Robert E. Redington v. State of Indiana

992 N.E.2d 823, 2013 WL 3989296, 2013 Ind. App. LEXIS 374
CourtIndiana Court of Appeals
DecidedAugust 6, 2013
Docket53A01-1210-CR-461
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 992 N.E.2d 823 (Robert E. Redington v. State of Indiana) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Robert E. Redington v. State of Indiana, 992 N.E.2d 823, 2013 WL 3989296, 2013 Ind. App. LEXIS 374 (Ind. Ct. App. 2013).

Opinions

OPINION

BROWN, Judge.

Robert E. Redington appeals from the trial court’s order to retain firearms. Redington raises four issues, which we consolidate and restate as:

I. Whether Ind.Code § 35-47-14-1 et seq., as applied to Redington, is unconstitutional; and
II. Whether the evidence is sufficient to support the order that Reding-ton’s firearms be retained.

We affirm.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY1

In late July 2012, Redington, who lives in Indianapolis, approached Devon Moore, a Bloomington parking enforcement officer in a Bloomington parking garage and began telling him that he has a gun range and that he found a person dead behind the range and thought perhaps he had killed the man, but that he subsequently learned that the man had killed himself. As Moore attempted to walk away, Red-ington followed him and began speaking about Lauren Spierer, an Indiana University student who had disappeared, and stated that he was in Bloomington to help find her, explaining that he had met her previously and that “he thought that she would come back and he would see her either through spirit or her physical body.” Transcript at 9. He also said that he believed Spierer would “come around” to Kilroy’s Sports Bar, which was where she had been the night she went missing, and that “he was just waiting for her to be there.” Id. at 13. Redington also stated that “he sees spirits and dark entities” and spoke about Jewish neighbors of his who “molested one of their daughters and [Reding-ton] found out about it and they took him [ ] up north somewhere and [ ] let him off in a cornfield,” and about how he “and his dad could see dark spirits in his home_” Id. at 9. Redington also told Moore that “he had guns on him and it made [him] feel ... courageous to have” them. Id. at 11. Moore phoned his boss after ending the encounter with Reding-ton, and his boss told him that if he observed Redington again he should call the police.

About a week later, on August 4, 2012, Moore again observed Redington on the third floor of the same parking garage appearing to be looking through binoculars toward Kilroy’s, and Moore called the police. Bloomington Police Officer Kyle Abram and another officer responded and observed Redington in the northwest corner of the third floor overlooking Kilroy’s holding a range finder and, with guns [826]*826drawn, made contact with him. Redington put his hands up and told the officers that he had a gun, and Officer McCoy, the second officer, recovered a handgun from Redington’s pocket. Officer McCoy unloaded the gun, which had a bullet in the chamber and a full magazine, and then handed the weapon to Officer William Keaton, who had arrived on the scene. Officer Abram then observed a second gun sticking out from Redington’s right front pocket, and Officer McCoy retrieved that gun as well, unloaded it, and handed it to Officer Keaton. Redington informed the officers that he had a shotgun in his vehicle which the officers eventually retrieved, as well as various rounds of ammunition located throughout the car.

The officers asked Redington why he was there, and he responded that he had been coming to Bloomington from Indianapolis for several weekends in a row and that he was “looking at or for people and at buildings and at lights.” Id. at 31. Redington then said that he had previously met Spierer at a gun range and “he got her name wrong and ... he felt and told her that he felt that she was in danger of some type and that he warned her of that....” Id. Redington also told the officers that he checked the range of the front door of Kilroy’s with his range finder and asked the officers if they “felt with the firearms that [they] carry on duty ... in a firefight that we would be able to hit someone from sixty-six yards during and in the mist [sic] of a firefight.” Id. at 32. Soon after, Redington mentioned that “he had ranged what would be approximately sixty-six yards from where he ... was standing ... [on] the third floor of the parking garage to ... where you would come around the corner” the officers used to approach. Id. Redington also stated that he ranged to somewhere near the back of Kilroy’s as being approximately sixty-six yards. Officer Abram asked Redington at some point if he owned other guns, and Redington laughed and said that he had several and specifically noted that he owned a rifle that “he had sighted in at that distance of sixty-six yards” and that “he could shoot accurately at that distance.” Id. at 33-34. Redington’s statements “alarmed [Officer Abram] quite a bit.” Id. at 34.

Officer Abram asked Redington if he would come to the police station to speak about the Spierer case, and Redington agreed and drove himself to the station. Bloomington Police phoned Detective Randy Gehlhausen, who had been working on the Spierer investigation, to come in and interview Redington. At the outset of the interview, Detective Gehlhausen asked Redington why he was in Bloomington and Redington replied: “I am in searching of anything I can come up with. Anything. I get kinda weird here, so and I don’t, I don’t allow myself to be limited to the physical. If I get a funny feeling, that’s good enough.” Exhibit A at 4-5. Reding-ton then stated that he was looking for Spierer, telling Detective Gehlhausen that he had met Spierer at a gun range three years ago with Cory Rossman, who was a person of interest in the investigation, and that Redington had warned her that she was in danger. Detective Gehlhausen knew that this was not true because Spierer and Rossman were not acquainted at that time. Redington told Detective Gehl-hausen that he had been looking for Spierer and wanted to avenge her. He spoke about observing a petite woman on the college campus and how “[i]t would take nothing to just grab her and toss her in” a vehicle, and how he went to a strip club and paid a stripper one dollar for every question he asked her, including how much she weighed, how tall she is, and how much she can drink in an evening. Id. at 24. Redington told Detective Gehlhausen [827]*827that, based upon her responses, in which she said she was four feet, six inches tall and weighed ninety-two pounds, he thought: “Could she put up a fight? Could she do anything? Could she run? What could she do?” Id. at 25.

Redington also stated that he had dreams about death and told stories including that his father told him that he would see him again after he passed, which came true, that he recalled an incident “about seeing an owl and a black man involved in the Spierer investigation by an ash tree close to Kilroy’s,” and that once, while attending a church in North Carolina, he envisioned that the pastor’s son was committing suicide which turned out to be the case. Transcript at 67-68. He told Detective Gehlhausen that he possessed “[i]nsight” and has a “[sjpiritual gift of prophecy.” Exhibit A at 44. Detective Gehlhausen’s impression of Redington based upon the interview was that he appeared “very delusional,” noting also that Redington “would just jump from one conversation to the next” and that he would talk to himself when he was alone and would talk under his breath to himself when in the presence of others. Transcript at 69. Redington also told Detective Gehlhausen that he did not point a rifle at anybody “because there’s too many cameras and that he would have been seen.” Id. at 70.

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992 N.E.2d 823, 2013 WL 3989296, 2013 Ind. App. LEXIS 374, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/robert-e-redington-v-state-of-indiana-indctapp-2013.