United States v. Schlamer

47 M.J. 670, 1997 CCA LEXIS 531, 1997 WL 728876
CourtNavy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals
DecidedNovember 10, 1997
DocketNMCM 96 00212
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 47 M.J. 670 (United States v. Schlamer) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Schlamer, 47 M.J. 670, 1997 CCA LEXIS 531, 1997 WL 728876 (N.M. 1997).

Opinion

OLIVER, Judge:

A general court-martial composed of officer and enlisted members convicted the appellant, contrary to his pleas, of several serious crimes stemming from a violent attack on a woman Marine. These were: unlawful possession of various weapons, premeditated murder, aggravated assault, and unlawful entry, in violation of Articles 92, 118, 128, and 134, Uniform Code of Military Justice, 10 U.S.C. §§ 892, 918, 928, and 934 (1994)[here-inafter UCMJ]. The panel adjudged a sentence of confinement for life, a dishonorable discharge, total forfeitures, and reduction to the lowest enlisted pay grade. The convening authority approved the sentence and, except for the punitive discharge, ordered it executed. This case is before us for review under Article 66, UCMJ, 10 U.S.C. § 866.

Background Facts

Sometime between midnight and the early morning hours of 16 October 1993 Lance Corporal Beverly Gardner was brutally murdered in her barracks room at Camp Le-jeune, North Carolina. Although she had been strangled and assaulted, she died because someone had cut her throat all the way to her backbone. After her roommate discovered her body about 1130 that morning, emergency medical personnel tried to revive her. Shortly after she was declared dead, Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) investigators began to gather evidence and conduct interviews.

A comprehensive investigation, involving scores of agents, revealed several possible suspects. Since the appellant had been reported knocking on doors in the women’s barracks around 0200, the NCIS interviewed him, along with hundreds of other possible witnesses. The investigators believed he had been less than candid about what he had been doing that morning, and the investigators discovered what appeared to be blood on a shirt they found during a consent search of his room. Consequently, the NCIS decided to interrogate the appellant along with several other suspects on 22 October 1993. However, the NCIS agents who interrogated the appellant admitted that, prior to that critical interview, they did not believe he was a prime suspect.

After advising the appellant of his rights under Article 31, UCMJ, 10 U.S.C. § 831, two NCIS agents began to ask the appellant questions about his version of what had happened that night. He first admitted that he had, in fact, been knocking on doors'in the women’s barracks, including that of the victim. After about 2 hours, the appellant first admitted that he had killed Private Gardner. He stated that after he entered her room in search of a sexual liaison, he strangled her, knocked her head against the floor, and, after returning to his room to get a knife, killed her. He confessed that he cut her throat several times, stopping only after he “felt something hard.” Record at 2310.

[674]*674After the NCIS agents typed up a written confession, the appellant read the document, made a minor correction, initialed it in several places, and swore to its accuracy before signing it. Prosecution Exhibit 5. He consented to comprehensive searches of his room and his car. The NCIS then took hair and fluid samples.

Shortly thereafter, the appellant repeated the details of his confession in the office of the senior investigator. Using the senior investigator as a “dummy,” the appellant demonstrated how he had choked his victim, how she had struggled and then collapsed to the floor, and how he hit her head against the floor after she lost consciousness. The appellant then admitted that he left the room. However, worried about how much trouble he would be in as soon as Lance Corporal Gardner recovered, he got his knife, returned to her room, and cut her throat. Again using the senior investigator as a prop, the appellant demonstrated exactly how he committed the murder.

Through the testimony of two Navy psychiatrists who had interviewed and tested the appellant as part of a team some 16 months after the incident, the defense developed the position at trial that his confession was false. Since the doctors had determined that the appellant possessed extremely low self-esteem, they both testified that he would have signed just about anything to avoid conflict. Moreover, since they concluded that he was suffering from an alcohol-induced blackout on the night in question, they testified that he could not possibly have remembered all the details contained in his confession. They speculated that the appellant simply adopted the facts of the crime which the NCIS agents suggested, a process the psychiatrists referred to as “suggestibility” or “confabulation.” Record at 2523, 2556, 2637. See Defense Exhibit PP (definitions).

On the other hand, the doctors emphasized that they were not concluding that the appellant had not committed the murder. Moreover, they testified that if he had done so, the fact that he was suffering from an alcoholic blackout did not mean he could not have premeditated the crime. Additionally, the appellant admitted to both of his doctors that he recalled knocking on Lance Corporal Gardner’s door and being in her room, with a knife, during the early morning hours of 16 October 1993. Record at 2533; Defense Exhibit LL.

The defense team also noted at trial and in its brief that there was little evidence corroborating the appellant’s confession. None of his fingerprints were found in Lance Corporal Gardner’s room. There was no trail of her blood found leading to or in his room. While several witnesses testified that they saw him knocking on doors, no one saw the appellant enter or leave the victim’s room.

This does not mean, however, that there was no such evidence. The investigators found small droplets of blood, consistent with the victim’s but which could not have come from the appellant, on the Avia-brand athletic shoes the appellant said that he was wearing when he committed the murder. Record at 1928, 1934-35. Two hairs, which an expert testified were “consistent with” the appellant’s, were found on a chair near the victim’s body. Record at 1949-50. A forensics expert testified that he found a blood stain on the outside of the right sleeve of a Nike sweatshirt the appellant said he was wearing when he committed the murder. While there was not enough even to determine if it was human or animal blood, the appellant stated that he had washed the sweatshirt after the murder, and the expert testified that a machine washing would likely have produced this result. Record at 1926-28.

A witness, who was watching television in an adjoining room, testified that he heard a muffled scream and several thuds at about 0230; this was consistent with the time the appellant stated in his confession that his victim screamed and he struck her head repeatedly against the floor. Record at 2690-92. The authorities also found a knife, which the appellant said he had used to kill Lance Corporal Gardner, beneath the passenger seat in his car. A screening test of the knife revealed that it was presumptively positive for blood.

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Related

United States v. Schlamer
52 M.J. 80 (Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, 1999)

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Bluebook (online)
47 M.J. 670, 1997 CCA LEXIS 531, 1997 WL 728876, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-schlamer-nmcca-1997.