SBS: Ohio: John Wilbert Jones' expert medical witness

Ed Meyer :  May 06, 2011
The lead detective in the Summit County murder trial of 18-year-old John Wilbert Jones unequivocally told the jury Friday that the defense theory on the case was wrong.
Gary Shadie, the Akron police detective who investigated the fatal head injuries to the defendant's 6-month-old daughter, Jada Ruiz Jones, based his testimony on the case timeline.
Both sides have agreed that Jada's mother, Deja Ruiz, the 19-year-old former girlfriend of Jones, left her Springdale Drive apartment and caught a bus for school at 8:05 on the morning of March 19, 2010.
A recorded 911 call, in which Jones told police he saw Ruiz off then awoke to find Jada was not breathing, began at 9:44 a.m.
At that time, Jones alone was caring for Jada, her twin sister and their 2-year-old brother in the Akron Metropolitan Housing Authority apartment.
Based on the Akron police investigative reports, as well as input from all of the doctors who treated Jada's head injuries that day at Akron Children's Hospital, Shadie told the jury that the effects of those injuries would have rendered her unconscious within ''a very narrow window.''
That period of time, Shadie testified, would have been ''immediately to within 30 minutes.''
''There was no possible way that Deja could have caused the injuries prior to her leaving at the agreed upon time, which they both said was 8 o'clock in the morning,'' Shadie testified.
He said that based on input from the doctors, Jada was a victim of shaken baby syndrome.
Lead defense counsel Joseph F. Gorman told the 30-member jury pool Tuesday morning — hours before the final panel was chosen — that the defense's position was that Deja Ruiz inflicted the injuries before leaving for school.
Common Pleas Judge Patricia Cosgrove is hearing the case. Jury instructions and closing arguments are scheduled for Monday morning.
Jones, who was 17 at the time of Jada's injuries, had his case bound over to adult court months after the incident. He was indicted Nov. 2 on two counts of murder, two counts of felonious assault and three felony counts of child endangering.
The murder charges were filed after Jada was removed from life support and pronounced dead July 16.
Children's Hospital doctors who treated Jada testified previously that, in addition to her head injuries, she had retinal detachments, fractures of the right and left upper arm, right thigh and lower right leg, left thigh and lower left leg and a spinal injury.
After the state rested Friday, the defense challenged the analysis of the head injuries by local authorities with lengthy testimony by Dr. Jonathan L. Arden, a veteran forensic pathologist from McLean, Va.
Arden received his medical degree from the University of Michigan in 1980. He did his residency at New York University Medical Center, later served as an assistant medical examiner for the state of Delaware and worked in the New York City medical examiner's office for nine years, eventually rising to a position there of second in command.
He was on the witness stand for more than three hours.
Arden testified that Jada had two types of head trauma — both collections of blood on the brain known in medical terms as hematomas.
He told the jury one was an ''acute,'' or fresh hematoma, which could have occurred up to one week before Jada's brain scans at Children's Hospital.
The other was a ''sub-acute,'' or older hematoma, which was in the middle stages of healing and could have occurred from one to three weeks before the hospital brain scans, Arden said.
Arden said he strongly disagreed with the opinions of the local medical authorities that the effects of Jada's head injuries would have left her unconscious immediately.
He told the jury he had the experience of 2,300 to 2,400 forensic autopsies during his long career and at least 400 pediatric autopsies.
If Jones is convicted of either of the murder charges, he could be sentenced to life in prison.
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SBS: Ohio: John Wilbert Jones convicted of murder

