Court Opinion

ID: 9877460
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-27 16:05:10.363816+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:58:11.722819
License: Public Domain

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA

                                  No. 22-1414
                               September 27, 2023

STATE OF IOWA,
     Plaintiff-Appellee,

vs.

TAYVON LYNN DAVIS,
     Defendant-Appellant.
________________________________________________________________

      Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Woodbury County, Tod Deck, Judge.

      Tayvon Davis challenges the sufficiency of the evidence supporting his

convictions. AFFIRMED.

      Priscilla E. Forsyth, Sioux City, for appellant.

      Brenna Bird, Attorney General, and Louis S. Sloven, Assistant Attorney

General, for appellee.

      Heard by Bower, C.J., and Ahlers and Chicchelly, JJ.
                                          2

AHLERS, Judge.

       Tayvon Davis lived with his girlfriend and her nineteen-month-old daughter.

Over the course of the first few weeks after Davis took on more childcare

responsibilities, the child began experiencing a series of seemingly unexplained

health problems including arm pain, lack of energy, listlessness, vomiting, and

difficulty walking. The downward spiral in the child’s health ended tragically when,

while in Davis’s sole care, the child stopped breathing and became unresponsive.

Although Davis took the child to her maternal grandmother’s nearby residence and

the two rushed her to the hospital, efforts to resuscitate the child were

unsuccessful, and the child died. An autopsy revealed numerous broken bones in

her arm, legs, ribs, and back. Some of the fractures were old enough to show

signs of healing, but others were new.        The medical examiner classified the

manner of death as homicide and the cause of death to be complications of

multiple blunt-force injuries.

       The State charged Davis for the death of the child. Following a trial, the jury

found Davis guilty of the three charges against him—murder in the first degree,

pursuant to Iowa Code sections 707.1 and 707.2(1)(e) (2018), a class “A” felony;

child endangerment resulting in death, pursuant to sections 726.6(1)(a) and

726.6(4), a special class “B” felony with a fifty-year term of incarceration; and

multiple acts of child endangerment, pursuant to section 726.6A, a class “B” felony.

       Davis appeals. He challenges the sufficiency of the evidence supporting all

three convictions. Sufficiency-of-evidence challenges are reviewed for correction

of errors at law. State v. Crawford, 972 N.W.2d 189, 202 (Iowa 2022). Jury

verdicts bind us if they are supported by substantial evidence. Id. Evidence is
                                            3

substantial if it is sufficient to convince a rational factfinder that the defendant is

guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.           Id.   In assessing whether evidence is

substantial, “we view the evidence in the light most favorable to the State, including

all ‘legitimate inferences and presumptions that may fairly and reasonably be

deduced from the record evidence.’” Id. (quoting State v. Tipton, 897 N.W.2d 653,

692 (Iowa 2017)). As Davis challenges the sufficiency of the evidence supporting

all three convictions, we will address each conviction separately.

I.     Murder in the First Degree

       The court gave the following marshaling instruction on the murder-in-the-

first-degree charge:

              1.       On or about August 22, 2018, the defendant caused
       blunt force injuries to [the child].
              2.       [The child] was under the age of 14 years.
              3.       [The child] died as a result of blunt force injuries.
              4.       The defendant acted with malice aforethought.
              5.       The defendant was committing the offense of:
                       a.     Child Endangerment. A person who is the
              parent, guardian, or person having custody or control over a
              child or a minor under the age of eighteen with a mental or
              physical disability, or a person who is a member of the
              household in which a child or such a minor resides, commits
              child endangerment when the person by an intentional act or
              series of intentional acts, uses unreasonable force, torture[,]
              or cruelty that results in bodily injury, or with the specific intent
              to cause serious injury.
                              or
                       b.     Assault. An Assault is committed when a
              person does an act with the specific intent to cause pain or
              injury, result in physical contact which will be insulting or
              offensive, or place another person in fear of immediate
              physical contact which will be painful, injurious, insulting[,] or
              offensive to another person, when coupled with apparent
              ability to do the act.
              6.       [The child’s] death occurred under circumstances
       showing an extreme indifference to human life.
                                            4

As Davis raised no objection to this marshaling instruction, it became the law of

the case for purposes of assessing his sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenge. See

State v. Schiebout, 944 N.W.2d 666, 671 (Iowa 2020) (“Jury instructions, when not

objected to, become the law of the case for purposes of appellate review for

sufficiency-of-evidence claims.”).

