15. Why has only ONE, highly questionable witness, been able to bring a conviction in this case?
Answer: First, a Reality Check (probably the biggest of all reality checks among those needed) is necessary. The Missouri Court of Appeals Western District had this to say in response to Case's claim:
"Case's claim that 'all of the [S]tate's evidence rested on the contradictory and uncorroborated testimony of Kelly Moffett' is incorrect. The State did not rest its case on Kelly's testimony alone, but rather on her testimony in combination with Case's tacit admission of having killed Anastasia."A jury convicted Byron Case of Murder in the First Degree upon consideration of the following, in reverse order of importance:
I. Case’s own appearance on the stand, in which he came across as cold and rehearsed;In Byron Case's first appeal of his conviction, his counsel argued that the taped conversations were a violation of his fifth amendment rights, as he incriminated himself without having been advised of his rights; attorneys for the state counter-argued that the right against self-incrimination only applies when one is under oath or in custody of authorities, and Byron Case was neither at the time he made his tacit admission. His appeal was denied by the Appellate Court, and the Missouri Supreme Court declined to review that decision. His next appeal was that he had incompetent counsel, but it has since been rejected. At his sentencing, he accused his trial judge of having fallen asleep during the trial (an incident reported only by friends of the defendant, but not by any attorney, juror, bailiff, or member of the media. In other words, the only people who claim to have seen this incident have a vested interest in its effect; no independent observer was ever found to corroborate those claims), but the Judge refused his request for a new trial on those grounds. Case may also be refiling his claim of fifth-amendment violations, despite having already been rebuked by the Appellate Court, to wit:
II. The tainted testimony of two of his friends, whose cross-examination gave the jury the strong impression that their testimony was calculated and/or coached;
III. The improbability, bordering on impossibility of his alibi, which required that AnastasiaIV. The forensic evidence that indicated the extreme improbability of her murder having been committed by a stranger in a random act;A. took an entirely unexplainable detour (which would take her in the opposite direction from home) at dusk from the nearly straight route to her home up an overgrown, poorly marked path she did not even know was there;
B. did so at the same time that a complete stranger just happened to by hanging around in an otherwise completely deserted cemetery hoping for someone to walk past unsuspectingly so that he/she could kill them;
C. allowed that person to approach her without making the slightest effort at flight or struggle; and
D. kept her back to that mysterious stranger, either unaware of his presence or unconcerned by it, and only turned to register her surprise in the last second of her life.
V. The testimony of Kelly Moffett, that she saw Byron Case shoot Anastasia WitbolsFeugen. Her testimony provided details of the killing that she could not have been known except to have been an eyewitness, and her demeanor on the stand, especially when contrasted with defense witnesses, made her highly believable to jurors; she is considered "highly questionable" only by supporters of Byron Case;
VI. and just as importantly as Kelly's testimony, Byron Case’s own tacit admissions, in taped conversations with Kelly Moffett; jurors found his response to her direct accusation of murder ("We shouldn’t talk about this") highly incriminating. Moffett's convincing testimony and Case's own words in an unguarded moment formed the true bedrock of his conviction.
"To be sure, the police were engaging in deception by having a friend of Case's record her conversations with him. But '[d] eception which takes advantage of a suspect's misplaced trust in a friend does not implicate the right against self-incrimination nor the fifth or six[th] amendment rights to counsel.' Alexander, 917 F.2d at 751.What should be noted is that Case was aware when making this appeal how much weight the tacit admission carried. Absent the tacit admission, the prosecution's case would have failed. In his appeal, he did not argue that the admission was misinterpreted, but only that he'd been made to confess by means of an unfair trick."Case might be right that the police had probable cause to arrest him in September 2000. But, there 'is no constitutional right to be arrested,' and the police 'are under no constitutional duty to call a halt to a criminal investigation the moment they have the minimum evidence to establish probable cause.' Hoffa, 385 U.S. at 310."
Sources: Testimony and cross-examination of Byron Case, Dr. Chase Blanchard, Abraham Kneisley, Tara McDowell, and Kelly Moffett, State v. Byron Case