Title: Wainer v. State
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: 280, 2004
State: Delaware
Issuer: Delaware Supreme Court
Date: February 15, 2005

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE 
 
DORIAN D. WAINER,  
§ 
 
 
§ 
No. 280, 2004     
 
Defendant Below, 
§ 
 
Appellant, 
§ 
Court Below:  Superior Court of  
 
 
§ 
the State of Delaware in and for 
              v. 
 
§ 
Kent County 
 
 
§ 
STATE OF DELAWARE, 
§ 
Cr. I.D. No. 0304002154 
 
 
§ 
 
 
Plaintiff Below, 
§ 
 
 
Appellee. 
§ 
 
 
 
Submitted: November 10, 2004 
 
 
Decided: 
February 15, 2005 
 
Before STEELE, Chief Justice, BERGER and JACOBS, Justices. 
 
O R D E R 
 
 
This 15th day of February 2005, upon consideration of the briefs of the 
parties and the record in this case, it appears to the Court that: 
 
1. 
The defendant below-appellant, Dorian Wainer, appeals from a 
Superior Court sentence, imposed after a jury found Wainer guilty of Sexual 
Solicitation of a Minor.  Wainer advances two claims on appeal.  First, he contends 
that the Superior Court erred in refusing to grant a mistrial, asserting that the jury 
was prejudiced by evidence related to a drug charge on which Wainer was 
acquitted.  Second, Wainer claims that the Superior Court erred by refusing to give 
the jury a “missing evidence” instruction.  Because neither claim has merit, we 
affirm both of the Superior Court rulings. 
 
 
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2. 
Wainer was tried in the Superior Court for Sexual Solicitation of a 
Child, Endangering the Welfare of a Child, and Burglary.  Those charges stemmed 
from an April 3, 2003 incident in which Wainer entered the home of Brooke Hollis 
and Lisa Hollis, while Brooke was at home with her babysitter, Janice Baker.   
3. 
At the time of the incident, Brooke was eleven years old.  Baker was 
staying at home with Brooke while Brooke’s mother, Lisa, was at work.  Wainer 
entered the house uninvited, and asked Brooke to have sex with him if he paid her.  
While he was inside the house but outside Brooke's presence, Wainer also removed 
a clear pipe, a “Brillo pad” and a white rock-like substance from a plastic bag in 
his possession, and he then attempted to smoke the rock-like material.  Based upon 
that conduct, the State charged Wainer with Sexual Solicitation and Burglary and 
with Endangering the Welfare of a Child. 
4. 
At the close of the State’s evidence, the trial judge granted Wainer’s 
motion for judgment of acquittal on the charge of Endangering the Welfare of a 
Child.  The trial judge found that the State had not shown that Wainer had 
consumed drugs in Brooke’s presence.   
5. 
At the conclusion of the trial, the jury found Wainer guilty of Sexual 
Solicitation of a Child, but was unable to reach a verdict on the Burglary charge.  
The Superior Court sentenced Wainer for Sexual Solicitation of a Child.  Wainer 
appeals from that sentence. 
 
 
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  6. On appeal, Wainer first argues that the trial judge abused his discretion 
by denying his motion for a mistrial.  Second, he claims that the trial judge erred 
by refusing to give a "missing evidence" instruction to the jury. 
 7. Before trial, the Superior Court denied Wainer’s motion to dismiss the 
Child Endangering charge.  During the trial, Brooke, Hollis and Baker all testified 
that while Wainer was inside the house, he tried to smoke the rock-like substance, 
but was unable to light the material.   Based on that evidence, the judge granted 
Wainer’s motion for acquittal on that charge, finding that the State had not proved 
all the elements of the charged offense.   
The Mistrial Motion 
8. 
After that acquittal motion was granted, Wainer moved for a mistrial, 
arguing that the drug evidence had prejudicially “tainted” the remaining counts and 
that the prejudice was incurable.  The judge denied the motion for a mistrial, and 
instructed the jury that it should not consider the dismissed Child Endangering 
charge. Wainer’s counsel declined the judge’s offer to consider giving additional 
jury instructions on that issue. 
 
 
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9. 
This Court reviews the denial of a motion for mistrial for abuse of 
discretion.1  A curative instruction will almost always be sufficient to remedy 
whatever prejudice may result from the admission of inadmissible evidence.2  “A 
trial judge should grant a mistrial only where there is a ‘manifest necessity’ or the 
‘ends of public justice would be otherwise defeated.’”3   
10. Wainer claims that by refusing to grant a mistrial, the Superior Court 
abused its discretion.  He argues that the evidence of his alleged drug use 
prejudiced the jury's ability to consider impartially the remaining charges against 
him.  Specifically, Wainer argues that the jury concluded that he was “a person of 
bad character,” based on the evidence that he had used drugs in Brooke's presence.  
That argument fails because the State presented sufficient evidence, unrelated to 
the drug-related testimony, to support the jury verdict on the Sexual Solicitation 
charge.  Furthermore, the jury's inability to convict Wainer of the Burglary charge 
demonstrates that the jurors were able to consider the evidence rationally and 
without bias.  Because Wainer did not demonstrate that granting a mistrial was a 
“manifest necessity,” the Superior Court did not abuse its discretion in denying his 
motion for a mistrial. 
                                          
