Thomas B. Spain

The case involved Leander Tungate, who was charged with multiple counts of first-degree sexual abuse of girls under age twelve at a daycare center operated by his wife. After trial, he was convicted on three counts and sentenced to three years in prison. The court affirmed the convictions, holding that the evidence was sufficient for the jury to infer the required element of sexual gratification from the circumstances, that the trial court properly excluded expert testimony on pedophilia indicators because it lacked scientific basis and invaded the jury's role, that denial of a jury view of the premises was within the court's discretion given available photos and video, and that no lesser-included offense instruction was warranted because the victims' ages were undisputed.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved Joseph Lee Rowland, a juvenile charged with two counts of first-degree assault for shooting his stepmother Carol and stepsister Kathy in 1991, resulting in Carol's permanent injuries and a PTSD diagnosis. After Carol underwent hypnosis treatment that refreshed her recollection of the incident, the defense moved to suppress her testimony as hypnotically influenced, but the trial court denied the motion while imposing limits on mentioning hypnosis at trial. Rowland then entered a conditional Alford plea to reduced second-degree assault charges and received concurrent ten-year sentences as a youthful offender. The Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the conviction and sentence, holding that the testimony was admissible because Carol's pre- and post-hypnosis statements showed minimal differences and were sufficiently reliable, rejecting a per se ban on such evidence. The court also upheld the denial of additional expert funding for the defense.

criminal lawprocedure

Sanborn v. Commonwealth was an automatic appeal from a death sentence imposed after a retrial in Jefferson Circuit Court, where the defendant was convicted of intentional murder, first-degree kidnapping, first-degree rape, and first-degree sodomy of Barbara Heilman. The Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the convictions and all sentences, including death for the murder and consecutive 95-year terms for the other offenses. The court reviewed numerous claims of error, including prosecutorial misconduct, evidentiary issues, and improper testimony regarding privileged communications, but concluded that none amounted to prejudicial error requiring reversal. The opinion addressed the facts of the 1983 crimes, the defendant's incriminating statements and forensic links, and the procedural history from the prior reversal in 1988, while rejecting arguments that would have required a new trial.

criminal lawprocedure

In Simpson v. Commonwealth, the appellant was convicted by a jury of kidnapping, first-degree rape, first-degree sodomy, first-degree wanton endangerment, and theft after abducting a woman at night, driving her 1.7 miles to a secluded field, sexually assaulting her, threatening her, and stealing her property. The Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the convictions, holding that the kidnapping exemption under KRS 509.050 did not apply because the restraint exceeded what is ordinarily incidental to the sexual offenses, and that sufficient evidence supported the wanton endangerment charge. The court vacated the fines, however, because KRS 534.030 requires the trial judge—not the jury—to determine the appropriateness and amount of any fine after considering factors including the defendant's indigency.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved John S. Johnson’s appeal from his conviction for the murder of Brian Sizemore, for which he received a life sentence. Johnson argued that the prosecution denied him due process by failing to preserve physical evidence, including the victim’s truck, a wooden post, and a table containing bullet fragments, and by allowing a sequestered juror who expressed bias and contempt to remain on the panel. The court held that no bad faith was shown in the handling of the evidence, that photographs and other materials adequately substituted for the items, and that any juror issues did not warrant reversal. It therefore affirmed the conviction.

criminal lawprocedure

In Cecil v. Commonwealth, Gabrielle Cecil was convicted by a Jefferson Circuit Court jury of intentional murder while mentally ill after shooting her former boyfriend Ronnie Hibbard in a store parking lot amid a series of confrontations involving jealousy over his relationship with her former roommate. The trial court imposed the recommended life sentence. On appeal, the Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the conviction and sentence, holding that the evidence did not warrant a jury instruction on extreme emotional disturbance that could have supported a manslaughter verdict under the standards set in prior precedent such as McClellan v. Commonwealth.

criminal law

The case involved Phillip Potts, who was convicted by a jury of second-degree assault for severely beating his girlfriend using various household items after discovering her with another man. The trial court instructed the jury only on second-degree assault and extreme emotional disturbance, refusing Potts's request for instructions on the lesser-included offense of fourth-degree assault. The Court of Appeals reversed the conviction, but the Kentucky Supreme Court reinstated it, holding that the items used qualified as dangerous instruments as a matter of law given the circumstances, and that the second-degree assault statute requires only physical injury, not serious physical injury, when a dangerous instrument is used intentionally.

