Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, February 26, 1991 TAG: 9102260499
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: MARK MORRISON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
Strickler's defense attorney, William Bobbitt, citing Virginia's so-called "trigger-man rule," argued before the Virginia Supreme Court today that the evidence presented in Strickler's trial in Staunton last June was insufficient to prove that he was an active participant in Whitlock's murder.
From that evidence, Bobbitt admitted that Strickler obviously was involved in Whitlock's abduction, robbery and killing in January 1990, but he said in order to uphold the capital murder conviction it must be proved that he actually delivered the fatal blow.
Whitlock, a native of Roanoke who was attending James Madison University in Harrisonburg at the time of her murder, was kidnapped from a Harrisonburg shopping mall, taken to a wooded area in Augusta County, stripped of her clothes and pounded over the head with a 69-pound rock.
The rock was dropped on her head three times and fractured her skull in four places. Strickler was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death. His case has been automatically appealed to the Virginia Supreme Court.
Bobbitt argued today, however, that there was no forensic evidence nor any eyewitnesses to prove what actually happened at the scene of the murder. He contended that another man, Ronald Lee Henderson, could have dropped the rock on Whitlock's head.
Henderson is scheduled to stand trial next month in Winchester.
Bobbitt said Strickler could have been turning the car around while Henderson killed Whitlock or he could have been with a third person who may or may not have been with Strickler and Henderson on the night of the murder.
"There are lots of possibilities," Bobbitt said.
The existence of this third person, a woman, remains unclear. Witnesses at Strickler's trial last June gave conflicting testimony about whether this mystery woman was with the two men or not. Authorities say they are still investigating, but have no positive leads on the woman.
"There's certainly evidence that both Strickler and Henderson were involved in the homicide," Bobbitt told the justices, "but it's not clear what roles they played."
Bobbitt also argued that Whitlock could have been unconscious at the time of her death, making it possible for one person alone to commit the murder.
But Assistant Attorney General H. Elizabeth Shaffer, who argued the appeal today, dismissed that theory. She said there was no evidence of any other serious injuries to Whitlock prior to the fatal blows with the rock.
Therefore, it must have taken two people to kill Whitlock - one to hold her down, while the other pounded her with the rock.
"Leann Whitlock was alive," Shaffer argued. "And it would be utterly contradictory to human nature for a victim just to lie there and have the life crushed out of her like that."
She said the evidence was sufficient to prove that Strickler jointly killed Whitlock. Virginia law permits a capital murder conviction and the death penalty when there are joint participants in a murder and robbery.
"The nature of the murder weapon is critical in this case," she said of the 69-pound rock, which had been wheeled into court on a dolly for today's arguments.
She invited the justices to pick up the rock and imagine trying to drop it on someone who wasn't being held down.
Shaffer also cited the testimony of Donna Kay Tudor at Strickler's June trial. Tudor, who met Strickler and Henderson at a Staunton nightclub shortly after Whitlock was murdered, said she overheard the two men say they had gotten into a fight with "it" and kicked "it" in the head so that "it" wouldn't give them any more trouble.
Tudor said they called "it" a "nigger" and she testified that Strickler said they used a "rock crusher" on "it." Shaffer said that was enough to prove that the two men acted together.
However, Bobbitt argued that Tudor testified that she was never sure what Strickler and Henderson were referring to in their conversation. She never said they were talking about a murder.
Shaffer also cited Tudor's testimony that Strickler's clothes had bloodstains on them when she met him the night of the murder and that his knuckle had been freshly skinned.
Strickler told Tudor he had suffered the skinned knuckle earlier that night in a fight and that's also why his clothes were bloody.
"It remains unclear how his injury came about and it certainly doesn't prove he killed anybody," Bobbitt argued.
Yet, Shaffer pointed out, at Strickler's trial there was no other explanation for the skinned knuckle and Bobbitt had no testimony from anyone who had been in a fight with Strickler earlier that day.
A decision on the Strickler appeal is expected to be issued in April.
by CNB