Court Opinion

ID: 9620345
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 05:41:08.117008+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:04:49.468146
License: Public Domain

Willis, J.,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I agree that the trial court erred in refusing to provide a DNA expert to assist in Husske’s defense, but I disagree with the majority’s rationale in reaching that conclusion. I also disagree with the majority’s holding that Husske’s statements to mental health personnel were coerced and that their receipt into evidence violated the Fifth Amendment.
*55PROVISION OF A DNA EXPERT
In constructing a due process rationale for requiring the provision of a DNA expert to assist Husske, the majority relies upon scientific treatises and reports that are not in evidence. Husske proffered to the trial court numerous scientific documents, all of which the trial court rejected. Those rulings are not challenged on appeal. The NRC Report, upon which the majority relies heavily, was not even among the proffered documents. The competence and credibility of these documents have not been established. Upon this infirm foundation, the majority bases its recital and discussion of controversies surrounding DNA analysis. No evidence in the record supports those recitals and conclusions. In my view, this practice is unsound.
The majority relies upon Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. 68 (1985). Ake addressed the constitutional necessity of providing psychiatric assistance to an accused who interposed an insanity defense. Addressing the application of Ake to the provision of non-psychiatric assistance and setting forth the general rule governing the provision of expert assistance to criminal defendants, our Supreme Court said:
[The defendant] claims he was entitled to an ex parte hearing on the necessity of the Commonwealth’s funding of experts to assist him in his defense. [He] admits none of the proposed experts would address the question of his sanity, as in Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. 68 (1985); they were all forensic scientists. [He] had no constitutional right requiring the Commonwealth to provide funding of this type of expert assistance.
We find no logical or constitutional reason for adopting a per se rule requiring the Commonwealth to furnish an indigent defendant with a number of experts equal to the number the prosecution may call. If the Commonwealth provided [the defendant] with the “basic tools of an adequate defense,” it complied with the constitutional requirements. The Commonwealth need not supply [the defendant] with all services that may be available.
*56The trial court had the discretion to decide whether [the defendant] needed an expert or experts, and the burden is on [the defendant] to show that this discretion was abused.
O’Dell v. Commonwealth, 234 Va. 672, 686-87, 364 S.E.2d 491, 499, cert. denied, 488 U.S. 871 (1988) (citations omitted).
DNA analysis played an important part in Husske’s identification as the perpetrator of the crimes. The means of challenging that identification constituted a “basic tool of an adequate defense.” Defense counsel explained to the trial court his inability, and the inability of any person not trained in the field, to mount such a challenge. The trial court did not disagree with that assertion. It replied, “I don’t feel I have the authority to do that. The motion is denied.” The trial court then went on to ask the Commonwealth’s attorney, “Well, you are using Consolidated Laboratories? ... I just wanted to know if you were using Consolidated Lab, because I ... I think that if you were not, I could order Consolidated Lab to assist, but that’s as far as I could go.”
The trial court apparently believed that it lacked authority to authorize the employment of expert assistance for the defense. That is not the case. Code § 19.2-163 provides, in pertinent part:
The circuit or district court shall direct payment of such reasonable expenses incurred by such court-appointed attorney as it deems appropriate under the circumstances of the case.
See also Singleton v. Commonwealth, 16 Va. App. 841, 433 S.E.2d 507 (1993).
I would hold that the trial court erred in ruling that it lacked authority to provide expert DNA assistance to Husske. The court should have authorized Husske’s attorney to investigate the availability of such assistance, to report its availability and cost to the court, and to seek a reasonable allowance.
HUSSKE’S STATEMENTS
On October 28, 1991, the trial court conducted a hearing at which it made findings of fact supporting its ruling that statements made by Husske to personnel of the Henrico County Mental Health and Mental Retardation Department would be received into evidence. A transcript of that hearing was not properly *57filed, and those findings of fact are not before us on appeal. Thus, the issue on appeal is whether the record contains credible evidence supporting the trial court’s decision to admit those statements. I find that it does.
Husske was referred to the Mental Health Department by his attorney. He voluntarily undertook a course of therapy addressing his misconduct as a “Peeping Tom.” When he came to trial on the “Peeping Tom” charges, his attorney advised the trial court that Husske was in therapy. The trial court imposed a suspended sentence conditioned, inter alia, on the continuation of therapy and a report pursuant to Code § 19.2-300. At his wife’s insistence, Husske admitted to his therapist his commission of the crimes involved in this case. The therapist did not force him to talk or threaten him in any way. Specifically, the therapist did not threaten Husske with punishment. After his confession, Husske executed a release authorizing the therapist to report the revealed information to the CDI coordinator. At no time did Husske decline to talk to any person involved. At no time did he interpose his right against self-incrimination. These facts, all of which are contained in the record, support a finding that Husske’s confessions to the mental health personnel were not coerced and support the trial court’s ruling that those confessions were admissible into evidence.