criminal lawprocedure

In Morgan v. Commonwealth, Michael Mark Morgan was retried and convicted of the intentional murder of his wife, receiving a life sentence after his initial conviction was reversed due to improper polygraph references at the first trial. On appeal, Morgan argued that the trial court erred by refusing a jury instruction on the lesser-included offense of first-degree manslaughter based on extreme emotional disturbance, and he also challenged the admission of certain financial records and the prosecutor's use of a 911 recording during closing arguments. The Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, holding that no evidence supported an extreme emotional disturbance instruction because there was no probative proof of adequate provocation or other triggering circumstances at the time of the killing. The court further found the financial records relevant to motive and no error in the handling of the 911 tape, as defense counsel did not object and the prosecutor properly invited the jury to interpret it themselves.

criminal lawprocedure

This case involved a dispute between two auto insurers over whether Kentucky Farm Bureau's liability policy covered injuries from a collision in which a non-owner intentionally rammed the insured pickup into another vehicle after taking the keys without permission. The trial court issued a declaratory judgment that the policy provided mandatory minimum liability coverage under the Motor Vehicle Reparations Act. The Court of Appeals reversed, and the Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed, ruling that the MVRA requires security only for permissive use and does not mandate coverage for non-permissive or intentional acts. The Court also held that the declaratory ruling was final and appealable even though a subrogation damages claim remained unresolved.

torts & liabilityprocedurebusiness & regulatory

The case involved Jed K. Deters, a candidate for district judge in Kentucky, who was publicly censured by the Judicial Retirement and Removal Commission for violating Canon 7 B(1)(c) of the Code of Judicial Conduct. His campaign ran newspaper advertisements stating he was a 'Pro-Life Candidate,' which the Commission found committed or appeared to commit him on the abortion issue, an issue likely to come before the court. Deters appealed, arguing lack of jurisdiction after his candidacy ended, that abortion was unlikely to arise in district court, and that the canon violated his First Amendment free speech rights. The Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the censure, holding that the Commission retained authority to discipline conduct during candidacy and that the statements violated the canon without impermissibly infringing protected speech. A dissent argued the canon was unconstitutional under strict scrutiny for free speech protections.

electionsfree speechabortion

The case involved Allen Hocker's conviction for first-degree assault after he and others attacked Cleston Cannon with various weapons, resulting in serious injuries including a skull fracture. The Kentucky Court of Appeals reversed the conviction, finding insufficient evidence that Cannon suffered a "serious physical injury" as required by statute. The Kentucky Supreme Court reversed the Court of Appeals, holding that the evidence, including the victim's hospitalization in intensive care and symptoms like hemorrhaging, supported the jury's finding of serious physical injury under KRS 508.010, and that expert medical testimony was not required.

criminal law

The case involved the dissolution of marriage between Bonita and David Dotson, focusing on the division of marital property and the husband's request for maintenance after the trial court had previously handled nonmarital property restoration. The trial court awarded 85% of the marital property valued at nearly $199,000 to the wife and denied maintenance to the husband based on his ability to work. The Court of Appeals reversed the property division and maintenance denial, and the Supreme Court affirmed that reversal. The core reasoning was that the trial court abused its discretion by overemphasizing the contribution factor under KRS 403.190(1) when the marital assets largely came from unearned income on the wife's premarital investments, requiring instead balanced consideration of all statutory factors including marriage duration and economic circumstances, with maintenance to be reassessed after proper property division.

family lawproperty

This workers’ compensation case addressed whether an Administrative Law Judge could, on his own motion, correct a legal error in a final, unappealed Opinion and Award that had awarded benefits for a limited duration instead of for life as required by the statute in effect at the time of the 1979 injury. The Kentucky Supreme Court held that the ALJ had authority under KRS 342.125 to reopen and amend the award. The Court reasoned that the statute’s reference to “mistake” encompasses mistakes of law as well as fact, consistent with long-standing precedent allowing such reopenings to avoid injustice when no court appeal had occurred, and that res judicata did not bar the correction in these circumstances.

labor & employmentprocedure

This case arose from a 1985 firefighter training exercise in which the State Fire Marshal's office set fires in a dilapidated office building attached to a tobacco warehouse; the fire spread out of control within minutes, destroying the warehouse and its contents of lumber stored by the lessees. After the City of Lebanon settled the resulting tort claims for $230,000, the claimants pursued the Commonwealth before the Board of Claims, which found the state 90 percent at fault, calculated gross damages for each claimant, and then offset those amounts by the city settlement payments pursuant to KRS 44.070(1). The Board limited the warehouse owner's recovery to his $10,200 purchase price plus lost profits, and the claimants appealed the set-offs and the measure of real-estate damages. The Supreme Court of Kentucky held that the statutory offsets were properly applied and that the Board had used an incorrect measure of damages for the permanent injury to real property, reversing and remanding for recalculation of the owner's award.

