Sanchez trial goes to jury

“Can you imagine being Joe, standing there on the asphalt?”

Cascade County Attorney John Parker asked the jurors that question during his closing arguments at the Yellowstone County Courthouse in Billings late Tuesday afternoon. Parker wanted the group, about to determine whether Adam Sanchez Jr. is guilty of deliberate homicide and four other felonies, to put themselves in Cascade County Sheriff’s Deputy Joe Dunn’s shoes, just before he was struck by the black Cadillac Sanchez was driving on Aug. 14, 2014.

Parker didn’t ask them to do it simply to garner sympathy for the slain law enforcement officer tasked with stopping a dangerous high-speed chase that was headed toward the city of Great Falls, he did it, he explained, to demonstrate the fear Dunn would have felt as he attempted to deploy a set of stop sticks. The state, the prosecutor explained during his closing argument, was tasked with proving that Dunn feared for his life as Sanchez steered his car toward the deputy.

Parker’s office charged Sanchez with deliberate homicide under what is known as the “felony murder rule,” meaning a victim was killed during the commission of a forcible felony. In this case, the underlying felony was assault with a weapon.

Parker displayed the words behind his burden of proof on a screen for the jury to see, explaining why his request for empathy wasn’t out of emotion, but the requirement to prove Dunn had reasonable apprehension of serious bodily injury by the use of a weapon, specifically Sanchez’s car. The offense, as charged, did not require the state prove that Sanchez purposely or knowingly caused Dunn’s death, rather he knowingly steered his car toward Dunn, causing the apprehension of injury, and through that act caused Dunn’s death.

Parker reviewed more key evidence for the jury, explaining why they should convict Sanchez on two counts of criminal endangerment for running red lights and nearly hitting the Davis family’s vehicle on 57th Street and Jerry Gray’s vehicle on the 15th Street Bridge. In the Davis vehicle, an 8-day-old baby was among those in the path of Sanchez’s car.

Parker also played the video of Great Falls Police Officer Rick Brinka nearly being struck by Sanchez on River Drive, saying “lightning almost struck twice that day.”

Finally, Parker told the jurors why they should find Sanchez guilty of assault on a peace officer for punching Great Falls Police Officer Clint Houston in the face and chipping his front teeth with his knee during the struggle to place the defendant in handcuffs.

“You know that had to be a painful encounter,” Parker told the group, adding the law calls for the state to prove that Sanchez purposefully caused the officer pain.

Lead defense counsel, public defender Tom Bartleson, told the jury if they followed the jury instructions and examined the evidence they would find Sanchez guilty only of two counts of negligent endangerment, the lesser-included offenses of criminal endangerment, based on the near-collisions between Sanchez’s car and the two other vehicles during the pursuit.

Bartleson said the state wanted the jury to “follow conjecture and assumptions to a guilty verdict,” explaining the state had not met its burden of proof on any of the original charges as filed.

“Concentrate on what Adam would have seen,” Bartleson instructed, telling jurors not to rely on slow-motion video or freeze frames, but to remember Sanchez was driving fast.

The attorney argued there was no evidence Sanchez struck Dunn for any other reason than to maneuver around vehicles and stop sticks and return to his lane as he’d done previously during the pursuit.

“Anything else is conjecture,” he said.

Bartleson told the jury they cannot know that Sanchez knowingly steered his car toward the deputy.

“None of us can know,” he added. “None of us are mind-readers.”

Bartleson concluded his remarks with one final request of the jury, “If you can’t say Adam wasn’t trying to pass vehicles and return to the westbound lane…you can’t convict.”

Parker’s rebuttal argument began with “the key to unlock the entire case.”

He told the jury criminal intent was not a missing piece, as the defense argued, but rather the “thread that ties the entire case together.”

Parker explained that Sanchez intended to be high on methamphetamine, he intended to speed dangerously, he intended to elude officers, and he did not intend to stop until his car would no longer move.

Despite the logical reason behind Parker’s earlier plea for the jury to empathize with Dunn, his closing arguments did not lack emotion.

“Squeeze your fist together until you can see only spike strips and not a human being,” Parker said, demonstrating the action for the jury, lest the group give any weight to the “nonsense” theory posed by the defense that Sanchez suffered from “tunnel vision” after driving at speeds upward of 100 miles per hour for a long stretch of time.

“He drove very skillfully when the goal was to protect himself,” Parker added, playing short clips of Sanchez’s successful maneuvers recorded by dashboard cameras from different patrol vehicles involved in the pursuit.

The state’s crash expert testified Sanchez passed some 200 vehicles during the incident.

Parker asked the jury for “justice for all five victims: four people who lived and one who didn’t.”

Dunn’s wife, Robynn, sat in the front row of the gallery with two GFPD detectives during Parker’s arguments. She, other family members, friends and law enforcement officers were visibly upset as Parker held up Joe Dunn’s uniform shirt, with its gold name badge still pinned to a front pocket.

“Joe was just doing his job, and Adam killed him,” Parker said.

The jurors received the case for deliberation around 5:30 p.m. Presiding District Judge Dirk Sandefur explained he would not keep them past 7:30 p.m. unless they chose to stay later. If a verdict is not reached Tuesday night, deliberations will resume Wednesday morning.

Andrea Fisher-Nitschke is the crime and breaking news reporter for the Great Falls Tribune. Reach her at anitschke@greatfallstribune.com. Like Facebook.com/gftrib_andrea and follow @gftrib_andrea on Twitter for updates.