Ed Meyer :, May 11, 2011
A Summit County jury has convicted an 18-year-old Akron man of one count of murder and one count of child endangering in the 2010 death of his infant daughter, Jada Ruiz Jones.
After 12 1/2 hours of jury deliberations over two days, Common Pleas Judge Patricia Cosgrove announced the verdicts Tuesday evening.
John Wilbert Jones, the defendant, was leaning over the defense table, his head down, as the verdicts were read at 6:20 p.m.
Moments later, he raised his head with tears running from his eyes, but he said nothing.
Jones is scheduled to be sentenced, facing the maximum penalty of life in prison, at 8:15 a.m. Thursday.
There was a split decision in the six-count indictment.
Jones was found not guilty of the first count of murder as a proximate result of committing or attempting to commit felonious assault. He also was found not guilty of a separate charge of felonious assault in connection with Jada's injuries.
Minutes after the verdicts were read, a sister of Jones bolted the courtroom from her seat in the front row of the public gallery and could be heard shouting: ''I swear to God, I'm going to kill that bitch,'' an apparent reference to Deja Ruiz, Jada's mother.
Ruiz was seated in the third row of the gallery and declined to comment on the case or the outburst.
''They've been threatening like that the whole time,'' an uncle of Ruiz's, Jody Tucker, of Akron, said afterward.
Outside of court, Tucker spoke for his niece and other members of the family, saying he was relieved by the verdict.
''God works in his way,'' Tucker said. ''If he would have just confessed in the beginning,'' he added, referring to John Jones, ''it might have been a little easier for him.''
Tucker said the case put the family ''through hell and back''' because of defense claims that Ruiz inflicted the fatal injuries on Jada.
The lead government counsel, Summit County Assistant Prosecutor Teri Burnside, told the panel in Monday's closing arguments that Jada, who was 6 months old, suffered irreversible brain injuries at the hands of her father.
Jada was pronounced dead July 16 at Akron Children's Hospital. She never regained consciousness over four months.
Burnside said Jada was a victim of shaken baby syndrome, and Jones was the perpetrator.
''He did what we know you should never do with a little baby. He shakes and shakes that baby and she finally stops crying, but she never cries again,'' Burnside told jurors.
The incident occurred on the morning of March 19, 2010, at the Akron Metropolitan Housing Authority apartment of Deja Ruiz, who was Jones' former girlfriend.
He had spent the night there and was caring for Jada, her twin sister, Jazmine, and their 2-year-old brother after Ruiz, then 19, left to catch a bus for school at 8:05 a.m.
 Jones made the 911 call, reporting that Jada was not breathing, at 9:44 a.m.
The criminal case began in Summit County Juvenile Court last spring following Jones' March 31 arrest, when he was 17.
He was charged later as an adult with two counts of murder, two counts of felonious assault in connection with the injuries to Jada and her twin, Jazmine, and additional counts of felony child endangering in connection with the twins.
The jury found Jones not guilty of both charges related to Jazmine.
Defense attorney Joseph F. Gorman said he was disappointed by the verdicts but respected the process.
''I'm not sure how you arrive at that decision,'' Gorman said. ''In my mind, he either committed these acts against the baby, or he didn't.
''I can't quite wrap my mind around the verdict, but once again, you have to respect it. John will have another day in court with an appeal, and we'll hope for the best in that regard.''
Gorman spent his full allotment of time in court Monday, 45 minutes, on his closing argument.
A good deal of it was spent informing jurors about the legal definition of the prosecution's task in the U.S. criminal justice system — proving the case beyond a reasonable doubt.
''Proof beyond a reasonable doubt is proof of such character,'' Gorman told the panel, ''that an ordinary person would be willing to rely and act upon it in the most important of his or her own affairs.''
He then provided a compelling example from this case.
Jada's doctors, in their decision to remove the child from life support after four months, ''had to be convinced, before they pull the plug, that there's no coming back, that Jada's never going to come back,'' Gorman said. ''That, God forbid, in our own lives, is a decision we might have to make with one of our family members: Should we pull the plug? That's a terrible, heavy decision,'' Gorman said.
If that type of proof does not exist, he told the jury, the verdict must be not guilty.
One of Gorman's principal arguments that Jones' guilt was not proven beyond a reasonable doubt was the acknowledgment by the lead Akron police detective, Gary Shadie, that Ruiz was also initially a suspect.
However, Gorman pointed out, there were no written reports from what were believed to be the earliest interviews of Ruiz by the juvenile detective unit.
Gorman told the jury no report exists from the first interview of Ruiz, believed to be at the hospital on the day of the incident. Shadie testified that he thought another detective was supposed to have done it, but to this day is not certain that it ever was.
Ruiz also testified that she and her mother went to Akron police headquarters for an interview one or two days after the incident, but no report was ever produced by the detective who did that interview either, Gorman said.
''Shocking,'' he told the jury, using only that word to describe the possible police oversights.
A seventh count in the indictment, for felony child endangering, was dismissed by prosecution motion before the trial began.

