One Fairfield teen’s murder case on hold

FAIRFIELD — A judge suspended court proceedings for one of the Fairfield teens who are accused of killing their Spanish teacher with a baseball bat after his lawyer filed a discretionary review or appeal with the Iowa Supreme Court Wednesday.

The interlocutory appeal asks the court to overturn Eighth Judicial District Judge Shawn Showers’ rulings made Tuesday which allows the public — including media — to attend a hearing Thursday regarding moving the first-degree murder case of Willard Noble Chaiden Miller, 16, to Juvenile Court.

Miller’s lawyer also asks the court to overturn Showers ruling denying the request to have a suppression hearing before the reverse waiver hearing on Thursday.

The other teen charged, Jeremy Everett Goodale, 16, hasn’t filed any similar appeal as of Wednesday morning. His reverse waiver hearing still is set for 1:15 p.m. Thursday.

Assistant Attorney General Scott Brown said Goodale’s hearing will go forward unless something else is filed by his lawyers. He had no further information.

Showers, in ruling Tuesday, said the teens’ lawyers didn’t show that the trials rights of the teens would be “irreparably damaged,” by having a public hearing.

Goodale and Miller are charged as adults and a reverse waiver hearing is under District Court rules in which proceedings are public, according to the ruling.

Christine Branstad, Miller’s lawyer, makes most of the same arguments in her appeal that she made in Jefferson County District Court on Monday.

In the appeal regarding the suppression hearing, she argues the prosecution will rely on evidence it unlawfully obtained, which the defense will ask the court to keep out of trial. The defense wants to keep out Miller’s statements to police and any physical evidence law enforcement obtained.

In the appeal, she asks the court to review if the District Court can ignore court rules and clear language of the Iowa Rules of Criminal Procedure by forcing a defendant to litigate reverse waiver when the prosecution intends to rely on evidence gathered in violation of constitutional rights.

Branstad also asks if a defendant’s right to a fair trial is prejudiced when the prosecution during a pretrial hearing is allowed to publish and rely on confidential and privileged information, as well as other evidence obtained that violated constitutional rights.

“There is no un-ringing of this bell,” Branstad said in the appeal. “Either the state may air confidential, protected, and privileged information to the public and taint the statewide jury pool, or the constitutional rights of Miller are protected and the state is limited to only evidence collected through constitutional and legal processes.”

Branstad said once the evidence is out of the “proverbial box” it will be repeated over and over by the media.

On Monday, unsealed search warrants provided more details on the crime and that the teens used a baseball bat to kill Nohema Graber, 66, who had taught at Fairfield High since 2012.

The teens schemed over social media to kill Graber by monitoring her routine before ambushing her on her daily walk in the park, killing her and later hiding her body, according to court documents.

Showers, in a ruling Monday, said the trials for both teens could be moved out of Jefferson County because the defense planned to file a change of venue and the prosecution will not resist.

Goodale’s trial was reset to Aug. 23. and Miller’s to Nov. 1.

In his ruling, Showers wrote that attorneys for the defendants are “justifiably concerned” with the publicity this case has already generated, and the court was just as concerned with “trial by media” as the defense.

“However, the Defendants have the burden of showing that their fair-trial rights will be irreparably damaged if the Transfer of Jurisdiction hearing is not closed to the public,” Showers wrote. “The Court finds that Defendants have not made that showing at this point in the pretrial proceedings, specifically the reverse waiver hearing.”

Showers wrote that he made his judgment knowing that the defendants will now not be trial locally and that they will be trial separately. He wrote that closing the reverse waiver hearing to the public (to decide if they should be tried as juveniles) would undermine confidence in the legal process and impinge on the press’s First Amendment rights. He argued that the defendants’ constitutional rights may be preserved through a venue change and voir dire, which refers to the process of selecting a fair and impartial jury.

The adult sentence for first-degree murder in Iowa is life in prison, although in 2016 the Iowa Supreme Court banned judges from imposing murder sentences of life without parole for offenders under age 18, saying it amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.

If the two teens are convicted in Juvenile Court, they would be released from custody when they turn 18, in less than two years.

— The Southeast Iowa Union’s Andy Hallman contributed to this report.