The Topete trial’s guilt phase will likely end today as both the prosecution and defense are expected to give their closing statements.
The defense has attempted to build a case that Mr. Topete is brain-damaged and lacks the ability to control his behavior.
District Attorney Jeff Reisig asked the court for more time to prepare if Mr. Topete indeed were going to testify. For once, the two sides were agreeing, with Defense Attorney Hayes Gable stating that he would need time as well, as he chuckled nervously.
Mr. Topete ultimately decided against testifying, but it would have been an interesting twist in a trial filled with so many twists and turns.
The defense case has been built around testimony from psychiatric experts who argued that Mr. Topete suffers from a number of ailments, including alcoholism, attention deficit, post-traumatic stress and an anti-social disorder.
Mr. Topete was described as a broken man. He had gotten out of prison and wanted to change his life, settling down with his pregnant wife. He was unable to hold jobs and eventually unable to live in the home in Davis that was costing the couple $1500 a month in rent.
The defense vividly described his trauma and turmoil, inculding waking in the middle of the night screaming.
His wife, Angelique Topete, testified that Mr. Topete was “very jumpy” after being released from prison. He did not like loud noises. He had nightmares and would wake up with breathing difficulties.
She testified that these nightmares occurred almost every night, and they left him sleep-deprived and irritable.
Mr. Topete was forced to rely on his wife’s income, and there were points when they had no income. For instance, Angelique had a problem receiving her maternity leave from her job at Lowe’s, because they said she had been pregnant before she began working there and therefore did not qualify for maternity leave benefits.
They struggled financially, borrowing money from Mr. Topete’s mother to survive.
According to Mr. Gable, all of this wore on Mr. Topete. The combination of alcohol problems and arguments with relatives contributed to the ultimate breakdown for Mr. Topete when, heavily intoxicated, he would lose control over his behavior during his encounter with Deputy Diaz.
“The defense is confident that when you apply the law to the case you will find that Mr. Topete did not act with premeditation or deliberation, nor did he lie in wait for Deputy Diaz,” Mr. Gable told the jury.
Dr. Rahn Minagawa testified that he was told by Mr. Topete and his sisters that their father would routinely beat them with belts and paddles. Â Â On another occasion, the father hit him with a wrench.
The doctor diagnosed Mr. Topete with a complex trauma, saying that these conditions could lead to problems with trust, high-risk behaviors, bursts of rage and a lack of self-control.
However, the prosecution was able to make the point that most of the details of Mr. Topete’s emerging life after prison come from Mr. Topete himself. Few of these descriptions have been independently confirmed.
Deputy DA Garrett Hamilton went on to suggest that Mr. Topete was less a victim and more a perpetrator of violence.
The prosecution’s rebuttal witness, Dr. Jason Roof, a psychiatrist at UC Davis, said that after viewing the dash camera video, there appeared to be several points where Mr. Topete made conscious decisions.
“Potentially, this could have been a plan,” Dr. Roof testified. “There’s some purpose to this.”
He argued at one point that when Mr. Topete turned his vehicle during the chase, he appeared to charge at the oncoming deputy’s car. He said that this did not appear to be “fleeing type” behavior.
However, Dr. Roof acknowledged that he had not personally examined Mr. Topete and therefore could not provide a diagnosis of his mental health condition.
Mr. Topete’s psychiatrists testified that scans of Mr. Topete’s brain had showed damage.
However, last week, Dr. Roof testified that while he agreed that the brain scans showed brain damage, he did not see evidence that such damage would have impacted Mr. Topete’s behavior.
On Friday, another doctor, Dr. Tucker, was recalled to rebut Dr. Roof’s testimony. He testified that Mr. Topete was filled with a combination of alcohol and other factors that would cause him to cease thinking clearly about his behavior and consequences.
However, Deputy DA Garrett Hamilton countered that Mr. Topete made a conscious decision to have a semi-automatic assault rifle in the car with him.
Mr. Hamilton would then use his cell phone to have the jury sit in silence for two minutes, making the point that this was sufficient time for Mr. Topete to formulate a plan as this was shown to be the time between when Mr. Topete got out of his car and the shots began.
While Mr. Hamilton made the point that he had a loaded gun in possession this entire time and Mr. Topete had plenty of time in which he could have decided not to shoot. At the same time, without knowing the state of his mind, it is hard to know if Mr. Topete at this point was having rational thoughts.
Holding people in silence for two minutes makes the point that two minutes are longer than one thinks, but fails to situate the jurors and other observers in a true facsimile of the actual situation at hand, which was both fast-moving and dynamic.
The defense would put on their own blood alcohol expert, Kenton Wong, a forensic blood alcohol expert. He reached similar conclusions to Joseph Palecek, a senior criminalist at the California Department of Justice, who testified for the prosecution as to what Mr. Topete’s likely blood alcohol level was – maximum of .20 with the possibility of being lower.
