Opinion ID: 2586092
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Determinations of Prejudice Should Be Made by the Superior Court on Remand.

Text: Because we hold that the pre-indictment delay was reasonable, the defendant cannot succeed in establishing both prongs of the pre-indictment delay test and therefore the indictment may not be dismissed because of pre-indictment delay. But a question remains as to what, if anything, should be done on account of the lost tape recordings. Gonzales argues that he has been prejudiced because the state lost the tapes to eleven interviews related to the charges against him. Two of these tapes, Gonzales claims, are crucial to a jury's determination of credibility. Of these eleven interviews, Gonzales has transcripts of every one except his own interview with Detective Branchflower which took place on January 17, 1992. This is one of the interviews that Gonzales describes as crucial, and the state concedes that there was a tape to the interview that has since been lost. The other such tape is Detective Branchflower's in-station interview of A.D. in which A.D. first makes the accusations. Gonzales states that this is a video-recorded interview, as were the other interviews conducted that day of M.D. (A.D.'s brother) and D.D. [58] It is unclear that the interview was recorded with a video recorder, as Detective Branchflower's police report notes suggest, as Gonzalez asserts, and as the state seems to concede. [59] Remarks in the transcript of the interviews indicate that the interview was an audio recording, not video. At one point Detective Branchflower instructed A.D. You have to say yes or no because my tape recorder can hear you pretty good but can't see you when you shake your head, OK? At another point Detective Branchflower told A.D. You're gonna have to talk real big for my tape recorder. Finally, when Detective Branchflower asks A.D. whether or not Gonzales owned a video camera, instead of pointing to the one that Gonzales asserts was in the room to give an example, Detective Branchflower said, Does he have a video camera? Do you know what a video camera is? Something that can take a movie of you? The transcripts show a similar likelihood that audiotape was used to interview M.D. later that same afternoon. [60] This is important because one of Gonzales's most compelling arguments was that the videotape would supply information about body language and subtle cues as well as showing what A.D. did with the anatomical dolls she was using to describe the assault. Accordingly, on remand the superior court should determine whether the interview was recorded with a video or audio recorder. The superior court addressed this missing evidence in the context of determining actual prejudice under the second prong of the test for pre-indictment delay. It found that: because the tapes were missing, among[] other items of evidence . . . I would have granted the motion under Fletcher [v. Anchorage] [ [61] ] to give an instruction to the jury that they would have presumed that the evidence would have been favorable to the defendant. In my view that sort of finding . . . is equivalent to actual prejudice. [62] This conclusion conflates two different standards and misunderstands the role of a Fletcher instruction. In Fletcher the court of appeals provided guidance to courts regarding whether and how to apply sanctions when evidence has been lost in preparation for a case. [63] Under Fletcher, the imposition of sanctions and what sanctions should be applied is to be determined by weighing the degree of culpability involved on the part of the state, the importance of the evidence which has been lost, and the evidence of guilt which is adduced at trial. . . . [W]here it appears that the evidence was lost or destroyed in good faith, the imposition of sanctions will depend on the degree to which the defendant has been prejudiced. [64] Fletcher also stated a policy that [t]he remedy of dismissal is a severe sanction which is generally not justified unless there has been deliberate action by the government or significant prejudice to the defendant. [65] Almost by definition, Fletcher asks a different question than prong two of the test for prejudicial pre-indictment delay. [66] On the one hand, the second prong of the pre-indictment delay test recognizes that, because the state ordinarily owes the accused no duty to indict promptly, unjustified delay by itself (that is, absent a showing of prejudice), cannot raise due process concerns. The second prong thus requires the accused to shoulder the further burden of proving that the state's unreasonable delay actually caused serious prejudicethat is, prejudice exposing the accused to an intolerable risk of being unfairly convicted. On the other hand, the Fletcher test recognizes that the state has a due process duty to preserve physical evidence. Thus, when the state breaches this duty, Fletcher requires the prosecution to bear the burden of proving that the failure to preserve the evidence was in good faith and that the defendant has not suffered prejudice. [67] Unlike the pre-indictment delay test, which mandates dismissal if the criteria are met, the Fletcher test leaves the trial court with the discretion to apply a wide array of remedies to cure any prejudice resulting from the missing evidence, including less drastic measures like a curative instruction to the jury. While these differences made it inappropriate for the superior court to equate Fletcher's standard for giving a curative instruction with the pre-indictment delay test's requirement that the accused prove serious prejudice, the superior court will now need to consider Fletcher on remand to determine what sanctions, if any, are warranted in light of the state's loss of evidence here. The philosophy underpinning Fletcher is that some forms of prejudice can be cured and that a lack of some piece of evidence is not generally fatal to a case. [68] As the court of appeals found in State v. Norman, [69] when the government has destroyed evidence through negligence . . . a court should not dismiss the charges against the defendant unless it affirmatively appears that the lost evidence would have created a reasonable doubt concerning the defendant's guilt. Similarly, this court held in Thorne v. Department of Public Safety [70] that the state's failure to preserve a videotape of defendant's sobriety test should be cured by instructing the hearing officer to presume the videotape would have been favorable to Thorne. On remand, the superior court should determine what sanctions, if any, are required in light of the evidence lost in this case.