this case. 
 
Sanders proffered testimony that the prison administration inflicted 
“psychological brutality” on the prisoners and hence bore some responsibility for 
the riot.  We regard that factor as potentially mitigating and have considered the 
proffered testimony.  However, we find that it deserves no weight.  
Vallandingham’s murder was not a response to any “psychological brutality” that 
may have existed at SOCF.  It was a calculated act, undertaken to bend the DRC 
to Sanders’s will.  In State v. Clark (1988), 38 Ohio St.3d 252, 264, 527 N.E.2d 
844, 856, we stated: “Appellant’s need for drugs may have led him to rob, but it 
certainly did not require him to kill in the course of the robbery.”  Similarly, 
whatever mistakes prison administrators may have made, Sanders need not have 
ordered Vallandingham’s murder.  For the same reasons, we give no weight to the 
fact that a DRC employee made a public statement that offended the inmates. 
 
We conclude that the mitigation here, though significant, is outweighed 
beyond a reasonable doubt by the three proven aggravating circumstances. 
Proportionality 
 
Sanders’s death sentence is proportionate to the death sentence imposed 
upon Aryan Brotherhood leader Jason Robb for Vallandingham’s murder, a 
sentence we approved in State v. Robb (2000), 88 Ohio St.3d 59, 723 N.E.2d 
1019.  It is also proportionate to death sentences approved for aggravated murders 
in detention facilities, see State v. Zuern (1987), 32 Ohio St.3d 56, 512 N.E.2d 
585; for “course of conduct” aggravated murders, see State v. Combs (1991), 62 
Ohio St.3d 278, 581 N.E.2d 1071; State v. Allard (1996), 75 Ohio St.3d 482, 663 
N.E.2d 1277; and for aggravated murders during kidnappings, State v. Seiber 
(1990), 56 Ohio St.3d 4, 564 N.E.2d 408. 
 
The judgment of the court of appeals is therefore affirmed. 
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52 
Judgment affirmed. 
 
DOUGLAS, RESNICK, F.E. SWEENEY, PFEIFER, COOK and LUNDBERG 
STRATTON, JJ., concur. 
__________________ 
 
Mark E. Piepmeier, Special Prosecuting Attorney, and William E. Breyer, 
Assistant Special Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee. 
 
David H. Bodiker, State Public Defender, Kelly L. Culshaw and Ruth L. 
Tkacz, Assistant Public Defenders, for appellant. 
__________________