torts & liabilitypropertyprocedure

In Dean v. Commonwealth, the appellant was convicted by a jury of multiple counts of first-degree rape and sodomy, as well as complicity to those crimes, arising from the abduction and sexual assault of a 16-year-old victim by Dean and a co-defendant over several hours, and he received a 90-year prison sentence. Dean appealed as of right, primarily contending that his taped confession should have been suppressed because a comment during interrogation about whether he should have someone present constituted an invocation of his right to counsel under Miranda, and he also raised issues including change of venue, prosecutorial remarks, sufficiency of evidence for complicity, exclusion of penalty-phase evidence, and jury pool composition. The Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the convictions and sentence, holding that Dean's remark was equivocal and did not clearly request counsel so as to require cessation of questioning under Edwards v. Arizona, that the trial court properly distinguished precedent on the issue, and that the remaining claims were either unpreserved, waived, or lacked merit under applicable statutes and rules.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved William Edward Sanders's convictions by a Kentucky jury for first-degree rape, two counts of first-degree sodomy, first-degree robbery, first-degree burglary, second-degree burglary, fourth-degree assault, and second-degree persistent felony offender status, resulting in consecutive sentences totaling 170 years. Sanders challenged the denial of his motion to suppress victim identifications from a photographic lineup that included two photos of him, the denial of his directed verdict motion, and the application of the violent offender statute (KRS 439.3401) that would require him to serve 85 years before parole eligibility. The court held that the identifications were reliable under the totality of circumstances per Neil v. Biggers and Simmons v. United States, that sufficient evidence supported the convictions, and that the statute's disparate treatment of term-of-years sentences versus life sentences lacked a rational basis and violated equal protection and due process. The convictions were affirmed, but the sentencing application of the violent offender statute was ruled unconstitutional.

criminal lawprocedure

In Pelfrey v. Commonwealth, the defendant was convicted of first-degree manslaughter after a shooting incident involving himself and an accomplice, Wise, who was separately tried and convicted first of wanton endangerment arising from the same events. Pelfrey argued that his Sixth Amendment and state constitutional rights to an impartial jury were violated because four jurors who had convicted Wise, along with others exposed to that trial, served on his jury panel, and the trial court denied his motion for a continuance to obtain a new panel. The Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, holding that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying the continuance given the safeguards of voir dire under the criminal rules, the lack of any challenges for cause during voir dire, and the judge's admonition to the jury to consider only evidence from Pelfrey's trial. The court further reasoned that failing to object to jurors before trial waived any claim of bias on appeal. The dissent argued that the prior exposure created inherent prejudice that could not be cured.

criminal lawprocedure

This case involves Darrell Perry's appeal of his convictions for attempted murder of a sheriff's deputy, first-degree burglary, and theft, as well as the Commonwealth's appeal of the trial court's order vacating Perry's first-degree assault conviction on his step-grandson and granting a new trial. The court affirmed the convictions for attempted murder, burglary, and theft, finding that the evidence was sufficient to support the jury's rejection of Perry's extreme emotional disturbance defense and that a directed verdict was properly denied. It reversed the order for a new trial on the assault conviction, holding that the jury instructions correctly permitted a lesser-included offense of first-degree assault based on the evidence regarding Perry's intent, and remanded for further proceedings to reinstate that conviction.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved the convictions of Sam Harris, Jr. for second-degree burglary, first-degree rape, and attempted first-degree sodomy in Fayette County, Kentucky, based on DNA analysis matching semen from the victim to Harris and a videotaped confession obtained after Miranda warnings. The trial court admitted the DNA evidence under the Frye standard for scientific reliability after hearing expert testimony on the FBI's RFLP testing procedures, quality controls, and statistical probabilities (one in eight million for a match in the relevant population), and the jury imposed consecutive sentences totaling twenty-nine years. The Supreme Court of Kentucky affirmed the convictions, holding that the DNA evidence was properly admitted despite incomplete compliance with Frye and that the confession was voluntary given Harris's awareness of his rights, lack of coercion, and knowledge of the DNA results. The court rejected challenges to the sufficiency of the evidence and procedural claims regarding the suppression hearing.

criminal lawprocedure

The case involved Robert and Barbara Hazel, who were convicted after a joint trial of multiple sexual offenses against Barbara's minor daughter, C.H., including first-degree rape, sodomy, sexual abuse, and related charges, based in part on photographs discovered during a police search. The trial court denied a motion to suppress the photos, which were found in a drawer while officers executed a valid warrant for drugs, and the Hazels appealed their convictions on grounds that the evidence was improperly admitted. The Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the judgments, holding that the photographs were properly seized under the plain view doctrine because officers had a right to search the drawer for drugs and the images immediately indicated criminal activity involving the child. The court also noted that the evidence would have been discovered anyway through an independent prior child abuse investigation from 1985. The core reasoning focused on the validity of the search warrant execution and established exceptions to the warrant requirement for plain view and inevitable discovery.

criminal lawprocedure