 
1 Taylor v. State, 827 A.2d 24, 27 (Del. 2003); Ashley v. State, 798 A.2d 1019, 1022 (Del. 2002). 
 
2 Id. (quoting Zimmerman v. State, 628 A.2d 62, 66 (Del. 1993)). 
 
3 Steckel v. State, 711 A.2d 5, 11 (Del. 1998) (quoting Fanning v. Superior Court, 320 A.2d 343,  
345 (Del. 1974). 
 
 
 
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The Jury Instruction Motion 
 
12. Wainer’s second claim relates to certain handwritten notes that the 
investigating officer destroyed after writing his police report.  Wainer contends 
that the trial judge erred by refusing to give a “missing evidence” instruction, i.e., 
an instruction that the jury should infer that the notes would have been exculpatory 
to the defendant had the State preserved them.  This Court reviews de novo the 
Superior Court’s denial of a requested jury instruction.4   
13. Jeffrey Melvin, the police officer who initially investigated the 
complaint against Wainer, testified that after he wrote the police report he 
destroyed the notes he had taken during his interviews of Baker and of Lisa and 
Brooke Hollis.  On that basis, Wainer requested a missing evidence jury 
instruction—commonly known as a “Deberry instruction”—that would require the 
jury to presume that the missing notes were exculpatory.   
 
14. In Deberry v. State,5 this Court held that the State is obligated, as a 
matter of due process, to preserve evidence that is material to a defendant’s guilt or 
innocence.6  Deberry established the test for determining whether exculpatory 
                                          
 
4 Gutierrez v. State, 842 A.2d 650, 651 (Del. 2004); Lunnon v. State, 710 A.2d 197, 199 (Del. 
1998). 
 
5 Deberry v. State, 457 A.2d 744, 754 (Del. 1983). 
 
6 Id.  
 
 
 
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evidence has been lost or destroyed.7  In reviewing a claim that the State lost or 
destroyed exculpatory evidence, this Court must consider:  (i) whether the 
requested material would have been subject to disclosure under Criminal Rule 16 
or Brady v. Maryland;8 (ii) if so, whether the government had a duty to preserve 
the material; and (iii) if so, whether the State breached that duty and what 
consequences should flow from the breach.9   
15. We assuming without deciding that the first two factors were 
established, i.e., that the handwritten notes would have been discoverable under 
Criminal Rule 1610 and that the police had a duty (which they breached) to 
preserve the notes.11 The issue then becomes the third Deberry factor, which 
requires us to consider the consequences that should flow from that breach.  In 
assessing those consequences, this Court considers:  (i) the degree of negligence or 
bad faith in the State’s conduct, (ii) the importance of the missing evidence, and 
                                          
 
7 Lunnon, 710 A.2d at 199. 
 
8 373 U.S. 83 (1963).  Brady requires the prosecution to turn over potentially exculpatory 
evidence to the defendant, upon request.  Id. at 87 
 
9 Lunnon, 710 A.2d at 199-200 (quoting Deberry, 457 A.2d at 750). 
 
10 The State does not concede that the notes would have been discoverable, and presents a viable 
argument that in fact the statements were not discoverable.  Because Wainer has not shown that 
the destruction of the notes was prejudicial, however, this Court need not reach the issue of 
whether the notes were discoverable. 
 
11 The trial judge found that the police officer did have a duty to preserve the notes, and that he 
failed to do so. 
 
 
 
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(iii) the sufficiency of the evidence presented at trial to support the conviction.12  If 
under that analysis the State fails to preserve evidence that is material to the 
defense, the defendant is entitled to a missing evidence instruction.13 
16. Here, Wainer has not shown that the State destroyed evidence that was 
material to his defense.  Even if it is assumed that Officer Melvin negligently failed 
to preserve the interview notes, there is no evidence that he did so in bad faith.14  
Nor is there evidence that the defendant’s case was prejudiced by the missing 
notes, because the trial judge found that the police report incorporated the 
substance of the notes and was written the same day the interviews were 
conducted.  The judge further found no evidence indicating that the substance of 
the notes was exculpatory.   Lastly, the evidence presented at trial was sufficient to 
support the jury verdict.   All three persons whom Officer Melvin had interviewed 
testified at trial and were cross-examined by Wainer's counsel.  Nothing of record 
indicates that those witnesses' stories changed between the interview and the trial.  
In short, the notes were not material to establish Wainer's defense.   
                                          
 
12 Lunnon, 710 A.2d at 200. 
 
13 Lolly v. State, 611 A.2d 956, 961-62 (Del. 1992). 
 
14 This Court has rejected the federal standard that a defendant must show bad faith on the part of 
the police in order to prevail in a claim for lack of due process.  Although it is not the 
determinative factor, the conduct of the State’s agent is still a relevant consideration.  Lolly, 611 
A.2d at 960. 
 
 
 
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17. In Lunnon v. State, 15 this Court held that where, as here, the State does 
not act negligently or in bad faith in failing to preserve evidence, and the missing 
evidence does not substantially prejudice the defendant’s case, a Deberry 
instruction is not necessary.  At most, Wainer has shown that the destruction of the 
notes was negligent, but he has not shown bad faith, prejudice, or insufficient 
evidence.  Accordingly, the Superior Court properly denied Wainer's request for a 
missing evidence instruction. 
NOW, THEREFORE, IT IS ORDERED that the judgment of the Superior 
Court is AFFIRMED.   
 
 
 
 
BY THE COURT: 
 
 
 
 
 
/s/ Jack B. Jacobs 
 
 
 
                 Justice 
 
                                          
 
15 Lunnon, 710 A.2d at 200-01.