Publications Written By Attorney Addison Steele in Santa Barbara, California

• Talking to a Represented Witness, California Defender, Summer, 2013.
• California Defender is a quarterly publication by the California Public Defenders Association. It is distributed to all members to be used as a training tool for the member attorneys and keep them current on developments in the law.
• Integrating Neuropsychology into Your Defense 101, California Defender, Spring 2012.
• Capital Litigation in Riverside County, Riverside Lawyer Magazine, Volume 60 Number 8, September 2010.
• Riverside Lawyer is a monthly publication of the Riverside County Bar Association. It is distributed to all members of the organization. 
• Commentary: The Truth About Why You Cannot Get Your Civil Case out to Trial and the Defense Bar's Responsibilities With Regard to the Situation, Riverside Lawyer Magazine, Volume 58 Number 10, November 2008.
• Molestation Cases Need to Have Limits, The Press-Enterprise, Perspective, April 2, 2006.
• The Press-Enterprise is an Inland Empire daily newspaper.
• Advice for Racists in Court [a satire], The Press-Enterprise, Perspective, February 13, 2005.
• The Politics of Hate, Santa Barbara News-Press, Perspective, February 14, 1999.
• The Santa Barbara News-Press is a Santa Barbara daily newspaper.
  

Legal Myth Busters

Myth:  If the police don't read me my rights the case has to be dismissed.

Reality:  A Miranda warning is an important part of the law on television.  In real life it very rarely has any importance.  It is EXTREMELY rare for a person's statement or confession to be suppressed because they weren't given a Miranda warning.  Even on those VERY rare occasions, it's not necessarily helpful, because the person suppression is undone if the person chooses to testify.

So here's the history, a guy named Ernesto Miranda took his case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.  That led to a U.S. Supreme Court decision Miranda v. Arizona (1966) 384 U.S. 436.  The ruling is about "custodial interrogations."  That means that it established a rule for when the police interrogate someone.  That rule is that if someone is in custody before they can be interrogated the police must inform the person of his or her right to remain silent and to have a lawyer.  What it has turned into, probably because it's what police, and the people that train them, have seen on television, is a meaningless ritual when someone is being arrested.  If a person is interrogated without a Miranda warning, and if that person confesses to a crime or makes statements harmful to his or her defense, there's a very small chance that the prosecution will not be able to use that confession or those harmful statements in their "case in chief" against the person.  That means that statements being suppressed because of a Miranda violation only helps if the person does not testify in his or her own defense.  The statements are only suppressed "for all purposes," meaning they cannot be used at all in the person's trial, if the Miranda violation was done in bad faith by the police.

After the Miranda ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court set out on a course to water it down.  That started with Harris v. New York (1971) 401 U.S. 222.  That decision made a new rule that a confession extracted in violation of Miranda could still be used to impeach a person.  That meant that if the person won the Miranda motion, an EXTREMELY occurrence, if the person takes the witness stand in his or her defense the confession will still come in as evidence against him or her.  That's okay in some cases where the person doesn't need to take the witness stand, but there are a lot of cases where the person has to take the stand and testify.  For example, in a self defense case it often difficult to even get a self defense jury instruction if the accused person doesn't take the witness stand.  In cases where the only people present are the accused and the accuser, the accused is at a huge disadvantage if he or she does not testify and the jury only hears the accuser's testimony.  In these cases winning a Miranda motion is useless because the statements or confession will still be used as evidence even though the Miranda motion was won.   

So what if the police didn't give a Miranda warning in bad faith.  Getting this kind of ruling is so rare it's virtually unheard of.  The most famous example is a case that was also heard by the U.S. Supreme Court Missouri v. Seibert (2004) 542 U.S. 600.  In that case officers had been trained to not give Miranda warning, get a confession, then give a Miranda warning and try to get the person to repeat the confession after the Miranda warnings were given.  The police strategy was that if the confession was repeated everything was fine, and if it wasn't repeated, at least the person wouldn't be able defend themselves on the witness stand because the confession could be used for impeachment per the Harris v. New York case.  That kind of planning is bad faith.  Police departments, at least publicly, stopped using that technique after the Missouri v. Seibert case. 