However, unlike Mr. Palacek, Mr. Wong testified that the mere fact that Mr. Topete could drive at a high rate of speed, without incurring an accident, does not mean that he was sober. The determination of how intoxicated Mr. Topete may have been affects the determination of whether he formed the requisite intent to shoot Deputy Diaz.
“It’s wide open out there,” Mr. Wong said of the terrain. “There’s not a lot of things to hit.”
Mr. Palecek had testified that, given the description of the chase, he would be surprised if Mr. Topete could navigate the course at that speed without serious risk and the likelihood of an accident. He said he would have issues with the high-speed turns, among other things.
He testified that his experience observing drivers on a closed test course showed people having trouble maintaining the course, even at much slower speeds, with a blood alcohol level of 0.08, the legal limit.
In his opinion, for someone to drive without issue would be highly unlikely, and therefore he questioned whether Mr. Topete really had a high level of intoxication.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
The DA should have just offered life in prison with no parole, and saved everyone the expense and drama.
This guy is likely to go sit on death row for the rest of his life, and cost all of us huge amounts of money above what normal prisontime costs.
Meanhwile, the victims and others close to them are going to spend most of the rest of their lives reading about the appeals, going to hearings, on and on.
California should abolish the death penalty.
Frankly, the Topete case is probably not one death penalty opponents should be pointing to in order to justify abolishment…
The argument made earlier was that Topete lured the officer into an ambush – that would have required some planning prior to the chase. Now the presecution seems to be saying they got to a place and then Topete took two minutes to “plan” his attack and by the way the “plan” did not include any sort of getaway.
[i][quote]”At the same time, without knowing the state of his mind, it is hard to know if Mr. Topete at this point was having rational thoughts….The determination of how intoxicated Mr. Topete may have been affects the determination of whether he formed the requisite intent to shoot Deputy Diaz.”[/quote][/i]Now that the defense has produced these conclusions (of yours?), I suspect you no longer would fault the DA’s strategy to include Mr. Topete’s gang membership and assure that all prosecution death penalty options are covered.
California should abolish the death penalty.
That was the defense case. I just got back from watching the closing arguments. The defense made an impressive showing particularly on the gang issue. I was not impressed with the prosecutor’s case, but they have the facts on their side. The defense put up a credible argument for Second Degree Murder, I don’t think they’ll get it, but it was impressive.
“Frankly, the Topete case is probably not one death penalty opponents should be pointing to in order to justify abolishment… “
I disagree. This is exactly the case, they spent huge amounts of money and time trying this case over three years, bungled it all over the place, and the guy is never going to be executed even if convicted and sentenced to death, I can’t think of a stronger case, short of an innocent being executed that would scream for reform more than this one.
[i][quote]”This is exactly the case, they spent huge amounts of money and time trying this case over three years, bungled it all over the place, and the guy is never going to be executed even if convicted and sentenced to death, I can’t think of a stronger case, short of an innocent being executed that would scream for reform more than this one.”[/quote][/i]Do you really think that six months from now anyone will care about these trial issues, as concerning as they might seem now?
I’m not convinced that the cost and three-year preparation would have differed significantly if the DA hadn’t sought the death penalty–considering that Mr. Topete is responsible for much of the delay and that there’s a credible defense case for second degree.
It’s fascinating that the best argument against the death penalty (we’re killing innocents) hasn’t swayed the populace enough to change, but that a weak one (we want to spend the money on something else now) may turn the tide. Either way, it’s past time.
In six months, no one will be remembering this case – I agree. The building of the record however, will matter.
In terms of cost, you have a four month trial. You have two court appointed attorneys (you only get one in a non-capital trial). You have a penalty phase that doubles the time. YOu have mandatory money for expert witnesses and psychiatric evaluations. One expert, the psyche cost $50K. That’s just absurd money that you would never see in a public defensed trial that was non-capital.
I agree with you there is a credible (though longshot) case for second degree. There would have been a trial without the death penalty, though ironically with the death penalty, the defense probably would have taken an LWOP offer. Obviously without the DP, they would not have.
[quote]I disagree. This is exactly the case, they spent huge amounts of money and time trying this case over three years, bungled it all over the place, and the guy is never going to be executed even if convicted and sentenced to death, I can’t think of a stronger case, short of an innocent being executed that would scream for reform more than this one.[/quote]
I don’t think the money angle is nearly as compelling as the innocence angle. One can argue it is worth any amount of money to wipe a cold-blooded killer off the face of the earth – and it probably is the reason people still favor the death penalty 2 to 1. It is the cases where some completely innocent person ends up on death row that makes the stronger argument. But we can agree to disagree on this one 🙂