Oral arguments in the latest appeal of Scott Doll's murder conviction were heard by Judge Robert C. Noonan this morning in Genesee County Court.
Timothy P. Murphy represented Doll and ADA William Zickl represented the people.
Murphy's appeal is based on a few key points:
- There was no "emergency doctrine" need to transport Doll from Pembroke to the Sheriff's Office on Park Road the early morning of Feb. 19, 2009 after Doll was found in blood-covered clothes and blood was found on his vehicle parked at North Lake Road and Main Road. Doll, Murphy argued, was taken into the custody, not just merely held in an attempt to find out if somebody was hurt and in need of help;
- There was no DNA evidence taken from under the fingernails of the murder victim, Joseph Benaquist. If there had been, it's possible the presence of a third party at the scene might have been discovered, which could have changed the outcome of the trial;
- The failure of Doll's defense attorneys, Paul Cambria and Dan Killelea, to raise these issues at trial constitutes incompetent representation.
Zickl countered:
- Doll's defense had every opportunity to raise these issues and did in fact raise these issues, at the trial level and through the appeals process and they lost on the rulings;
- The emergency doctrine does apply to the transport of Doll because the emergency continued unabated until the body of Benaquist was discovered;
- The transport was necessary because investigators felt certain that Doll was covered in human blood and even though they didn't yet know what happened, it was likely a crime might be discovered and the evidence needed to be secured, rather than letting Doll walk around in 10-degree weather;
- Because Noonan served as trial judge, he knows Doll received a vigorous, cogent and coherent defense that can hardly be characterized as incompetent;
- Even if DNA had been collected, and even granting for the sake of argument that a third-party presence might have established, that fact wouldn't have changed the outcome of the case. The evidence that Doll killed Benaquist is simply overwhelming and conclusive. Where Murphy argued that physical evidence indicates Benaquist was involved in a struggle against attackers, Zickl argued the evidence is clear that Benaquist was ambushed and had little opportunity to defend himself.
Noonan said he should have a written ruling in about a week.