What's worse is that Miranda keeps getting watered down.  The U.S. Supreme Court keeps coming up with new exceptions to need to give Miranda warnings.  For example, Rhode Island v. Innis (1980) 446 U.S. 291 made a new rule that an in custody "spontaneous" statement didn't need a Miranda warning if the statement wasn't in response to a direct question.  So the police could then get incriminating statements by making vague comments like, "Your parents aren't going to be happy about your situation," or anything else like that which isn't a direct question, but is likely to get the accused person to say something.  Another example is the "public safety" exception created by New York v. Quarles (1984) 467 U.S. 649, because of Quarles the police don't have to give a Miranda warning if the questioning is needed for public safety.  One example of this is the interrogation of Richard Allen Davis in a homicide case.  In that case the "public safety" exception was used despite the person that Davis was being questioned about having been missing for more than two months.  One more example is Colorado v. Connelly (1986) 479 U.S. 157 in which the U.S. Supreme Court decided that it didn't matter if the person confessing was developmentally disabled, only if a reasonable person would think the person was not developmentally disabled.  This established a rule that the police could get a "knowing, intelligent and voluntary" Miranda waiver from a developmentally disabled person as long as the person didn't look or sound developmentally disabled.

When a client says, "The police didn't read me my rights when they arrested me, that means they have to dismiss the case, right."  The first question is, "Were you interrogated and did you give them an incriminating statement?"  If the answer to the question is, "No, they didn't ask me any questions," or, "I didn't say anything to them," then the response is, "Well, then whether or not you were given a Miranda warning just doesn't matter, and no your case is not going to be dismissed."  If the answer is, "Yeah, they asked me questions and I confessed to the crime."  Then the next question is going to be, were you detained or under arrest when you confessed to the crime?"  If the answer to that question is, "Ugh no, we were just talking on the sidewalk, they never said that I couldn't leave, it was clear to me if I wanted to leave I could."  Then the answer is going to be, "It doesn't matter if you weren't read your rights, they're going to be able to use that confession against you, and no your case is not going to be dismissed."  If the answer is, "They did not read me my rights and I was in handcuffs in an interrogation room in the police station," then the next question is, "Was your confession the only evidence against you?"  If the answer to that question is, "Oh no, they have my fingerprints, my DNA, and there's a video, there's plenty of other evidence," then the answer is going to be, "No, your case is not going to be dismissed because even if we win a Miranda motion and your confession is suppressed, they have plenty of other evidence against you, so they're not going to dismiss your case."

Over the past few years the police have added a tactic where they bring the person into the station for an interrogation, tell the person that they can leave any time, don't put them in handcuffs, tell them they are not under arrest and are not being detained, leave the door to the room open, NOT read them their Miranda rights, and using psychologically manipulative methods, get the person to confess.  They then let the person leave and go get a judge to sign an arrest warrant based on the confession.  This is allowed by California v. Beheler (1983) 463 U.S. 1121.

Myth:  Security at store is not allowed to touch you if they suspect you of shoplifting.

Reality:  Some stores, particularly large chains, have a policy of not allowing their employees or loss prevention people to touch someone that is suspected of stealing from them.  The want to avoid liability if the person that is stealing fights and someone gets injured.  However, must business don't have such a policy, and it appears that more and more business have just the opposite policy.  They want their employees or loss prevention people to grab someone that is stealing from them so they can turn a misdemeanor shoplifting into a felony violent strike robbery.

A shoplifting can turn into a felony violent strike because of a California Supreme Court case People v. Estes (1983) 147 Cal.App.3d 24.  The Estes case established a rule that merchant or loss prevention officer can be the victim of a robbery of a store's property even though the merchant or loss prevention officer is not the owner of the property that's being stolen.  Robbery is the taking of the property of another by means of force or fear.  So if the store employee or loss prevention person grabs a shoplifter, and the shoplifter uses any force at all to resist being grabbed, the shoplifting becomes a felony violent strike. 

