The State of Washington v. Darold Ray Stenson

Summary

Writing for the court, Judge Guy rejected Darold Stenson's challenges to the initial and expanded search warrants, the scope of the searches, his broad written consent, seven guilt-phase evidentiary rulings, five instances of alleged prosecutorial misconduct, and the trial court's denials of substituted counsel, a continuance, and self-representation, finding no abuse of discretion and no misconduct. The court read warrant 561's limiting phrase commonsensically to confine the document search to Stenson-Hoerner relationship evidence, approved the officers' necessary review of papers and the affidavit-incorporated addendum, admitted the phenolphthalein results as presumptive-only evidence whose uncertainty went to weight, and held Stenson's pro se request conditional and equivocal in light of the whole record while expressly declining to settle the timeliness question. Justice Sanders dissented, contending Stenson's admitted irreconcilable conflict with lead counsel and his timely, unequivocal pro se demand compelled reversal of the conviction and a new trial.