A man convicted of beating and shooting a Sahuarita man nearly 20 years ago has failed to get the Arizona Court of Appeals to reconsider whether the murder weapon and other evidence was improperly seized by officers in Los Angeles hours after the murder.
Christopher Eugene Thomas has been serving a sentence of natural life in prison without the possibility of release after being convicted by a Pima County jury of felony murder in furtherance of an underlying felony. That underlying felony was a burglary at the home of Gene Doyle Allen on April 18, 2002 during which Allen was killed.
Thomas was also convicted of theft of means of transportation for stealing Allen’s pickup truck. It is the circumstances surrounding his arrest in Los Angeles while driving the truck which Thomas relied on earlier this year when he filed an application for a writ of habeas corpus, contending he was being “illegally confined” due to violations of the Fourth and Fourteenth amendments of the U.S. Constitution.
Thomas’ main argument for the writ involved a gun, a bloody wallet, and other items seized from the truck by LAPD officers which eventually connected him to Allen’s murder. Without those items, there may not have been enough physical evidence tying Thomas to Allen’s murder.
Prior to trial, Thomas argued that the evidence should have been suppressed due to search and seizure violations. But the trial judge in 2002 and the Arizona Court of Appeals in 2005 ruled a person driving a stolen vehicle is without a legitimate expectation of privacy in that vehicle’s contents.
The legal basis for those rulings years ago was part of what the Arizona Court of Appeals based its Dec. 28 decision on in response to Thomas’ writ application.
“Thomas has not shown that the trial court here lacked jurisdiction based on his previously rejected claim of a Fourth Amendment violation. The court therefore did not err in concluding Thomas was not entitled to relief,” Judge Peter Eckerstrom wrote in the latest unanimous appellate decision. “Accordingly, we affirm the order dismissing Thomas’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus.”
The 2002 murder of Allen was described at the time as particularly violent. But court records reveal it was a routine traffic stop in Los Angeles which led a Sahuarita police officer to discover the body.
Those records show Thomas at the wheel of Allen’s truck when a LAPD office saw the vehicle driving the wrong way on a one-way street. The two officers involved in the traffic stop would testify that as they approached the truck, Thomas was “sweating profusely and appeared agitated.”
The officers drew their weapons when Thomas ignored commands to show his hands. Eventually Thomas got out of the truck and identified himself with Allen’s name. But when asked to provide his driver’s license, Thomas informed the officers it was in a duffel bag in the truck.
One officer asked for and was given Thomas’ consent to look for his driver’s license in the bag, but as the officer lifted the bag he noticed a gun had been under it. Thomas was arrested for carrying a concealed weapon. During a subsequent search of the vehicle and bag, LAPD officers located Allen’s driver’s license — it described Allen as a white male age 59. While Thomas was a black male of age 37.
Allen’s wallet was blood-stained, as was Thomas’ pants and the gun. A LAPD detective notified the Sahuarita PD of the discovery, which led to a welfare check at Allen’s residence. The officer noticed a drag mark from the yard to the unlocked doorway of the home where he found Allen dead, covered with a blanket.
An autopsy determine Allen had sustained multiple blunt force wounds, a fractured skull, defensive wounds on his hands, and one gunshot to the head.
The Pima County Attorney’s Office argued to the jury that Thomas was likely burglarizing the home when he came into contact the homeowner. Evidence presented to the jury included Thomas’ fingerprints in Allen’s house, ballistic tests matching the gun seized by LAPD to the fatal bullet, and Allen’s blood on other items found in the truck.
The gun used to kill Allen was stolen from a different residence several months earlier.
Thomas has 30 days to file a petition for review to the Arizona Supreme Court.
