Opinion ID: 162966
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Destruction of Evidence Claim

Text: 72 Mr. Torres argues that the prosecution violated his due process rights by destroying latent fingerprints obtained at the Yanez/Morales residence after the murders. Here, Mr. Torres focuses on the trial testimony of Oklahoma City Police Department Investigator Charles Goforth. Mr. Goforth testified that he had obtained some latent fingerprints at the residence. However, Mr. Goforth further explained that these prints were smears and thus were of no evidentiary value. Rec. Tr. Trans. vol. VI, at 147. As a result, he destroyed them. 73 In support of his argument, Mr. Torres focuses on Mr. Goforth's statement that some of the latent fingerprints that he destroyed contained faint ridges and that a single ridge could contain a single point of dissimilarity that would allow a fingerprint expert to exclude an individual as having left that print. Mr. Goforth also admitted that he never attempted a comparison between the prints he obtained and the prints of the residents of the house, the victims, or the defendants. 74 As noted by the district court and the OCCA, the destruction of potentially useful evidence by the police does not constitute a due process violation unless the petitioner can show that the destruction of evidence was accomplished in bad faith. See Arizona v. Youngblood, 488 U.S. 51, 58, 109 S.Ct. 333, 102 L.Ed.2d 281 (1988). Here, the OCCA's conclusion that Mr. Torres failed to establish bad faith, see Torres, 962 P.2d at 13, was not unreasonable. Moreover, as the district court observed, Mr. Torres also failed to establish that the fingerprint evidence was even potentially exculpatory: 75 Simply because a point of dissimilarity on ridges might show that a fingerprint was not [Mr. Torres's] would not make the exculpatory value of a fingerprint smudge apparent given that several people lived in the victims' home and anyone who visited the home may also have left his or her fingerprints on objects in the home. 76 Rec. vol. I, doc. 27, at 14-15 (District Ct. Mem. Op. and Order, filed Aug. 23, 2000). 77 Accordingly, Mr. Torres is not entitled to relief on his due process claim arising out of the destruction of latent fingerprints.