Opinion ID: 4176095
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Testimony regarding the content of letters

Text: found at the crime scene In her second assignment of error, petitioner argues that the circuit court abused its discretion by failing to declare a mistrial after an investigating officer testified to graphic, sexual letters found at the murder scene. By way of background, during the search of the victim’s home, law enforcement found a bloody glove, a bloody knife, and various letters in a trash can. The letters in question were addressed to petitioner and sent from a Nathan Messick, an inmate in federal prison in South Carolina. In the letters, Mr. Messick wrote that he believed the victim was not satisfying petitioner sexually, and described in graphic detail the sexual acts he intended to perform upon her once he was released. As a result of the sexual nature of the letters, petitioner moved the circuit court prior to trial to exclude their content as being prejudicial and irrelevant. At a pre-trial hearing, the circuit court ruled that the State could only refer to the content of the letters as indicating a “potentially romantic relationship between [petitioner] and Mr. Messick.” Investigating Officer Captain John Eckerson was the State’s first witness at trial. When asked to describe the content of the letters he found at the scene, he testified that the letters were “gushy, pen pal, prison letters.” When asked a follow-up question as to whether the letters indicated a romantic interest between petitioner and Mr. Messick, Captain Eckerson testified, “Yeah. There was some graphic sexual stuff in it, yes.” Captain Eckerson’s answer prompted petitioner to move for a mistrial, which the circuit court denied on the grounds that the testimony was not prejudicial. 5 On appeal, petitioner contends that Captain Eckerson’s testimony warranted a mistrial. We review this issue under an abuse of discretion standard. The decision to declare a mistrial, discharge the jury and order a new trial in a criminal case is a matter within the sound discretion of the trial court. A trial court is empowered to exercise this discretion only when there is a “manifest necessity” for discharging the jury before it has rendered its verdict. This power of the trial court must be exercised wisely; absent the existence of manifest necessity, a trial court’s discharge of the jury without rendering a verdict has the effect of an acquittal of the accused and gives rise to a plea of double jeopardy. State v. Lowery, 222 W. Va. 284, 288, 664 S.E.2d 169, 173 (2008) (citing State v. Williams, 172 W. Va. 295, 304, 305 S.E.2d 251, 260 (1983) (citations omitted)). Upon our review of the record and the parties’ arguments, we find that the circuit court did not abuse its discretion in denying petitioner’s motion for a mistrial. Petitioner states that the letters played significant role in explaining what she describes as a “domestic struggle” on the night of the murder. However, petitioner contends that Captain Eckerson’s testimony was prejudicial because it “may have lead [sic] the jury to believe that [she] had no regard for her marriage. And based upon the disregard for her marriage, the jury may be left to infer that [petitioner] may have been more likely to commit the intentional murder of her husband.” This argument rings hollow. Even if Captain Eckerson had described the letters as indicating a “potentially romantic relationship between [petitioner] and Mr. Messick,” petitioner fails to recognize that there was ample other evidence from which the jury could infer that she had little regard for her marriage, to wit: that she was living with Mr. Shoemaker, with whom she was having an affair at the time of the murder. More importantly, the basis of the circuit court’s pre-trial ruling was to prohibit admission of the graphic, sexual content of the letters. Although Captain Eckerson’s testimony went beyond the precise description of the letters that the circuit court authorized, his testimony in no way revealed any of the graphic, sexual content in the letters, and thus, was not unduly prejudicial to petitioner. Accordingly, the circuit court correctly denied petitioner’s motion for a mistrial. Accordingly, we find her second assignment of error is without merit.