So not only is there not a law that a merchant, store employee or loss prevention person cannot touch a person that is stealing, the law actually encourages them grabbing someone so they can turn a shoplifting into a robbery, which is commonly referred to in court as an Estes robbery.

Myth:  The "victim" has to "press charges" for me to be charged with a crime.

Reality:  This is one of the most prevalent legal myths out there.  There is only one place in California where "pressing charges" exists, that is Hollywood in the movies and on television.  The way the system works is that someone calls the police, they give the police a statement.  The police then write a report, that report is sent to the district attorney.  A filing deputy reads the report and make a filing decision.  There are several things that causes confusion with this:  One is that often the police will ask the "victim" if they want to "press charges."  What they should be asking, and often accurately do ask is, "Are you willing to cooperate with prosecution?"  Another thing that causes confusion is that for a misdemeanor that is not seen by a law enforcement officer requires the "victim" to sign onto or agree to a "citizen's arrest," the citizen doesn't actually arrest anyone, nor does the citizen have the authority to arrest anyone, that's just what it's called.  However, once the person has given the statement or signed off on the "citizens arrest" it's done, if the person changes their mind, it will not unwind the district attorney's case. 

This myth most often comes up in domestic violence cases.  The person charged has several thoughts because of the myth.  "My significant other doesn't want to press charges, so they have to dismiss it."  That is one hundred percent incorrect.  Especially with domestic violence cases, the district attorney is geared up for and even expects the "victim" to "go sideways."  Another one is, "My significant other is just going to call up the district attorney and explain that nothing happened [they were the aggressor, not me, it was all just a big misunderstanding, it was just an argument, etc.] and the case has to be dismissed."  Not only will that not result in the case being dismissed, it will actually make things worse because the district attorney will decide, in his or her own mind, that the reason the "victim" is "going sideways" is that the "victim" is being manipulated or controlled by the person that's accused of the crime.

The district attorney will take the stance that the person not wanting to "press charges" is because that person is being further victimized.

The Unwritten Rules in Court

Unwritten Rule:  If you are saved from a life sentence by a jury, you must then pay the Victory Tax.

What is the Victory Tax?  The Victory Tax is the penalty that must be paid for winning the most serious charge or charges in a jury trial, and that tax is the judge will sentence to the maximum for whatever is left.  For example if a person is found not guilty of first degree murder, which has a mandatory sentence of twenty-five years to life, and second degree murder, which has a mandatory sentence of fifteen years to life, and is only convicted of voluntary manslaughter, which has a maximum sentence of eleven years, the unwritten rule is that he must be sentenced to the maximum and all enhancements that are left as a punishment for having the unmitigated audacity to be acquitted by a jury of all the charges that carry a life sentence.

An example is Addison's client Edward A.  Eddie was found not guilty of first degree murder, found not guilty of second degree murder and only found guilty of voluntary manslaughter.  The judge could have sentenced Eddie to the low term of three years prison, the middle term of six years prison, or the upper term of eleven years prison.  Eddie also had a one year enhancement for the use of a knife and two one year enhancements for having been to prison twice before.  Instead of sentencing to the presumed term which is the middle term of six years, the judge imposed the Victory Tax.  Eddie had the audacity to win the life sentence counts, that meant the judge would impose the Victory Tax and sentence him to all the time he could for what was left.  He got fourteen years prison:  The upper term of eleven years, one year for use of a knife and two years for having been to prison twice before for a total of fourteen.  A fair sentence would have been the middle term of six years, one year for the knife and one year for one of the prison priors, for a total of eight years, but no he had beaten the life in prison charges with a jury trial, so he had to pay the Victory Tax and be sentenced to every minute of everything that was left.

