Day 3: Defense drills police on evidence

By Andy Gates - Argus Observer
Thursday, June 21, 2007 11:11 AM PDT

The ‘Depot Square’ concept is one key element to the Ontario downtown revitalization project discussed by representatives from Crandall Arambula PC, a Portland-based design firm, during a workshop Tuesday evening at Four Rivers Cultural Center.

VALE - From an unidentified white substance on a kitchen floor to suspected, but untested blood spots, defense attorneys representing a young mother charged with killing her 3-year-old stepson last year blasted police Wednesday with questions about evidence during the third day of trial in Malheur County Circuit Court.

The 20-year-old stepmother, Marisol Sedano-Ruiz, is charged with murder and two counts of criminal mistreatment in the June 27, 2006, death of her stepson, Roberto Lee Ruiz.

The state claims Sedano-Ruiz caused the child’s death through abuse. Prosecutors also assert the young stepmother engaged in a pattern of assaulting the boy.

Sedano-Ruiz pleaded not guilty to the serious charges. She passed up her right to a jury trial — opting for a bench trial, and Malheur County Circuit Court Judge J. Burdette Pratt will rule on the matter that is scheduled for a two-week trial.

Defense lawyers assert there are other explanations for the child’s death than what the prosecution claims. Possibilities presented include a fall from an ATV and/or a fall from a kitchen counter.

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Cookies were kept in the kitchen cupboard so the Ruiz children could not get to them, their father, Roberto Marin Ruiz, 27, testified Wednesday.

Injuries, like bruises, abrasions and lacerations, both older and fresh, covered the boy’s body at the time of his death. A fatal and fresh injury was found on the back of his head, Oregon State Medical Examiner Dr. Karen Gunson testified Monday.

The boy died from battered child syndrome, terminal blunt force trauma, the medical examiner said.

Sedano-Ruiz and her husband, Ruiz, a dairy farm worker and Mexican national, transported the child from the Willow Creek area to Holy Rosary Medical Center June 27, 2006, where he was pronounced dead.

Ruiz pleaded guilty in October to first degree criminal mistreatment against his 3-year-old son. There were four children in the Ruiz home.

Ruiz testified Wednesday the boy had recently fallen from an ATV, and he said his wife told him the child fell off the counter.

Ruiz said on the stand Wednesday he checked his children’s room before he left for work the morning of the death. He said they appeared to be fine.

An emergency room doctor testified Wednesday the child’s body was brought in dead, with bruising from head to toe. He was wet and his temperature was more than 4 degrees colder than a living human, Dr. David Kline said in court.

“Probably the body had been dead for a while,” Kline said.

Gunson testified Monday food was found in the boy’s stomach.

“A lot of things come to mind,” Kline said in reference to bruised, dead children.

There was not massive bleeding, but a soft-spot was on the back of the boy’s head, Kline testified Wednesday.

The Ruiz couple seemed upset and concerned at the hospital, Kline said, but there was difficulty extracting the history of the child’s injuries from them. Parents react differently to dead child situations, he said.

Police and child welfare officials were called to the hospital, Kline said. A Malheur County Sheriff’s Office deputy went to the Ruiz’s Willow Creek home to conduct a welfare check, after receiving information a young child was missing.

Malheur County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Brad Williams testified Wednesday he went into the home to look for a child less than two hours after the Ruiz couple arrived at the hospital.

“Scene preservation I knew would be important,” Williams said.

Malheur County Sheriff’s Office Sgt. Robert Speelman waited about six hours outside the residence before entering with a search warrant, he testified Wednesday.

Speelman snapped pictures throughout the cluttered trailer home, which included close-ups of suspected blood stains, a cell phone, a bucket with a substance in it and a white substance on the kitchen floor.

Some small amounts of suspected blood, however, went untested, Speelman confirmed when questioned by the defense.

A belt and a toilet brush were seized from the home, which Speelman showed to the court.

One of the Ruiz children testified Tuesday belts were used for punishment in the Ruiz home.

Speelman said a cell phone was also seized from a bed. Police, however, were not called from the cell phone on the morning of the child’s death, officers said in court.

Large amounts of blood were not located in the home, Speelman said.

One small amount of blood, though, was found on a wall, but who it came from is not known, Oregon State Police Lab Director Steve Taormina, Ontario, confirmed Wednesday in court.

Ruiz’s 4-year-old daughter was questioned after her brother’s death in a recorded interview played in court. In the interview, the child seemed to say her brother died in the kitchen, but she was in another room.

A white substance on the kitchen floor appeared to show a footprint, but shoes were not seized from the home, police confirmed in court.

Ruiz testified Wednesday that police did not ask him for his shoes.

Pictures Speelman took of the kitchen showed bottles of Ajax and bleach.

The white substance on the floor, a substance on the bristles of a broom, and a liquid substance in a bucket in the kitchen were not tested to determine what they were, Taormina confirmed.

Taormina was called to the home the day after the boy died to look for blood, he testified Wednesday.

No evidence of blood was found in the kitchen, however, Taormina testified.

A substance called Luminol, often used to determine the presence of blood, was not used on the floor, Taormina said in court.

Police opted not to use Luminol on the floor because of the “type of scene” at the house, Taormina testified.

Deputy District Attorney Erin Landis asked Taormina if cleaning agents like bleach could react with Luminal and create a false-positive result for blood, and Taormina confirmed that could occur.

However, defense attorney Mark Rader asked if the substance on the floor was tested and confirmed to be Ajax and/or bleach. Taormina said substances on the kitchen floor and in the bucket were not tested.

“I wouldn’t hazard a guess about how long the liquid was in the bucket,” Taormina testified.

A ring was seized in July, days after the boy’s death and tested for blood, Taormina confirmed, but no blood was found on it. Taormina said he received the ring from another officer and did not know where it came from.

A name log of people coming and going from the home during the investigation was not kept, Williams confirmed in court.

Malheur County Sheriff’s Office Lt. Craig Smith testified the Ruiz’s ATV was seized and investigated.

Ruiz testified Wednesday the boy fell from an ATV about two days before he died. Ruiz said he saw his son getting up from the ground and was bruised from the incident.

“He was clumsy,” Ruiz said about his son.

With a scientific formula, Smith testified the maximum start-up speed for the ATV would be about 10 mph in 10 feet.

However, under cross-examination by Sedano-Ruiz’s attorney Manuel Perez, Smith confirmed the boy would weigh a lot less than the officers who tested the ATV.