The of Charlene Whitehead - Case Study Example

Criminal Justice Field Charlene Marie Whitehead v. Record No. 080775 Case Charlene Whitehead and Jamil A. Walden were arrested on December 22, 2005. This took place when police officers from Danville city stormed their apartment with warrants to arrest them. The officers had also received information that properties stolen from a number of motor vehicles were being kept in their apartment. Upon entry, the officers discovered various items which included computer equipment, mobile phones, many bags which contained miscellaneous, personal property in a closet and compact discs. Whitehead gave the police a signed statement five days after her arrest in which she clearly described the thefts committed by her husband (Walden). According to her statement, it is quite clear that she was aware of her husband's habit of stealing and indicated that he was doing it in order to support them. Some of the stolen items were also listed in the statement in conjunction with Whitehead's comments on to their ownership (Charlene Marie Whitehead v. Record No. 080775, 2). However, during the trial in Circuit court for the city of Danville, Whitehead denounced everything she had indicated in her statement. She went ahead and claimed that she did not know about Walden's habit of breaking into people's cars. Instead all she knew was that Walden returned with a bunch of things including money. However, during the cross examination, Whitehead admitted that the items brought back to the apartment by Walden were not his. In a contradicting statement, Walden denied having never given Whitehead any stolen item though he pled guilty on the issue. From the issued statements, the trial court decided to bring together Whitehead's forty denunciations to thirty two counts for accepting stolen items from her husband (Charlene Marie Whitehead v. Record No. 080775, 3). In return, the court passed a ruling for each count. Later on, during a sentencing hearing the thirty two counts were reduced to six counts whereby Whitehead was sentenced to five year's imprisonment with four years suspended on each count, for a total of 30 years imprisonment with 24 years suspended. However, the trial court withheld the sentencing on the remaining 26 counts conditioned on 25 years of good behavior. Appearing before another judge in the same court who had been asked by the common wealth to cancel her suspension, Whitehead pled guilty for violating her probation. Consequently, the trial court cancelled its prior suspension and sentenced her to seventeen years, four months of imprisonment with 12 years, four months suspended, for a total of 5 years in addition to her sentences of the new conviction (Charlene Marie Whitehead v. Record No. 080775, 4). The court of appeals confirmed the new convictions and the revocation order in an unpublished opinion indicating that the evidence was adequate to support the court's sentencing. From the information obtained, I tend to disagree with the court of appeal's ruling on Whiteheads case; confirming Whitehead's convictions and the trial court's order of revocation of her probation. This is due to the fact that the common wealth never contended that Whitehead was involved in the actual theft of items or that she received the stolen properties from Walden. Although, there was some contradicting information from Walden regarding her awareness on the stolen items, the court of appeal should have gone a step further and investigate the case. Jeffrey Wayne Rowe v. Record No. 081173 Case It was around 1:30 am on July 9, 2005 when Officer Brian J. Fair of the Virginia Beach police department noticed a truck being driven recklessly. At the moment, he was in his dark blue uniform and was driving his personal car on his way home. He immediately contacted the Virginia Beach police dispatcher requesting for the notification of the incident to the Virginia state police since he believed that the truck driver (Rowe) was drunk. However, he was informed that there were no available state police officers to assist. He therefore took it upon himself and followed the reckless driver at a distance (Jeffrey Wayne Rowe v. Record No. 081173, 1-2). The chasing continued despite the officers' effort to identify himself as a police officer. Rowe drove into a ravine between the northbound and the southbound lanes of the interstate while officer Flair drove to the guardrail overlooking the Ravine, approximately 25feet above Rowe's position. Thinking that Rowe wanted to escape, officer Fair removed his service weapon and ordered Rowe to stop the engine. In return, Rowe complied with the order and extended his hands outside the window. However this appeared to be a trick since as the officer went close to the truck, Rowe pulled back his hands in the truck and instantly began the engine and accelerated rapidly. This made Fair respond by shooting severally at the front of the truck and he believed that he had managed to hit the engine since the steam was escaping from the front. However, the truck was still functional and Rowe grabbed on to the opportunity and drove out of the area. In an effort to avoid the speeding car, Fair fell on the wet grass and surprisingly Rowe drove directly at him which prompted him to fire several more shots at the truck. After Rowe left the area, Officer Fair called the dispatcher and went back to his car, where he was joined by Chesapeake and State police. After several hours, Chesapeake police officers caught Rowe