       Davis challenges the evidence supporting most of the elements, asserting

the State presented insufficient evidence that (1) he caused blunt-force injuries to

the child; (2) the child died from blunt-force injuries; (3) he acted with malice

aforethought; (4) he committed the offense of child endangerment or assault; and

(5) the child’s death occurred under circumstances showing an extreme

indifference to human life. We address each assertion in turn.

       A.     Causing Blunt-Force Injuries

       Davis contends no one saw or heard him mistreat the child generally, let

alone on the date the child became unresponsive and later died. He points to the

lack of external injuries as support for his claim that the State failed to prove he

was responsible for inflicting blunt-force injuries to the child.

       The lack of direct evidence noted by Davis does not persuade us there is

insufficient evidence supporting the finding that he caused the child’s blunt-force

injuries. Direct evidence is not required because we treat direct and circumstantial

evidence as being equally probative. State v. Ernst, 954 N.W.2d 50, 57 (Iowa

2021). There is abundant circumstantial evidence here. There is no dispute that

Davis was alone with the child when she stopped breathing. Medical experts

testified that the child’s fatal injury resulted from a violent force applied to the brain

inside the skull, such as from violent acceleration/deceleration of the head by
                                          5

shaking, and the catastrophic effects of the brain injury would be nearly immediate

and obvious. As Davis was the only one with the child when the injuries were

inflicted, a reasonable juror could conclude that Davis was responsible for inflicting

the injuries.

       B.       Blunt-Force Injuries Causing Death

       Davis argues that the State’s evidence was also insufficient to establish that

the child died from blunt-force injuries. He again highlights the lack of external

bruising and also points out that the child’s skull was not fractured. He also

contends the child had a variety of other medical issues that could have caused

her to stop breathing and ultimately led to her death. Likewise, he points to his

efforts in trying to resuscitate the child in the car on the way to the hospital as the

possible cause of injuries that resulted in lack of oxygen to the child’s brain and

ultimately to the child’s death. He points to his expert’s testimony that children

sometimes just stop breathing to support his contention that there is insufficient

proof blunt-force injury caused the child’s death.

       Davis’s argument overlooks the evidence presented by the State that the

brain injury and the retinal bleeding the child suffered were caused by very fast

alternating movement, such as by shaking the child back and forth, and that such

motion resulted in the injuries causing the child’s death. The State also presented

evidence rejecting the notion that the child’s medical conditions or efforts to

resuscitate the child could have caused her fatal injuries. A reasonable juror could

have concluded that the child died from being shaken with extreme force rather

than for some other reason.
                                          6

       C.     Malice Aforethought

       A person has malice aforethought when the person acts with “a fixed

purpose or design to do physical harm to another that exists before the act is

committed.” State v. Tyler, 873 N.W.2d 741, 751 (Iowa 2016) (citation omitted).

Davis contends there was no evidence that he acted with malice aforethought. He

points to the evidence that he had a caring relationship with the child and the lack

of evidence of malice or bad feelings toward the child.

       Davis’s argument ignores various pieces of evidence that support a finding

of malice aforethought. The State introduced medical evidence that the child’s

brain and retinal injuries could only be caused by the type of motion produced by

a motor-vehicle collision or violent or abusive head trauma. A reasonable juror

could conclude that, with the severity of force needed to inflict the child’s injuries,

Davis acted with the purpose or design to do severe physical harm to the child. As

will be discussed in more detail later in this opinion, a reasonable juror also could

have concluded that Davis inflicted the numerous other injuries discovered at the

child’s autopsy. Such a juror could then conclude that Davis acted with malice

aforethought when he inflicted the fatal injuries to the child a few days later. See

State v. Henderson, No. 20-0608, 2021 WL 1400085, at *3–4 (Iowa Ct. App. Apr.

14, 2021) (finding sufficient evidence of malice aforethought when the child had

multiple injuries of varying ages before receiving trauma to the head that resulted

in the child’s death).

