Opinion ID: 2790291
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Childhood Abuse and Neglect

Text: As for Doe’s childhood, J.B. did elicit penalty-phase testimony that his father did not support his mother, that his grandmother cared for him while his mother was working, that his uncle abused him physically,59 and that he had emotional problems when his mother remarried. This picture of Doe’s childhood, however, seriously understated the violence he suffered at the hands of his mother and his uncle, and afforded little in the way of mitigation that might be persuasive to a jury. concluded that Doe had suffered another major depressive episode upon his release from prison, which only worsened after he moved to California. 59 J.B. did not, however, elicit the painful details. Penalty-phase testimony about Doe’s childhood came only from his mother; she mentioned, only briefly, that his uncle would “whip” Doe, and that he started to beat Doe when he was eleven or twelve. The violence inflicted on Doe as a child was characterized by J.B., in questioning Doe’s mother, as “discipline.” 70 DOE V. AYERS Dr. J.C., who conducted interviews designed to elicit evidence of childhood abuse and neglect, learned much more. She reported that Doe’s mother, herself a victim of physical and sexual abuse and an abuser of alcohol and drugs, was “virtually absent” from his life until he was six years old. When he was an infant, she abandoned him, sometimes overnight, to go out drinking. On such occasions, she would leave him wrapped in a fur coat, without food or clean clothes or diapers. Sometimes, his diapers were not changed for days, and became so filthy they were black. Neighbors saw him crawling down the hallway of his apartment, begging for something to eat. Not only was Doe’s mother neglectful; she beat him with a belt or extension cord. In Dr. J.C.’s words, Doe’s “early childhood was in many ways a continuation of his experience in infancy,” and his “transition from childhood to adolescence was filled with continued neglect by his mother and the other adults in his life.” The testimony the jury heard did not make known that Doe was, in fact, raised largely by his violent uncle and grandmother (who once aimed a gun at him) after the age of one, because his mother was unable to take care of him. Doe’s uncle singled him out, repeatedly beating him throughout his childhood years, unpredictably and for no reason, with his fists and with sticks, sometimes on the head. He punched Doe in the head if he came home slightly late or did something perceived to be disrespectful. He once knocked Doe off a ladder, and kicked him in the head as he lay on the ground until he lost consciousness. On another occasion, he pounded Doe’s head into a telephone pole. Another time, he tried to run Doe over with a car. Even after Doe was released from prison, his uncle still beat him, once with a large shovel. DOE V. AYERS 71 Doe wrote in a letter that he was “lucky the man didn’t kill me . . . .” This evidence, too, would have been powerful. “It is well established that early childhood trauma, even if it is not consciously remembered, may have catastrophic and permanent effects on those who . . . survive it.’” Stankewitz, 698 F.3d at 1169 (citation omitted).