who appeared disturbed and smelled of alcohol (Jeffrey Wayne Rowe v. Record No. 081173, 4). Rowe was charged for attempted capital murder of a law enforcement officer, and was found guilty of that offense in a bench trial (Jeffrey Wayne Rowe v. Record No. 081173, 5). Later on, he filed a motion to reconsider, which the trial court offered and held a hearing on the same at which a law enforcement mutual aid agreement was received as evidence. At the conclusion of the hearing, the trial court vacated its finding of guilt on the charge of attempted capital murder of a law enforcement officer, and instead convicted Rowe of the class 6 felony of assault and battery of a police pursuant. The court of appeal offered an appeal to Rowe holding that he had waived his argument that the assault and battery charge was not a lesser included offense of the attempted capital murder charge. Therefore, Rowe denied his petition as to the raised question. According to the court of appeals, Rowe violated Rule 5A: 18, which limits questions on appeal to those raised in the trial court and incorporates the requirements of other rules, including Rule 5A: 20, to delineate what arguments are preserved. It can therefore be concluded that the court of Appeals did not err in affirming Rowe's conviction for assault and battery of a law enforcement officer. The ruling of the court of appeals was therefore confirmed. I therefore agree with the court of appeal's ruling since from the information provide it is clear that Rowe battered and attempted murder on a law officer who was executing his professional duties. Kelly Dinelle Payne v. Record No. 081258 Case On March 7, 2006, Payne arrived at her work place at around 9:30 am in her boyfriend's white pick up truck. According to her supervisor's (Ketty) testimony, Payne smelled of alcohol on arrival at the work place. The recording of the video surveillance which showed Payne holding a bottle of Crown royal whiskey and drinking from a clear plastic cup which contained a brown liquid was used as evidence on her drunkenness (Kelly Dinelle Payne v. Record No. 081258, 2). A number of people testified against Payne indicating her state and conduct during that specific day, To start with, Steve Messer, a coworker testified that he had seen Payne with a bottle of crown royal whiskey and a cup of which he saw her drink from throughout the day. Both Messer and Penrose testified on Payne's behavior change during the day and she became flirtatious. She later on left the work place after being requested to leave early due to her irrational and erratic behavior. She nearly knocked another car in the parking lot as she was leaving. According to Priest's testimony the truck in which Payne was driving slammed into her car leaving her bleeding, dizzy, dazed and light headed. She also claimed that Payne appeared lethargic and dazed and sooner than later she fled the accident scene. Priest therefore drove herself to a medical clinic where she was diagnosed with a neck sprain (Kelly Dinelle Payne v. Record No. 081258, 3). Michael Foster testified as having seen someone in a white truck drive away from the accident scene. He followed up the truck which was been driven carelessly hitting Patel (a pedestrian). Payne did not stop even after hitting Patel instead she continued to Chippenham Parkway. Foster called 911 and reported the accident whereby he stated that Payne was driving like a maniac. Unfortunately, Patel died from his injuries. Payne later arrived at the forest restaurant at around 4.30 p.m. Frances Laney a waitress at the hotel testified that Payne seemed "fine" when she first arrived in the restaurant, later on she observed that she appeared intoxicated after she made a mess of the sandwich in which she had been served. After Laney testified, Payne's counsel moved for a mistrial, arguing that Laney's testimony was exculpatory evidence that was not disclosed by the common wealth prior to trial. However the court rebuffed the motion. The common wealth introduced into evidence at trial a transcript of a telephone call that Payne placed while she was an inmate at the Richord city jail. Later on, the common wealth presented Dr. Julia Pearson, a toxicologist, to testify concerning the effects of alcohol and the ability of alcoholics to conceal those effects. However, Payne's counsel objected to the expert testimony arguing that the common wealth had failed to lay a proper foundation for the testimony. The trial court overruled the objection, but excluded expert testimony regarding general information concerning intoxication and limited by Pearson's testimony to the effects of alcohol on an alcoholic. Having no evidence from Payne, the jury found her guilty of felony homicide, aggravated involuntary manslaughter and two counts of felony hit and run. This attributed to a 46 years in prison sentence. As a result, Payne filled a motion for a post trial arguing that her sentences for both felony homicide and aggravated involuntary manslaughter violated the prohibition against double jeopardy. According to the testimonies offered by different individuals, I tend to disagree with the ruling considering that Payne was under the influence of alcohol and that she was not offered a chance to give her evidence. Bibliography Charlene Marie Whitehead v. Record No. 080775, Commonwealth of Virginia, 2009. Jeffrey Wayne Rowe v. Record No. 081173, Commonwealth of Virginia, 2009. Kelly Dinelle Payne v. Record No. 081258, Commonwealth of Virginia, 2009. Read More