       D.     Committing Child Endangerment or Assault

       For his challenge to the element that required the State prove Davis

committed the offense of child endangerment or assault when the fatal injuries
                                          7

were inflicted, Davis reprises many of his previous arguments claiming the child

did not suffer blunt-force injuries or die because of them. For the same reasons

we rejected those arguments in relation to the other elements, we reject them in

relation to this one.

       Davis also claims the child’s injuries could have just as easily been caused

by an accident like dropping her after giving her a bath rather than from intentional

acts by him. But the evidence does not support this claim. First, Davis’s claim that

he dropped the child did not surface until much after the investigation into the

child’s death began. Davis told one of the early treating physicians that he was

with the child and started to give her a bath and the child later became less and

less responsive.        Davis mentioned nothing about dropping her.       In a later

conversation with a nurse, Davis again described giving the child a bath to try to

calm her fussiness and stated the child just went limp. Again, he made no mention

of dropping the child and gave no other explanation for why the child stopped

breathing. It was only after Davis became aware that doctors had found suspicious

injuries that implicated the child’s caregiver that Davis began asserting that he

dropped the child. A reasonable juror could conclude that, if Davis had dropped

the child and the child became unresponsive after the fall, Davis would have

mentioned it right away. The fact that he didn’t would justify a reasonable juror

concluding that Davis was lying about dropping the child and he concocted the lie

because he had intentionally inflicted the injuries. See State v. Hettinger, No. 21-

0548, 2022 WL 1486187, at *4 (Iowa Ct. App. May 11, 2022) (noting the

incriminating nature of the defendant’s changing story about how the child suffered

fatal injuries). Second, the State presented evidence that a reasonable juror could
                                           8

have accepted to reach the conclusion that a fall, such as dropping the child while

removing her from her bath, would not have caused the injuries this child suffered.

So, even if a reasonable juror accepted Davis’s claim that he dropped the child,

the juror could still reasonably conclude that the drop did not cause the fatal injuries

and the fatal injuries were caused by Davis’s other, intentional acts.

       Based on the medical and other testimony, a reasonable juror could

conclude that Davis committed the offense of both child endangerment and assault

when the fatal injuries were inflicted.        The evidence reasonably supports a

conclusion that Davis was a member of the household in which the child resided

and Davis intentionally used unreasonable force that resulted in bodily injury to the

child. Likewise, a reasonable juror could conclude Davis did an act with the

specific intent to cause pain or injury or result in physical contact that would be

insulting or offensive when he inflicted the injuries that resulted in the child’s death.

       E.     Circumstances Showing Extreme Indifference to Human Life

       To contest the finding that the child’s death occurred under circumstances

showing an extreme indifference to human life, Davis points to the child’s medical

history, his quick efforts to seek help when the child became unresponsive, and

his efforts to resuscitate the child on the way to the hospital. But Davis’s argument

fails to counter the evidence that the child’s medical history could not have caused

the conditions that led to her death. Nor does his argument counter the evidence

that the child’s fatal injuries were caused by severe acceleration/deceleration

injuries consistent with violent shaking at a time when he was the only one present

who could have inflicted the injuries. A reasonable juror could conclude that Davis

violently shook or otherwise mistreated the child to the point that fatal injuries were
                                           9

inflicted and that the circumstances showed Davis’s extreme indifference to the

child’s life, regardless of what actions he took to try to save the child’s life after

inflicting the fatal injuries.

II.     Child Endangerment Resulting in Death

        The court gave the following marshaling instruction on the child-

endangerment-resulting-in-death charge:

               1.     On or about August 22, 2018, the defendant was the
        person having custody or control of [the child] or was a member of
        the household in which [the child] resided.
               2.     [The child] was under the age of 14 years.
               3.     a. The defendant acted with the knowledge that he was
        creating a substantial risk to [the child’s] physical, mental, or
        emotional health or safety
                              or
                      b. The defendant intentionally committed an act or
        series of acts which used unreasonable force, torture, or cruelty that
        resulted in bodily injury to [the child] or that was intended to cause
        serious injury to [the child].
               4.     The defendant’s acts resulted in the death of [the child].

As with the murder charge, Davis did not challenge the instruction, so it becomes

the law of the case in relation to his sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenge. See

Shiebout, 944 N.W.2d at 671.

