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State v. Fortin2/3/2004
ce and forehead were caused by a combination of blunt force trauma and the scraping of her skin against the concrete surface of the pipe. A fracture in Padilla's hyoid bone, hemorrhaging of her epiglottis (the upper portion of the windpipe), and abrasions to her neck revealed that she had been manually strangled. The medical examiner concluded that Padilla died from asphyxiation and that her anal injuries were the result of a sexual assault at or near the time of her death.
On August 11, 1994, the day of the murder, Steven Fortin lived with Dawn Archer, his former girlfriend, in the Douglas Motel located on Route 1, north of the Quick Chek, in Woodbridge. That evening, Archer and Fortin left their motel to visit a friend, Charles Bennett, who lived in the Five Oaks Apartments on the northbound side of Route 1, less than a mile south of the Douglas Motel. The Five Oaks Apartments were located to the south of the Gem Motel. Fortin and Archer walked south along the northbound side of Route 1 and stopped at the Quick Chek to buy some cigarettes. After their arrival at Bennett's apartment around 9:00 p.m., the three drank alcohol. Archer remembered arguing with Fortin and Bennett asking them to leave. Bennett denied witnessing an argument between Fortin and Archer.
At approximately 10:30 p.m., Fortin and Archer left Bennett's apartment and continued to argue. After walking a short distance, Fortin turned violent and began to choke and kick Archer. He threw her to the ground, and Archer ran into a nearby restaurant, Bud's Hut, screaming for help.
At 10:32 p.m., a Woodbridge police officer responded to the Bud's Hut parking lot, where he found Archer intoxicated, red faced and nose-bloodied. Archer told the police officer that her boyfriend, Steven Fortin, had attacked her. She, however, declined to sign a complaint against him. The police took Archer to the hospital, but she refused treatment.
At approximately 11:15 p.m., Fortin returned to Bennett's apartment looking for Archer. Bennett observed a few scratches on Fortin's leg but none on his face. Fortin explained that he had gotten the scratches while in a fight with Archer. He left Bennett's apartment a few minutes later. Fortin's walk back to the Douglas Motel would have set him in the direction of the brutal assault of Padilla. Archer's and Bennett's accounts placed Fortin near the Gem Motel and the Quick Chek around 11:30 p.m. on the evening of August 11, 1994.
On August 12, Fortin called a friend, Ron Celis, and met him at a diner. Fortin appeared upset and told Celis he was having "woman problems." Celis observed scratches on Fortin's face. Fortin explained that he got the scratches while traversing through a wooded area. Archer next saw Fortin on August 13, when the two reconciled. She noticed he had scratches, several inches long, on his face, chest, and arms.
Fortin and Archer moved out of the Douglas Motel and became itinerant travelers, mostly staying with friends. Eventually, they went to Maine to stay with Fortin's parents. During a trip to visit Archer's father in Massachusetts, Fortin struck Archer and the two parted for good.
At the time of the investigation of the Padilla murder, the police had not gathered those facts and they had few leads to go on. There were no witnesses to the crime. Although the police took fingerprint exemplars from several local men who had been convicted of sexual assaults, there were no matches to fingerprints lifted from the scene. Fortin was not on their radar screen. Without leads or suspects, the investigation was stalled. In April 1995, the Maine State Police communicated with the Woodbridge police department about Fortin, who had b
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