Opinion ID: 2600609
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: Initial Police Investigation

Text: Two police officers, John Hacker and William Seymour, also responded to the 911 call. Defendant told Officer Hacker that he had taken Kesha into the shower about 3:30 p.m. to clean her up after a bowel movement, and that the red marks on her body were apparently a bad reaction to the water, since, as defendant acknowledged, the water was not hot enough to burn him even though he was in the same water at the same time. Defendant said that later in the evening, he was on the couch playing with her when she suddenly stopped breathing. Hill told the officer essentially the same story, but added that Kesha's reaction to the water was due to an unnamed illness. Defendant, however, told Officer Seymour that he thought the water in the shower had been too hot, and that it had burned Kesha. Hill told Officer Seymour that, when she arrived home, she put Neosporin on the burns and that Kesha appeared to be fine. Detectives arrived on the scene and secured the premises. A detective photographed the interior of the apartment, including the top of the stove, which had a frying pan on it. The frying pan was seized and subsequently analyzed. It contained five empty shrimp tails, and appeared to have contained between 10 and 20 ounces of grease or cooking oil. Defendant and Hill were arrested and placed together in a police car. Their conversation was secretly recorded and the tape was played to the jury at trial. Defendant told Hill that the only way they could get away with this was for Hill to tell the police that she was frying shrimp and accidentally knocked the pan over. Police conducted a taped interview with Hill that night. She stated that when she returned home from having run errands, defendant told her that he had taken Kesha into the shower because she had defecated on him, and that she was burned in the shower. Police then conducted a taped interview with defendant, who had been advised of and waived his Miranda rights. ( Miranda v. Arizona (1966) 384 U.S. 436 [16 L.Ed.2d 694, 86 S.Ct. 1602].) When asked how Kesha was burned, he stated that he had given her a shower because she had vomited on him, and that when he started drying her, her skin began coming off. Police returned to defendant's apartment, tested the hot water, and determined it was not hot enough to have caused Kesha's burns.