        Davis challenges only the third element. His challenge consists largely of

repeating the arguments he made with respect to the murder charge, this time

highlighting the fact that there were competing experts as to what caused the

child’s injuries. For the same reasons we rejected Davis’s arguments with respect

to the murder charge, we reject them with respect to this charge. The fact that

Davis presented expert testimony that conflicted with the testimony of the State’s

experts does not negate the sufficiency of the State’s evidence, as the jury is

entitled to resolve the conflict between the experts and could do so in the State’s
                                          10

favor. See State v. Jacobs, 607 N.W.2d 679, 685 (Iowa 2000) (“When a case

evolves into a battle of experts, we, as the reviewing court, readily defer to the [fact

finder’s] judgment as it is in a better position to weigh the credibility of the

witnesses.”).

       A reasonable juror could conclude that the child’s death was the result of

non-accidental traumatic injury that involved shaking or other force violent enough

to cause injury to the brain that resulted in the child’s death. Such a juror could

also conclude Davis was the only person with the child at the time the injury was

inflicted. As a result, that juror could reasonably conclude that Davis acted with

knowledge that he was creating a substantial risk to the child’s physical health or

safety, or that he intentionally committed an act or series of acts which used

unreasonable force that resulted in bodily injury to the child, and the child’s death

was caused as a result. Accordingly, Davis’s challenge to the sufficiency of the

evidence of his child-endangerment-resulting-in-death charge fails.

III.   Multiple Acts of Child Endangerment

       The court gave the following marshaling instruction on the multiple-acts-of-

child-endangerment charge:

              1.      On or about July 1, 2018 through August 22, 2018, the
       defendant was the person having custody or control of [the child] or
       a member of the same household.
              2.      [The child] was under the age of 14 years.
              3.      The defendant engaged in a course of conduct which
       included three or more separate and distinct acts within a [twelve-
       ]month period where:
                      a. The defendant knowingly acted in a manner which
       created a substantial risk to [the child’s] physical, mental, or
       emotional health or safety
                            or
                      b. The defendant intentionally committed an act or
       series of acts or used unreasonable force, torture, or cruelty resulting
                                           11

       in bodily injury to [the child] or that was intended to cause serious
       injury to [the child].

With no objection to this instruction, it becomes the law of the case in relation to

Davis’s sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenge. See Shiebout, 944 N.W.2d at 671.

       Davis contends there is insufficient evidence of three separate and distinct

acts of Davis injuring the child. He cites State v. Niederbach in support of his

contention that the evidence is insufficient to support his conviction on this charge

because a number of people had been alone with the child during the time the

various injuries were caused. 837 N.W.2d 180 (Iowa 2013). But, as the State

correctly notes, Niederbach does not mandate the direct evidence Davis seems to

suggest is required—the case simply requires enough evidence to enable a

reasonable fact-finder to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that Davis inflicted

a particular injury. See id. at 218–19. We are persuaded that a reasonable fact-

finder could determine that Davis intentionally used unreasonable force resulting

in bodily injury to the child on at least three occasions.

       We start with the number of injuries. While the medical experts generally

agreed that placing a date on an injury after the fact is difficult, there was sufficient

evidence to allow a reasonable juror to conclude that the child suffered at least

three separate and distinct injuries. Without listing all the injuries the child suffered,

we point out that the State presented evidence that there were at least two events

leading to the child’s ribs being broken, as the autopsy revealed both healing

fractures and new fractures to multiple ribs. The same is true with regard to broken

legs, as the autopsy revealed both healing and new fractures of both legs. The

child’s broken vertebra being in a state of healing indicated that it had been broken
                                          12

prior to the event leading to the child’s death. There was also a healing fracture of

the arm. Finally, of course, there are the injuries that resulted in the child’s death.

       Even if we assume that the new fractures found during the autopsy were

inflicted at the same time that the fatal injuries were inflicted, there are healing

fractures supporting a finding that they were inflicted before the fatal injuries. Even

though determining the date of the prior injuries could not be accomplished solely

with medical testimony, there is other evidence that supports a conclusion that at

least some of the prior injuries happened at two different times. Three weeks

before the fatal injuries were inflicted, the child was discovered to have an injured

arm immediately after being in Davis’s sole care. Davis said nothing about the arm

injury when he dropped the child off with her maternal grandmother later that day.

