Ronk v. State

172 So.3d 1112

Timothy Robert RONK a/k/a Timothy Ronk a/k/a Timothy R. Ronk

v.STATE of Mississippi.

No. 2011–DP–00410–SCT.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

May 7, 2015.

Rehearing Denied Sept. 17, 2015.

Office of the State Public Defender by Alison R. Steiner, Justin T. Cook, attorneys for appellant.

Office of the Attorney General by Melanie Dotson Thomas, Jason L. Davis, Marvin L. White, Jr., Cameron L. Benton, Brad A. Smith, John R. Henry, Jr., attorneys for appellee.

EN BANC.

Opinion

WALLER, Chief Justice, for the Court:

¶ 1. A Harrison County jury found Timothy Ronk guilty of capital murder and sentenced him to death. The jury also found Ronk guilty of armed robbery, and the trial court sentenced him to thirty years' imprisonment. Ronk now appeals his convictions and sentences to this Court. Finding no error in the culpability phase or in the sentencing phase, we affirm.

FACTS

¶ 2. On the morning of August 26, 2008, emergency personnel responded to reports of a house fire on Timber Ridge Lane in Biloxi, Mississippi. In their efforts to extinguish the flames, firefighters discovered the remains of a human body in a bedroom of the house. Dental records would later identify the body as thirty-seven-year-old Michelle Lynn Craite. Craite's autopsy revealed multiple stab wounds to her back in addition to severe burns that destroyed her flesh down to the bone. Craite had suffered blistering and burning to the lining of her mouth, tongue, larynx, and windpipe, and a high level of carbon monoxide was found in Craite's blood. This evidence indicated that Craite was still alive and breathing during the fire. Dr. Paul McGarry, a forensic pathologist, opined that the stab wounds likely were the cause of Craite's death, as she would have died from those wounds within “minutes” or “hours” without medical assistance. However, he noted that the stab wounds also incapacitated Craite so that she could not escape from the fire.

¶ 3. Officer Carl Short and Investigator Mike Shaw with the Biloxi Police Department were called to the scene shortly after the firefighters arrived. While waiting to gain access to the inside of the house, the officers began a perimeter investigation. Officer Short ran the license plate of a red Ford Explorer parked in the house's carport and discovered that the car belonged to Craite. Officer Short also noticed a red plastic gas can sitting in the carport, which appeared to be “out of place.” After the fire had been extinguished, Investigator Shaw went to investigate the body, which was laying face down on the floor of the master bedroom. Investigator Michael Manna, who took photographs of the scene, explained that the body had been severely burned, and, “You couldn't even tell it [sic] was a man or a woman until you rolled her over.”

¶ 4. Special agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms investigated the cause of the fire. ATF Special Agent Drew Sheldrick and another agent used a fire dog to walk the perimeter and the inside of Craite's house. In total, the dog “alerted” thirteen times to the presence of ignitable liquid in and around Craite's home, including three alerts in the master bedroom, two alerts in the hallway, two alerts in the carport, and one alert on the porch. The ATF investigation resulted in a determination that the fire in Craite's house had been intentionally set, with gasoline vapors being the ignition source. Agent Sheldrick concluded that the gasoline trail traveled “all the way from [the gas can in the carport] through the kitchen and down the hall and into the master bedroom,” where Craite had died.

¶ 5. Sergeant Christopher DeBack, Supervisor for Violent Crimes Against Persons for the Biloxi Police Department, and lead investigator in this case, interviewed Craite's neighbors and family regarding her death. These individuals stated that Craite had moved to Mississippi from Michigan in 2008 and had been in a relationship with Timothy Ronk. They also confirmed that Ronk had been living with Craite at the time of the fire. During his investigation, Sergeant DeBack learned that Ronk drove a dark green 1999 Honda Passport, and he instructed local police to be on the lookout for that vehicle.

¶ 6. ____ Officer Short and Investigators Shaw and Manna conducted a search of Craite's Ford Explorer. Receipts and items from the glove compartment were strewn about the passenger and driver seats of the vehicle. Investigator Manna retrieved a Mississippi tax receipt and a Mississippi application for certificate of title to a 1999 Honda from inside the vehicle. Both of these documents were in Ronk's name. The investigators also found Ronk's birth certificate inside the vehicle.