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Ed Meyer can be reached at 330-996-3784 or emeyer@thebeaconjournal.com.

http://www.ohio.com/news/121618944.html

 

SBS: Ohio: John Wilbert Jones fought removal of life support

Ed Meyer :  May 10, 2011

Within three days of her arrival in the emergency room at Akron Children's Hospital, Jada Ruiz Jones' condition was clear to her pediatric specialists. The 6-month-old infant would never recover.
Doctors told the young mother, Deja Ruiz, that the effects of shaken baby syndrome on Jada's brain were so severe, resulting in a prolonged loss of oxygen, they believed the best decision would be to remove her from life support.
What happened next, Summit County prosecutors said in Monday's closing arguments, was probably the most telling fact in the murder trial of the 18-year-old father, John Wilbert Jones.

Assistant county prosecutor Teri Burnside said Jones steadfastly fought the decision to remove Jada from life support — for four months.
Why? Already facing charges of felonious assault and child endangering, Burnside argued, Jones knew the decision to disconnect would mean that he would be charged with murder.
''So did he really have the best interests of Jada?'' Burnside asked in summation, leaving the answer hanging.
After 41/2 hours of jury deliberations Monday, the fifth day of Jones' trial, the panel of six men and six women went home for the night at 5:30 p.m. without reaching a verdict.
Common Pleas Judge Patricia Cosgrove, who is hearing the case, ordered the delibera
tions to resume today at 9 a.m.
Jones, whose case began in Summit County Juvenile Court last year when he was 17, is charged with two counts of murder, two counts of felonious assault and additional felony counts of child endangering.
His case was bound over to adult court and he was indicted Nov. 2.
Trial testimony showed that Jada was admitted to Children's in full cardiac arrest on the morning of March 19, 2010. Jones made the emergency call that day, at 9:44 a.m., from the small home of his former girlfriend, Ruiz, then 19. Both sides agreed that Jones, who was caring for Jada, her twin sister and their 2-year-old brother, was the only adult in the apartment when he made the call. Both sides also agreed that Ruiz left to catch a bus for school at 8:05 a.m. Although she was initially a suspect when Akron police detectives arrived at the apartment, she was never arrested or charged with any offense.
Four months later, on July 16, Jada was pronounced dead after Summit County Probate Judge Bill Spicer approved Ruiz's request to remove her daughter from life support.
It was against that backdrop that defense attorney Joseph F. Gorman attempted to create reasonable doubt in the state's theory.
Prosecutors contended that because Jada's injuries left her unconscious almost immediately, Jones was the only one who could have caused them because of the timing of the 911 call.
Gorman called two witnesses to dispute those allegations — veteran forensic pathologist Jonathan L. Arden, of McLean, Va., a former top aid in the New York City medical examiner's office, and Jones himself.
From more than 30 years' experience in forensic pathology, with his specialty being pediatric forensics, Arden told the jury he strongly disagreed that the effects of Jada's injuries were instantaneous.
In more than three hours of testimony, Arden left the jury with his opinion, based on a reasonable degree of scientific certainty, that Jada's injuries could have been caused before Ruiz left the apartment, Gorman argued.
A member of Ruiz's family began weeping in the public gallery and hurriedly left the courtroom soon after Arden made that statement.
Jones, who took the stand Friday evening after Arden's lengthy testimony, told the jury he was half-asleep when Ruiz took a shower about 7 a.m. He said she woke him shortly before 8 a.m. and he saw her to the door.
Jones said he then went back into the living room and propped feeding bottles, using a blanket, into the mouths of both Jada and her sister, who were on a small couch. He said he then went back to sleep when the babies appeared to accept the bottles.
Jones told police that when he awoke about 10:15 a.m. (only the time was incorrect, according to Gorman) Jada's body was limp and he called 911.
Gorman noted that Jada's feeding bottle was a crucial piece of evidence at the crime scene — one that Akron police never collected to determine whether about half of the milk was left, as Jones had said.
With no such physical evidence, Gorman produced a police crime scene photo of the bottle on its side, next to a pacifier on the small couch, and showed it to the jury on the courtroom's big-screen television.
Inspection of the photo with a brighter image showed that the bottle, indeed, appeared to have only half of the milk left, Gorman said.
''I wish I could reach into that picture and show you, but I can't because they didn't do their job,'' he said, referring to the police oversight.
''It doesn't make any sense, folks, and it's certainly not proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Justice here,'' Gorman said, emphasizing that one word. ''I'm asking you to do justice.''

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Ed Meyer can be reached at 330-996-3784 or emeyer@thebeaconjournal.com.

http://www.ohio.com/news/121549684.html