The grandmother immediately noticed the injury and sought medical treatment.

Only after the child’s mother told Davis about the child being taken to the doctor

did Davis mention the child’s arm problem, and then he blamed the daycare even

though the child seemed to be fine after returning from daycare the night before

Davis watched the child. A reasonable juror could conclude that Davis’s failure to

report the injury to the child’s arm until someone else discovered it coupled with

his attempt to deflect blame on the child’s daycare (blame that was rebutted by the

fact that the child was observed to be fine between her return from daycare through

the time that the child ended up in Davis’s sole care) established that Davis

intentionally used unreasonable force that injured the child. A reasonable juror

could conclude that, if Davis had unintentionally injured the child, he would have

notified the grandmother or at least not tried to deflect blame for the injury. The
                                           13

arm injury, occurring three weeks prior to the fatal injuries, is the first event of child

endangerment that the jury could have found established.

       Thirteen days after the arm incident, and eight days before the fatal injuries

occurred, the child’s mother noticed that the child was having difficulty holding up

her head and holding the mother’s phone. This came after four consecutive days

during which the child was alone with Davis for at least part of each day. Three

days after that, during which time the child was again in Davis’s sole care for at

least part of each day, the child began having difficulty walking. A reasonable juror

could conclude that the child’s vertebra, ribs, or leg fractures occurred during this

period of time. Again, despite Davis having the child in his sole care at times during

most days in this period, he reported no injuries or accidents, which a reasonable

juror could conclude established that Davis was not reporting the injuries because

he inflicted them. The child’s difficulty holding up her head and walking five to

eight days before the fatal injuries is a second event of child endangerment that

the jury could have found established. Of course, the third event would be the

event during which the fatal injuries were inflicted.

       Having determined that a reasonable juror could conclude that the child

suffered three separate and distinct acts of intentional and unreasonable force

resulting in injury, we address the evidence that Davis inflicted the injuries. As

noted previously, the child began experiencing mysterious ailments that interfered

with her ability to use her arm, hold up her head, and walk in a three-week period

leading up to her death. Despite repeated trips to the doctor during that period,

none of the medical professionals diagnosed the fractures revealed at the autopsy.

That three-week period coincided with Davis taking on an increasing amount of the
                                         14

child’s care responsibilities.   Each time the child displayed signs of injury, it

immediately followed a period during which Davis was her sole care provider.

Couple that with the fact that Davis never once reported any of the problems that

others immediately noticed after the child left Davis’s care, and a jury could

reasonably conclude Davis was the cause. To be sure, the jury was not obligated

to find three events of abuse or that Davis caused the injuries during those events,

but a reasonable jury could have and did here. Therefore, we reject Davis’s

challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence supporting his conviction for multiple

acts of child endangerment.

IV.    Weight of the Evidence

       Throughout Davis’s brief challenging the sufficiency of the evidence, Davis

also refers to the evidence being against the weight of the evidence. He also

references raising the issue of the verdict being against the weight of the evidence

in his new-trial motion and cites the correct standard of review (i.e., abuse of

discretion). See State v. Stendrup, 983 N.W.2d 231, 246 (Iowa 2022) (noting that

review of rulings on new-trial motions based on the claim that the verdict is contrary

to the weight of the evidence is for abuse of discretion). However, Davis does not

develop any argument explaining how the district court abused its discretion in

denying his motion for new trial. As a result, we find the issue waived. See State

v. Tyler, 867 N.W.2d 136, 166 n.14 (Iowa 2015) (noting that a “passing reference”

to an issue in a brief is insufficient to avoid waiver of the issue). Moreover, we

agree with the State that, just like the supreme court found in Ernst, Davis

“repackaged his sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenge into a weight-of-the-

evidence challenge” and he has “fail[ed] to identify any specific evidence that
                                         15

preponderates so heavily in favor of acquittal that we can say the district court

abused its discretion in denying his motion for a new trial.” 954 N.W.2d at 60. As

a result, to the extent Davis challenges the district court’s denial of his new-trial

motion based on the weight of the evidence, we reject the challenge.

V.     Conclusion

       Sufficient evidence supports all three convictions, and we reject any

challenge to the district court’s new-trial motion ruling based on the weight of the

evidence. Therefore, we affirm.

       AFFIRMED.