¶ 7. The police focused on Ronk as their primary suspect and decided to search Craite's bank and phone records for more evidence. After obtaining a subpoena for Craite's bank accounts, the investigators discovered that someone had used Craite's debit card on the morning of her death. The bank records showed a $500 withdrawal from a BancorpSouth ATM located in a Walmart in D'Iberville, Mississippi, a $418.16 purchase at the jewelry department of the same Walmart, and a $116.18 purchase at a Shell gas station in Mobile, Alabama. With a subpoena, police obtained still images from the Walmart ATM's surveillance camera, and Ronk was pictured in the photographs. The police also learned that Ronk had purchased three cartons of cigarettes and an energy drink at the Mobile gas station and had forged Craite's signature on the receipt.

¶ 8. Investigator Shaw interviewed Jennifer Mitchell, the manager of the D'Iberville Walmart. Mitchell confirmed that, on August 26, 2008, she had assisted a man with the purchase of a diamond ring. After being shown the picture from the ATM surveillance camera, Mitchell positively identified Ronk as the man who had purchased the ring. According to Mitchell, Ronk initially had expressed interest in a particular ring, but said that “he didn't have time to wait” when he was told the ring would have to be ordered. Ronk then selected a different ring and purchased it using Craite's debit card, receiving one hundred dollars back in cash.

¶ 9. After obtaining a subpoena for Craite's phone records, Sergeant DeBack learned that Craite kept two cellular phones, and that Ronk had been using one of them. The records revealed that the phone Ronk had been using showed extensive activity to a cell phone number in the (904) area code in northeastern Florida. The phone number belonged to Heather Hindall, a resident of Middlesburg, Florida. Craite's phone records indicated that Ronk and Hindall had communicated regularly, and that their communication had increased in frequency during the two weeks preceding Craite's death. A few days prior to Craite's death, Ronk had sent Hindall a text message asking if she needed a television or an Xbox video game console. Then, on the morning of Craite's death, Ronk had sent Hindall a text message stating that he was loading up and coming to Florida.

¶ 10. On August 27, 2008, two United States Marshals approached Ronk and Hindall as they were leaving a department store in Jacksonville, Florida, and placed Ronk under arrest for the murder of Michelle Lynn Craite. Law enforcement officials also recovered a knife from Ronk's vehicle. That same day, investigators with the Biloxi Police Department traveled to Jacksonville to question Ronk and Hindall. Hindall told the investigators that she had developed an online relationship with Ronk some time in July of 2008, while he was living with Craite. Hindall was aware that Ronk was living with a “roommate” in Biloxi, but she believed that he planned to move to Florida to marry her. Hindall recalled a phone conversation with Ronk on the night before Craite's death, during which she had heard Craite yelling at Ronk in the background. The next evening, Ronk had arrived in Florida and had proposed to Hindall with the ring he had purchased at the Walmart in D'Iberville.

¶ 11. Hindall visited Ronk after he was arrested. During their meeting, Ronk told Hindall that he and Craite had gotten into an argument when he attempted to leave for Florida, and Craite had tried to attack him with a knife. He told Hindall that he had disarmed Craite and stabbed her when she threatened to get a shotgun and kill him. Then, Ronk “poured gasoline over everything and lit it on fire and jumped in his truck and took off, and he told me that he had threw [sic] the knife over the bay bridge before he got to me.”

¶ 12. Ronk later confirmed this story in a letter he wrote to Hindall from prison in October 2008. In the letter, Ronk described Craite as a “rich widow” and an “alcoholic millionaire” who fell for him “at first sight.” Ronk admitted to Hindall that he had manipulated Craite “to get the car so I could come see you, used her to buy your ring, used her to have money to make the trip.” The letter stated that, on the morning of Craite's death, Ronk told Craite that he was leaving for Florida. She began slapping him and then approached him with a knife. Ronk asserted that he never intended to kill Craite, and he had stabbed her only after she threatened to shoot him. Ronk concluded, “When I realized what I had done, I cleaned the knife off, changed my clothes, doused the house with gasoline, set it on fire and drove off....”

¶ 13. No weapons were found inside Craite's house. However, the police did find two unloaded shotguns stored in their cases in a studio apartment behind Craite's house.

PROCEDURAL HISTORY

¶ 14. On June 1, 2009, a grand jury indicted Ronk for armed robbery and capital murder with the underlying felony of arson. Ronk's trial commenced on October 4, 2010. Ronk presented no witnesses in his defense. On October 7, 2010, a jury convicted Ronk of capital murder and armed robbery. Ronk's sentencing hearing commenced the following day. To prove additional aggravating circumstances supporting the death penalty, the State relied primarily on the reintroduction of...