Court Opinion

ID: 9772748
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 17:28:48.333855+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:48.126780
License: Public Domain

ROBERT L. Brown, Justice, dissenting. I would grant a new trial solely on the basis that trial counsel failed to call the crime lab serologist, Edward Vollman. Vollman testified at the Rule 37 hearing that his tests confirmed that the victim and Helton had the same blood type which was “O.” Seminal stains found on the victim’s underpants, however, confirmed a “B” blood type, which was not Helton’s blood group. That was a crucial piece of medical evidence. In my judgment, that evidence could have changed the outcome of the trial by creating a reasonable doubt of culpability. It certainly denied Helton a fair trial. It is true that Helton is a “secretor,” and evidence of a secretor’s semen was found. But 80 percent of the population are secretors and the inescapable fact is Helton’s blood type was not found. A third party was involved. This is how the serologist put it: DEFENSE COUNSEL: And Robert Helton, could he have left that fluid or item in her underpants with the B group? VOLLMAN: No. DEFENSE COUNSEL: Could not have have (sic) occurred? VOLLMAN: No. DEFENSE COUNSEL: So really then Robert Helton is excluded from depositing the bodily fluid or substance that was found in Rebecca Shyrock’s undepants (sic) the very next day in the rape kit that you tested? VOLLMAN: He is excluded from the “B” substance. There’s also the “H” substance that was present, which he is not excluded from. DEFENSE COUNSEL: Let me ask about the “B” and the “H” substance. Could the same person that deposited the “B” substance, that person being someone other than Robert Helton, could that person also have deposited the “H” substance? VOLLMAN: Yes, because a person can deposit the “H” substance no matter what their ABO type is if they are a secretor. DEFENSE COUNSEL: So the “B” and the “H” could have been deposited by the same person and that person would not have been Robert Helton, correct? VOLLMAN: That’s a possibility. DEFENSE COUNSEL: The “H” substance could have been deposited by Rebecca Shyrock because she was a type “O”, is that correct? VOLLMAN: Yes. DEFENSE COUNSEL: But there’s no way that “B” substance could have been deposited either by Robert Helton or Rebecca Shyrock? VOLLMAN: That’s correct. DEFENSE COUNSEL: It came from some third person? VOLLMAN: Yes. Trial counsel urged at the Rule 37 hearing that he did not call the serologist as a witness because he wanted to argue that the State produced no corroborative medical evidence. That argument might have some appeal but for the fact that the serologist had exculpatory evidence that would have aided the defense. The State, of course, did not call Vollman for obvious reasons. In Wicoff v. State, 321 Ark. 97, 900 S.W.2d 187 (1995), we granted a new trial due to counsel’s failure to call the defendant’s grandmother who would have testified that the eleven-year-old victim told her she fabricated the rape story. The exculpatory evidence in this case, as it relates to blood type, is even more persuasive and less subject to challenge than a grandmother’s testimony. In 1992, the Missouri Supreme Court reversed a rape conviction due to trial counsel’s failure to obtain requested blood tests and granted a new trial. Moore v. Missouri, 827 S.W.2d 213 (Mo. 1992) (en banc). Those tests would have shown that the source of the semen found on bed sheets could not have been the defendant. The Supreme Court held that counsel’s failure to obtain the results fell below reasonable and customary standards and that there was at least a reasonable probability that the trial results would have been different. The Helton case is certainly analogous to these facts. The jury should have been privy to this important piece of medical evidence in reaching its verdict. I respectfully dissent. NEWBERN, J., joins.