Opinion ID: 2003747
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Denial of Funds for a Defense Pathologist

Text: The defense sought the appointment of an expert in pathology, intending to counter the evidence that a left-handed person had slit Peters' throat. Funds were allowed for a private investigator, but not a pathologist. Refusal of such funds, Keene argues, violated due process and equal protection guarantees, undermined the credibility of the sentencing determination and deprived him of effective assistance of counsel. Ill. Const.1970, art. I, § 8; U.S. Const., amends. VI, VIII, XIV. In People v. Lawson (1994), 163 Ill.2d 187, 206 Ill.Dec. 119, 644 N.E.2d 1172, we touched on the constitutional protections relevant to indigents' requests to secure experts. As a matter of Illinois constitutional jurisprudence, the protections are triggered when the expertise sought goes to the `heart of the defense.' ( Lawson, 163 Ill.2d at 220-22, 206 Ill.Dec. 119, 644 N.E.2d 1172, quoting People v. Watson (1966), 36 Ill.2d 228, 234, 221 N.E.2d 645.) Of course, whether the expertise sought is of that nature will vary with the circumstances of each case. ( Watson, 36 Ill.2d at 234, 221 N.E.2d 645.) The touchstone, however, is not with what is useful, helpful, valuable, or even important to the defense effort but what is crucial to it. ( People v. Glover (1971), 49 Ill.2d 78, 82-83, 273 N.E.2d 367 (acknowledging that prejudice is necessarily present when an issue is crucial to the defense).) A similar concern lies at the core of the last of the elements that the Supreme Court has identified as relevant to providing indigents raw materials for building a defense. Ake v. Oklahoma (1985), 470 U.S. 68, 77-82, 105 S.Ct. 1087, 1093-96, 84 L.Ed.2d 53, 62-65. What is crucial to the defense effort is often made plain in taking account of the inculpatory evidence offered. ( Cf. Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. at 82-83, 105 S.Ct. at 1095-96, 84 L.Ed.2d at 65-66 (holding that where a defendant's sanity at the time of the offense is to be a significant factor at trial, the defendant is entitled to funds for an expert in psychiatry).) Thus, in Lawson, where the State's strongest piece of evidence was shoeprints, the defendant was entitled to have an expert examine them. ( Lawson, 163 Ill.2d at 228-29, 206 Ill.Dec. 119, 644 N.E.2d 1172.) And, in Watson, where prosecution for delivery of a forged traveler's check turned on the instrument's counter signature, the defendant was entitled to a handwriting expert. ( Watson, 36 Ill.2d at 234, 221 N.E.2d 645.) But, in Bell, no need was shown for a medical expert to prove the defendant's drug dependency, addiction being irrelevant to the charge of narcotics possession there. People v. Bell (1972), 53 Ill.2d 122, 129-30, 290 N.E.2d 214. An expert opinion that Peters' throat was not slit by someone using his left hand could have helped rebut the evidence that Keene, the sole left-handed perpetrator, was responsible. But the State's case against Keene did not turn on proof that the act could only have been done by a left-handed person. That belies the notion that a pathologist's participation was crucial to the defense. Blum's testimony was only that it was likely that whoever had slit Peters' throat had done so holding the knife in the left hand. The cut, Blum believed, was formed by the knife passing from the right side of Peters' throat to the left. Making such a cut would have been awkward for a person holding the knife in his right hand given where Peters lay on the floor. But Blum never excluded the possibility that the actor could have held the knife in the right hand. He simply believed it unlikely. Nor, it should be noted, did Blum's testimony do anything to dispel the idea that a right-handed person, using the weaker hand, might have inflicted the wound. More importantly, the primary evidence against Keene was not Blum's opinion as to how Peters' throat had been slit. The core of the State's case was Hoover's testimony that Keene had admitted complicity. A defense pathologist may have rendered an opinion contrary to Blum's. But such could only indirectly refute what Hoover recounted of Keene's responsibility for slitting Peters' throat. Thus, the issue of how Peters' throat was slit was not, in that way, crucial to Keene's defense. We therefore find no error in the decision not to make funds available to Keene to retain a pathologist.