Another example is Addison's client Jaray C.  Jaray was found not guilty first degree murder, found not guilty of second degree murder, and for each of those counts gang allegations were not reached because he was found not guilty, and personal use of a gun allegations, which also carried mandatory twenty-five years to life sentences, were not reached because of the not guilty verdicts.  He was also found not guilty of five additional robberies, one was an acquittal by the judge pursuant to Penal Code section 1118.1, and gang allegations and personal use of gun allegations were not reached on those as well because of the not guilty verdicts.  He was found guilty of  of two conceded counts of attempted robbery, but the gang allegations and personal use of a gun allegations were found not true by the jury, a conceded count of commercial burglary, but the gang allegations and personal use of a gun allegations were found not true by the jury, and conceded count of gun use by a co-defendant.  Instead of sentencing to the presumed term of the middle term or even granting probation, which would have been fair considering that Jaray had no criminal history, the imposed the Victory Tax.  Jaray had the audacity to win the life sentence counts and five other alleged robberies and be convicted of the conceded counts that were on video, that meant the judge would impose the Victory Tax and sentence him to all the time he could for what was left.  He got four years, eight months prison:  The upper term of three years for attempted robbery, the maximum eight months consecutive for the other count of attempted robbery and the maximum one year for a co-defendant using a gun.  A fair sentence would have been the middle term, which would have meant three years, eight month, or even the low term which would have meant three years, or even probation would have been reasonable, but no he had beaten the life in prison charges with a jury trial, so he had to pay the Victory Tax and be sentenced to every minute of everything that was left.

It seems like the only exceptions, sometimes, are people with no record at all. 

For example Addison's client Enrique A. was charged with attempted murder with a gun and criminal threats.  He had no criminal history at all.  The jury acquitted him of attempted murder which in his case carried a mandatory sentence of seven years to life, that also meant that he couldn't be given a twenty year gun enhancement.  He was also acquitted of the criminal threats charge.  He was only convicted of an assault with a firearm.  The full Victory Tax would have been fourteen years, the upper term of four years for assault with a firearm and the upper term of ten years for the gun enhancement that applied to that charge.  A fair sentence, because he had no criminal history at all, would have been the low term of two years for the assault with a firearm and low term of three years for the gun enhancement, for a total of five years.  He didn't get the full Victory Tax, but he did get a victory assessment of the middle term of three years for the assault with a firearm and the middle term of four years for the gun enhancement for a total sentence of seven years.

Tomas Z., also Addison's client with no record at all, was acquitted by a jury of three counts of attempted murder that carried a mandatory sentence of twenty-one years to life, and because of the not guilty verdicts he could not be sentenced to an additional thirty-three years, four months for the gun enhancements.  He was convicted of three counts of assault with a firearm, with three gun enhancements and a charge of possession of drugs while armed.  A fair sentence, because he had no criminal history, would have been low term for the assaults with a firearm and the two other counts concurrent for two years, low term for the gun enhancement of three years and one third the middle of three years, which is one year consecutive for the possession of drugs while armed for a total sentence of six years.  He didn't get the full Victory Tax, but he did get a victory assessment of the middle term of three years for the assaults with a firearm, the middle term of four years for the gun enhancements, and one third the middle term of three years, which is one year, for the possession of drugs while armed for a total sentence of eight years.

Martin L., Christine's client, with no record at all, was found not guilty by a jury of first degree murder and found not guilty of second degree murder.  A gun enhancement that alone carried twenty-five years to life was not reached because of the not guilty verdicts.  He was only convicted of manslaughter with a gun enhancement.  The full Victory Tax would have been twenty-one years, the upper term of eleven years for manslaughter and the upper term of ten years for the gun enhancement that applied to that charge.  A fair sentence, because he had no criminal history at all and was just twenty-one years old, would have been the low term of three years for manslaughter and low term of three years for the gun enhancement, for a total of six years.  He didn't get the full Victory Tax, but he did get a victory assessment of the middle term of six years for manslaughter and the middle term of four years for the gun enhancement for a total sentence of ten years.

Trial and Court Stories

The Tyler M. Trial

Tyler was serving a sentence at the San Luis Obispo County Jail.  He was housed in an eight man pod, also referred to as a tank, that at the time had five men in it.  Tyler testified that in early June the tank boss, the inmate that was in charge of the tank, was released to attend a funeral.  When he returned he smuggled in a large amount of methamphetamine and fentanyl.  Tyler found himself in a difficult situation because he had been clean and sober since December and knew that if he didn't use drugs with the other men in the tank that he would be suspected of being a snitch.  Over the next few days the other men became more and more suspicious of him.  The tank boss demanded that he give up the password to his tablet so they could see if he was communicating with law enforcement on it.  Even though they didn't find anything on his tablet, they weren't satisfied and continued to suspect him because he wasn't getting high with them.

