|
Michigan v. Budzyn
Budzyn Defense Coming to a Close
(DETROIT, MICHIGAN - March 6) Most of the day's testimony focused on Massad Ayoob, a defense expert in the use of force. Ayoob said that Walter Budzyn's version of his attempted arrest of Malice Green was credible and phsically possible. He testified that, given the small amount of room in Green's car and the force needed for the blows, previous witness Teresa Pace's account of how Malice Green's fatal beating was physically impossible.
Pace had testified that Walter Budzyn straddled Green and beat him over the head with a flashlight. According to Ayoob, the small space within Green's car would have made a forceful overhead or side motion with the arm "virtually impossible."
Ayoob was also allowed to testify about the effects of trauma on a police officer's perception. He contended that trauma could alter an officer's perception and possibly alter memory. During particular instances of stress, Ayoob said, the brain could screen out certain things that may happen during the incident. The defense was trying to use Ayoob's testimony to help explain the inconsistencies in Budzyn's testimony between his first trial in 1993 and his current trial and why he might remember certain parts of the incident with Malice Green better now than six years ago.
"One thing is an affection of time perception . . . when there's danger, your survival instinct kicks into gear, which creates the illusion that things happen in slow motion," Ayoob said. "[Another] common experience is tunnel vision; the brain is screening out anything that would be extraneous to short-term survival." This observation would help explain Budzyn's testimony that his struggle inside the car "seemed like it lasted an hour" - and may assuage juror concerns about the fact that he initially ignored and later had little memory of exactly what was going on between Larry Nevers and Green around this time.
On cross examination, however, prosecutor Douglas Baker made it plain he was buying little of Ayoob's theory. He attacked the witness's lack of personal police experience, ridiculed his pro-gun reputation, and inferred that he was a witness available for hire by any defendant who could come up with the cash. Baker also cast doubt on Ayoob's credibility, noting that he was not an expert in psychology and focusing on how much money the witness earns for his services in trials. Ayoob insisted that he does not testify at trials solely for money, noting that he had offered his services in several other cases for free. However, Ayoob did admit during cross-examination that a pathological liar, a good actor, or a person who knew a lot about the death of Green could trick a doctor and give the false impression that stress has altered his perception and memory.
Charles Wetli, the chief medical examiner of New York's Suffolk County, took the stand as an expert in forensic pathology and cocaine usage. Wetli made it very clear that he had not been called as a witness to testify about the cause of Malice Green's death. But he did offer extensive evidence about the effect that cocaine may have on an individual - noting that the initial sense of euphoria typically gives way to melancholy, and the progression then continues to paranoia and hypervigilance, and on to psychosis, culminating in a perception of high levels of strength, the absence of reaction to pain, and even death.
Although Green's autopsy revealed the presence of cocaine in his system, Dr. Wetli testified that it is impossible to speculate how a specific person will react to a specific level of the narcotic. But Green's autopsy also revealed that the victim had consumed both cocaine and alcohol in the hours before his death --- and Wetli told jurors that those substances are combined in the body to create a new, even more powerful narcotic: cocaethylene. "It's about one-and-a-half times more powerful than cocaine," said Dr. Wetli. "In effect, it gives you super-charged cocaine."
Wetli ended his direct by reminding defense attorney James Howarth once again that he was not able to say specifically how the drugs ingested by Malice Green on November 5, 1992 may have affected his actions that night. (But the defense clearly hopes the generalities offered by the witness will register with the jurors.)
The final witness called for the day was Ronald Gotowicki, who was a forensic chemist in the Detroit Police Department in 1992. Following Green's death, Gotowicki performed visual examinations and chemical analyses of the flashlights belonging to Walter Budzyn and Larry Nevers. Gotowicki said he found no visible or chemical trace of blood on the flashlight belonging to Budzyn. He did, however, find traces of the fluid on Larry Nevers' flashlight, both on the handle of the object and on its lens cap. He also observed blood on the tan jacket that Nevers had been wearing at the time of the incident.
Nonetheless, Gotowicki acknowledged that the use of hydrogen peroxide at the scene could have inhibited his ability to find blood - and prosecutor Robert Donaldson took the opportunity of cross examination to suggest the possibility that the flashlight identified as Budzyn's wasn't even the same one the officer actually had that night.
The defense's case is steadily drawing to a close. Budzyn's lawyers will call a few more witnesses on Monday, with a rebuttal case expected from prosecutors. Closing arguments could take place either Tuesday or Wednesday.
top of page
| 
