The State of Washington, Respondent v. Jonathan Lee Gentry, Appellant

Summary

In an en banc review of a Kitsap County aggravated first degree murder conviction and sentence of death, the Washington Supreme Court upheld every challenged aspect visible in the text: PCR DNA, gamma marker, and PGM test results were admissible under the two-prong Frye test and ER 702; substantial evidence supported premeditation and the concealment-of-identity aggravating circumstance; warrant-derived evidence stood because probable cause survived correction of alleged affidavit defects; autopsy photographs, jury instructions, the inadvertent alternate-juror substitution, death-qualification excusals, the prior judgment-and-sentence exhibit, and penalty-phase prosecutorial argument were all sustained; and the victim's father's victim impact testimony was ruled admissible under both the federal Constitution (after the Supreme Court decision issued just before the penalty phase overruled Booth and Gathers and removed the per se Eighth Amendment bar) and the Washington Constitution, by harmonizing the 1989 victims' rights amendment with the Bartholomew II evidentiary limits. The supplied text is truncated partway through Issue Sixteen, before the court addresses the mitigation instruction, statutory vagueness, proportionality review, and the final disposition. Justice Utter dissents, arguing that PCR DNA evidence failed the second prong of Frye and that the death sentence is disproportionate under RCW 10.95.130(2)(b), with Justice Johnson concurring in that PCR critique; Justice Johnson, joined by Justices Utter and Madsen, separately dissents that victim impact statements remain barred under Bartholomew II's independent state-constitutional requirements.