The tension grew and grew in the tank until Tyler felt that he had no choice but to ask the correctional deputies (C.D.s) to "roll him up," which means to move him out of the tank and re-house him.  The C.D.s weren't taking any action to move him, then late on June 14, 2025 during "pill call," a time when the inmates can leave their pods and go to the C.D.'s station to get their meds, Tyler went to the C.D.'s station and told them that he needed to get out of the pod immediately and told them why.  However, one of the other men from his pod was in earshot and heard what he said to the C.D.s.  Tyler told the C.D.s that it wouldn't be safe even for him to go back to the pod to roll up his property there.  By the time the C.D.s got to the pod the tank boss had heard that Tyler had spilled the beans about the drug use in the pod. The men left in the pod had to flush their drugs and come up with a plan to counter what Tyler had told the C.D.s.

That plan was to levy false accusations and make a Prison Rape Elimination Act, or PREA, complaint.  If they could distract the C.D.s with a PREA complaint, perhaps they wouldn't focus on the drug use in the tank.  However, they didn't have enough time to really think their accusations through to make sure that they made sense.  Letzer Salguero Paiz accused Tyler of grabbing his penis when he was in the shower, but the story told didn't make any sense.  He said that Tyler grabbed his penis while he, Tyler, was sitting on the toilet.  Mr. Salguero Paiz didn't count on the Steele & Voss team getting a court order to photograph and measure the tank, which proved that there was absolutely no way that someone sitting on the toilet could reach someone in the shower.  Mr. Salguero Paiz, then changed his story from he was in the shower to he was getting out of the shower reaching for a towel.  However he didn't realize that with the new story he was still too far away for a person on the toilet to reach him.  Finally, he changed his story again to say that Tyler wasn't on the toilet, but had been on the toilet and had stood up and walked toward him.  When asked on cross-examination about the third story, he couldn't answer if Tyler was clothed hanging out on the toilet or bottomless as if using the toilet. 

Mr. Salguero Paiz spun an additional story that Tyler was constantly exposing himself in the tank. When he was asked on cross-examination about Tyler's pubic grooming, which he would clearly be able to answer if Tyler was bottomless in front of the other men in the tank, Mr. Salguero Paiz said he couldn't answer the question.  Another man that was in the tank, Robert Forsman, said that Tyler had gone into the shower and grabbed his buttocks.  However again, the details were not well thought out.  He said that Tyler was clothed when he went into the shower and grabbed him, but couldn't say whether or not Tyler's clothes got soaked in the very small jail shower. Both men admitted that allowing that allowing another person in jail to sexually batter them without immediately beating that person up would cause them to have a, "bitch jacket," which is a reputation in the jail, which would follow them to prison and back onto the streets, for being a coward, and that having a "bitch jacket" is very dangerous.  Neither man could explain why they did not take action in order to not have a "bitch jacket."

The jury came back with NOT guilty verdicts for both counts of sexual battery and for both lesser included offenses of simple battery.  Had Tyler been convicted of either sexual battery he would have had to register as a sex offender for at least ten year.

The Robert M. Trial

At the beginning of the case nineteen year-old Robert Martin was charged with the murder of a white supremacist, with a gang special circumstance, the gang special circumstance made the case a life in prison without the possibility of parole (LWOPP) case.  He also had a gang enhancement, which added ten years to his exposure, an assault on the white supremacist's buddy and a substantive gang charge (a gang activity charge).  The defense started with a presentation at the D.A. staffing, the people who would decide if they were going to seek the death penalty, to convince the D.A.'s office not to seek death in the case.  That resulted in the D.A. filing a notice that they would NOT be seeking death.

