Opinion ID: 2267917
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Redding v. State

Text: At approximately 2:00 a.m. on May 18, 1988, an intruder forced his way into Diana Wendell's [5] apartment building and raped her. After the attack, the assailant warned Wendell not to contact the police and then left the apartment. Wendell immediately went to her bathroom to clean herself up. In that process, she threw away the underwear she had been wearing. Later that morning, Wendell went to the police station. Because the rape took place in dim lighting, however, Wendell was unable to describe her assailant beyond noting that he had a scar across his face. Approximately three months later, a man again forced his way into Wendell's apartment. The two struggled, and Wendell managed to call for help through an open window before the intruder pulled her away from the window. He identified himself as the assailant from the previous assault by telling her that he would fuck [her] like he did the first time. Eric Lloyd was passing by Wendell's apartment and happened to hear her scream. He called the police and remained on the scene. The intruder had forced Wendell to perform various sexual acts, and was attempting vaginal intercourse when the police burst through the back door of Wendell's apartment. The intruder ran out through the front door, but the responding officers gave chase and captured the fleeing man, later identified as Isaac Redding, on the street outside. One of the pursuing officers, Officer Strawbridge, testified that he never lost sight of Redding from the time he first saw Redding in Wendell's apartment to the time he apprehended Redding outside the building. In addition, the passerby, who was watching from the street, testified that he saw a man run out the front door of Wendell's building, and then saw a police officer follow and apprehend him. Wendell also identified Redding, when shown photographs shortly after the second attack. She stated that the person she identified from the photograph was the same person who had attacked her in May. At trial, Redding testified that he had known Wendell's husband for approximately fifteen years, and that he had met Wendell  thus explaining why she was drawn to his picture in the photo lineup. His alibi for the first attack was that he was babysitting the daughter of Lana Hickman at the time. Hickman, Redding's girlfriend, corroborated his testimony. With respect to the second attack, Redding testified that he had been drinking alcohol with friends approximately seven blocks from Wendell's apartment. When he noticed how late it was, he decided to run home along a path that brought him near Wendell's apartment. As he was running, a police officer jumped him. The jury convicted Redding on all charges and he was sentenced to four life terms. In June 2002, Redding filed a motion seeking DNA testing of two slides containing vaginal material taken from Wendell during the investigation of the two attacks. The trial court denied his motion, finding that the requested testing did not have the scientific potential to produce new, noncumulative evidence materially relevant to Redding's assertion of actual innocence.