Jaynes v. Mitchell, No. 15-1342 (1st Cir. 2016)
Annotate this CaseIn 1997, Jaynes befriended 10-year-old Jeffrey in his Massachusetts neighborhood. Jaynes took Jeffrey for rides in Jaynes's Cadillac without his parents' knowledge. On October 1, Jaynes and Sicari picked Jeffrey up in the Cadillac, bought gasoline, duct tape, a large plastic container, lime, and concrete, and traveled to a New Hampshire apartment that Jaynes rented. The next morning, the Cadillac was seen parked at the Great Works River Bridge in Maine. Jaynes was arrested; an inventory search of the Cadillac yielded a driver's license with a picture of Jaynes under a different name and a Manchester address; duct tape; and receipts for a plastic container, lime, and concrete. Following Sicari’s confession, implicating Jaynes, police conducted a warranted search of Jaynes's New Hampshire apartment and found lime, the plastic container's label, and Jeffrey's jersey smelling of gasoline. Jeffrey's body was discovered in the Great Works River, inside a plastic container sealed with duct tape. An autopsy revealed that a gasoline-soaked rag had been held over his nose and mouth. Jaynes was convicted of kidnapping and second-degree murder. State appeals courts rejected his claims that the Commonwealth was required to prove that harm preceding death (not the separately charged abduction) occurred in Massachusetts, and concerning brief closing of the courtroom to the public, although not to Jaynes or his counsel. On unsuccessful appeal from denial of a second motion for a new trial, Jaynes argued that inflammatory evidence of his sexual preferences was improperly admitted, evidence from the searches should have been excluded, and ineffective assistance. The First Circuit affirmed denial of his federal habeas petition, holding that no state court determination was either contrary to nor an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law.
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