The incident occurred in a crowded upscale sushi bar in Corona, California that would convert into a nightclub late at night.  There were numerous witnesses that testified.  The case was complex in that there was faulty handling of the DNA evidence, the gang expert made up his testimony, there was an intoxication defense and a forensic pathology expert was called to counter the coroner's inaccurate testimony. The defense was that a "friend" of Robert's, Richard Casiano, was in fact the stabber, not Robert, that the stabbing weapon was in fact a broken beer bottle, not Robert's pocket knife that did not have any of the decedent's blood or DNA on it, and that Robert had done nothing more than get beat up by the decedent.

Addison's forensic evidence expert, Blaine Kern, caught the lab worker lying about the handling of the evidence.  The order in which the evidence was processed was very important because everything was tested for touch DNA.  The order of the handling had implications for cross contamination.  The lab worker testified that he handled each item and then immediately thereafter took a photo.  During aggressive cross-examination he stuck with his story about the order of the handling of the evidence.  He said he was positive about it.  At the time no one really thought about metadata on photographs.  However Blaine did, he checked the metadata on the photos and was able to figure out the order in which they were taken, which did not at all match the testimony of the lab worker.  His confident testimony about the order of the handling of the evidence was false testimony.

There was also, well maybe not false, but certainly incompetent, testimony from the Deputy County Coroner.  When asked over and over again about the decedent's wounds, despite the often jagged nature of the wounds, he insisted that the wounds were from a knife and if they were from a broken bottle it would have to be a shard that was shaped like a knife.  However, it turned out that he had no idea whatsoever what he was talking about.  He couldn't read an x-ray and misidentified where the decedent's heart was on the x-ray.  Addison's expert pathologist was able to point out that the Deputy County Coroner had no clue what he was talking about.

A Penal Code section 1118.1 motion to dismiss the assault charge was granted.  After a four month trial, Robert was acquitted of first degree murder.  The jury hung on second degree murder and the substantive gang charge (ten to two for not guilty on both charges). Robert went from facing the death penalty to beating LWOPP with an acquittal and beating 25 years to life in prison with the acquittal.  There were 200 people in the sushi restaurant at the time of the incident and Addison's investigator found a good portion of them and got them interviewed, subpoenaed, and to court.  Addison also hired and presented a pathology expert, DNA expert, gang expert and intoxication expert. What was left was second degree murder and a ten year gang enhancement. 

Addison was moved into a different assignment, exclusively defense of capital murders, so the case was reassigned. Because they couldn't have Addison do the retrial, his family hired a different lawyer.  Where Addison had fought for four months battling every aspect of the case, the hired lawyer put on a two week trial and went from Addison's ten to two for not guilty to a conviction for second degree murder and a true finding on the gang allegation.  The judge struck the ten extra years for the gang enhancement and Robert was sentenced to fifteen years to life in prison.

The Dennis C. Jury Trial

This was a cold case DNA hit case. It was reported as a break-in stranger rape. What came out at trial was completely different from that. It turned out that Dennis was a neighbor in the condo complex in which the complaining witness (who the prosecution referred to as "the victim") lived. He was a young skateboarder and she was an older woman with a child and a husband that wasn't home much. There were two witnesses that mattered in the trial, the complaining witness and Dennis Once the trial started, the complaining witness' story began to unravel. 

She said that she didn't know Dennis and had never seen him before. There was evidence that he was always on his skateboard all over the complex, and Dennis said that he stopped and chatted with her many times while she was on her front porch and he was skating through the complex. He described many long conversations with her at her front porch and that it was clear that liked him despite their age difference. 

She said that he broke into her home through the garage at the back of the condo right after her husband left for work at 5:30 a.m., and then entered through an unlocked door from the condo to the garage, but his fingerprints weren't on either the garage door or the door from the garage to the house. Dennis said they had arranged for an early morning rendezvous, and that the plan was for him to go to the front door at 5:30 a.m. as soon as her husband had left for work. He said that he showed up as planned and she let him in. The police didn't dust for prints at the front door because she told him that he entered and left through the back door.

The condo had no signs of forced entry and there was no sign of a struggle in the condo, nothing was out of place.

She said that he raped her at knifepoint with a twelve inch fixedblade knife and that he was holding it the entire time. He said there was never a knife, and no knife was ever found.

