A man convicted of the kidnapping, raping and killing of 11-year-old Carlie Brucia appealed for a new trial Wednesday before the Florida Supreme Court.
Joseph P. Smith, 42, remains in a maximum security prison, sentenced to death after he was convicted in 2005.
Attorneys with the Public Defender’s Office in Bartow have appealed the case in hopes of getting a new trial for Smith.
Smith was sentenced to death on March 15, 2006, for first-degree murder and received two life sentences for sexually battering Carlie and kidnapping her behind a Sarasota car wash. The kidnapping, which happened as she was walking home from a friend’s house, was caught on surveillance footage.
A jury voted 10-2 to recommend Smith get the death penalty.
On Wednesday, a 110-page appeal was submitted by Deborah Brueckheimer, assistant public defender in Bartow for the 10th Circuit, outlining as many as eight issues where Circuit Court Judge Andy Owens may have erred during the November 2005 trial.
Those issues include: the FBI expert, who did not conduct the actual lab test on evidence used to convict Smith, testified; whether a medical examiner’s opinion should be used since the Carlie’s body was badly decomposed when found behind the Central Church of Christ on Proctor Road in Sarasota County; and whether statements from Smith’s brother should have been suppressed since he acted in cooperation with law enforcement.
Adam Tebrugge, Smith’s former lead defense attorney in the trial, read the appeal brief and said the issues arose at trial.
“There’s a number of issues on the appeal. One significant issue has to do with the DNA evidence in the case. When we were in trial, the FBI sent down an expert witness to testify before the jury about the DNA, but that expert was not the person who actually did the testing,” Tebrugge said in a telephone interview Wednesday night.
“While she was qualified to be an expert and to help explain things to the jury, I was very strongly of the opinion that they needed the witness who actually did the test,” he said.
“I questioned the expert as to whether she had been in the lab the day the tests were being run and she had no idea. She was more of professional witness for the court.”
DNA weighs heavily as evidence in cases, Tebrugge said. In this case, the DNA on Carlie’s red shirt was sent to a FBI lab in Quantico, Va.
It was the main evidence that led to Smith’s guilty verdict, he said.
“DNA sort of has this aura around it like it’s a magic bullet when, in fact, it’s a very sensitive and complicated process. And there was a history at the FBI lab of making mistakes and of analysts giving false reports,” Tebrugge said.
“So this expert was up there vouching for the credibility of the test when she had no idea if they were performed properly or not. During that trial, I really did believe that was a very significant issue, but the judge overruled my objection.”
Tebrugge said if the Supreme Court does grant a new trial for Smith, the DNA evidence would not necessarily be thrown out.
“They would set guidelines for the judge about what the mistake was and how it would be corrected in a subsequent trial,” he said.
Manatee County Judge Debra Riva, who was the lead prosecutor at Smith's trial, could not be reached for comment.
Beth Burger, criminal justice reporter, can be reached at 708-7919.
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