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People v. Williams12/13/1976
This is an interlocutory appeal seeking reversal of portions of a district court order suppressing evidence in a manslaughter case. After an extensive hearing on the defendant's motion, the trial court suppressed: (1) items of evidence (including the defendant's diary) found in a search of the defendant's residence, and (2) the results of laboratory tests performed on blood and urine samples obtained from the defendant despite her refusal to consent. We affirm.
A thorough review of the facts is essential to understanding the conclusions we have reached. Shortly before 5:50 p.m. on March 21, 1976, Lieutenant Baldridge of the Pitkin County Sheriff's office responded to a telephone report of a shooting at the Vladimir (Spider) Sabich residence in the Starwood subdivision near Aspen. The defendant and her three children had been living at the Sabich residence for some time. As Baldridge entered the subdivision's security gate, he picked up Roy Griffith, a private security officer who was on duty there. When the officers approached the Sabich residence, one of the defendant's children told them that Sabich had been shot.
Baldridge and Griffith arrived at the Sabich residence just ahead of an ambulance. Griffith immediately entered the house without knocking. Several emergency medical technicians entered close behind Griffith, and Baldridge followed them in. Glancing down a hallway, Griffith saw the defendant, who said, "in here, in here." As Griffith went down the hall-way, he asked, "who shot who?" The defendant replied, "I shot Spider; help him." After Griffith observed Sabich lying wounded, and perhaps dead, on the bathroom floor, the defendant explained that a handgun had accidently discharged while Sabich was showing her how to use it. She indicated that the gun was around somewhere.
Griffith went down the hall looking for the gun, and through an open bedroom door, he spotted a .22 caliber pistol lying on a bed and two long-barrelled guns standing in the corner. Griffith delivered the pistol to Baldridge and informed him of the long guns. Baldridge immediately checked the latter, a rifle and a shotgun, and found they were not loaded.
The defendant was not arrested at the residence. Rather she was allowed to accompany Sabich in the ambulance to the hospital.
The house was then secured by the police. Griffith guarded the front door while Baldridge took photographs inside. Baldridge testified that while photographing, he noticed a ledger-type book (the diary here involved) on top of the dresser in the bedroom where the pistol had been found. However, Baldridge's testimony was contradicted by his own photographs, apparently made before this dresser was searched. These photographs clearly depict this dresser with all drawers neatly closed and no diary in sight. Other testimony revealed that this diary was normally kept inside the top dresser drawer, and, in fact, was there when found. Photographs taken later that night showed the diary on top of the dresser but also revealed that the drawers obviously had been opened and re-closed, after Baldridge's photographs, leaving some drawers ajar with clothing protruding. Baldridge testified that he did open the top three dresser drawers, but that he had found the diary on top of the dresser before opening them.
On the basis of the conflicting testimony and the photographic evidence, the trial court found that Baldridge was mistaken in his testimony that he found the diary lying on top of the dresser. Rather the trial court, which heard the witnesses, found that the diary had been inside the closed dresser draw
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