She said denied that there was consensual sex and said that there was never any kissing of any sort, just a rape at knife at knifepoint, but she didn't have an explanation for a hickey on her neck, both her husband and she said that her husband, an older man, didn't give hickies. She also had no explanation whatsoever for the hickey on her vagina, and again both she and her husband said that wasn't something he would do.

The forensic exam that was done after she reported being raped showed no signs of forced sexual intercourse.

When the police asked for her bedsheet so they could examine it for any fluids, hair samples, or any other forensic evidence, she said that he took the bedsheet with him. When it was pointed out that it didn't make sense that he wasn't seen by anyone fleeing the condo with a knife in one hand and a bedsheet in the other, she said that he rolled up, while still holding the knife in one hand. The police didn't check the washer for the bedsheet, they just took her at her word that he took the bedsheet with him. They did check the dumpster right outside the back of the condo, there was neither a bedsheet, nor a knife in it.

Dennis said that their rendezvous started with heavy kissing and led to him giving her oral sex. He said that hickies were his thing when he was young, and that he enjoyed giving hickies all over a woman's body but that he only had a chance to give her hickies on her neck and vagina. He said that their rendezvous was going just fine until her baby that was in a crib in the room with them began to cry. He said that she then said that she wanted to stop having sex. He said that he then quickly ejaculated inside of her vagina. When asked why he did that he said he was being irresponsible ejaculating inside the vagina of his married neighbor with whom he had just started a sexual relationship. He said that when she told him to stop when the baby started crying that he didn't think she meant stop because she was no longer consenting to having sex, but just that she wanted to stop for a minute to attend to the baby, so he just thought it was best to just finish.

He said that she became upset with him for ejaculating inside of her and expressed worry about what she would do if he got her pregnant. She was upset that she had engaged in their brief affair, he said that it was clear that she felt guilty about cheating on her husband in their bed with her baby in the room. She told him to leave and that their affair that had just started was now over. He did just as she said and walked out her front door and walked back through the complex to his condo and respected her wishes and never went back to her condo. Years later he was arrested because of the DNA hit. When the police interviewed him he told them that he didn't know what they were talking about because they described a breakin rape, he didn't even make the connection with brief rendezvous he had with his neighbor.

In order to overcome the weaknesses in her case, the DDA came at Dennis with his, "Kidnapping for rape" prior. What in fact happened is that Dennis had been burned on a drug deal. He went to what he thought was the dealer's house, grabbed who he thought was the dealer's petite girlfriend with a plan to hold her until the drug dealer paid him back what he had ripped off from him. He put her in his car, drove about a block and figured out that not only did he have the wrong person, but he in fact had a kid. He immediately pulled over and got her out of the car. When he was letting her out of the car he dropped his wallet right there with his identification in it. It took the police about a minute to figure out who he was and where he lived and were able to easily go pick him up. Then he was faced with life in prison for kidnapping for rape if he fought the case or taking a deal to avoid the risk. He took a deal.

At one point it looked like the DDA had Dennis on cross examination. She asked him if he disrespected the complaining witness and he answered, "Yes," and then she asked if he had raped her, and he said, "Yes." When asked what he meant by that he said that at the time he didn't think she meant, "Stop," as in, "I am no longer consenting to having sex," but meant, "Stop, I need a minute to calm down the baby and we'll get right back to this." And that now, the time he was testifying at trial, he realized that what she meant was that the baby crying triggered her feeling guilty about cheating on her husband and the now, in hindsight, he realized that she meant, "Stop, I no longer consent," and that his understanding of the law is that's rape. It seemed like a subtlety that was going to be difficult to explain to the jury.

Then came the closing argument and the jury instruction that the whole case would turn on, this is copied directly from Addison's closing argument slide:

"Dennis in NOT GUILTY of rape if he actually and reasonably believed that Ms. Doe consented to the intercourse. The plaintiff has the burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that Dennis did not actually and reasonably believe that Ms. Doe consented. If the plaintiff has not met this burden, you must find Dennis NOT GUILTY."

It turned out that the jury did understand the instruction and Dennis was found NOT guilty of all charges and all lesser included offenses.