Which graphic autopsy photos will triple-murder trial jurors see? Attorneys debate

The autopsy images are exceedingly graphic, even for an exceedingly brutal triple-murder, say those who’ve seen them.

“It’s a little more than what we usually see in terms of autopsy photographs,” Judge Gil McBride said of pictures from the autopsies of Gloria Short, 54; son Caleb Short, 17; and granddaughter Gianna Lindsey, 10.

Each was found bludgeoned over the head Jan. 4, 2016, in the Shorts’ 3057 Bentley Drive home in Columbus’ Upatoi neighborhood. Three youths were charged in the homicides, and one, Rufus Leonard Burks IV, is on trial in Muscogee Superior Court.

His attorney, Jennifer Curry, has sought to limit the photos to be shown Monday during a medical examiner’s testimony regarding the autopsy results. Curry argues some are so shocking and unnecessary they only would prejudice jurors against her client.

One question is whether prosecutors need to show “post-incision” images to prove each victim’s principal cause of death. In head trauma, “post-incision” means the medical examiner has cut and peeled back tissue to expose injuries to the skull and brain.

Curry argued photos of the bodies taken before that procedure are sufficient to show what happened to the family: “Blunt-force trauma to the head is apparent in these photographs,” she said of the pre-incision images.

Chief Assistant District Attorney Al Whitaker countered the slayings were so atrocious that showing jurors graphic autopsy images is unavoidable.

“These autopsy photos are horrific, but this was a horrific crime,” he said.

Though prosecutors have talked to the forensic pathologist about picking only the photos necessary from the autopsies of Caleb and Gloria Short, they have not done the same for Gianna Lindsey, Whitaker said.

Instead of holding a hearing Friday for attorneys to argue which images are admissible, McBride had them meet privately to go through the pictures. They did not finish, so they’re expected to resume Monday, when prosecutors anticipate concluding their presentation of evidence.

Court precedent

The most recent Georgia Supreme Court ruling relevant to the photo issue is Pike v. State, announced Jan. 29, the day jury selection began in Burks’ trial.

In that case, Matthew Jacob Pike appealed his conviction in an April 10, 2012, murder in Houston County, where the victim was beaten, choked and dumped into the Ocmulgee River.

Pike appealed partly on the argument the autopsy photos jurors saw “were not only gruesome, but had no independent probative value and served only to prejudice and inflame the jury.”

The justices disagreed, citing the state law defining “relevant evidence” as “evidence having any tendency to make the existence of any fact that is of consequence to the determination of the action more probable or less probable than it would be without the evidence.”

Evidence deemed relevant still may be excluded “if its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, confusion of the issues, or misleading the jury or by considerations of undue delay, waste of time, or needless presentation of cumulative evidence.”

Though the court ruled against Pike, the circumstances differed: Prosecutors in Pike’s case showed jurors no “post-incision” autopsy photos.

Wrote the court:

“The challenged photographs do not depict the victim’s autopsy incisions, and they are not especially gory or gruesome in the context of autopsy photographs in a murder case; furthermore, they were relevant to show the nature and location of the victim’s injuries, which corroborated the state’s evidence of the circumstances of the killing.”

The victim in Pike’s case died not only from strangulation, but “blunt force head trauma,” the court said, and the photographs “illustrated the nature and extent of the physical beating.”

Investigators in Burks’ case have said Caleb Short died from head trauma – beaten so badly his teeth were dislodged – but Gloria Short and Gianna also had “multiple stab wounds.” As jurors already have seen in crime-scene photos, each was bound with tape.

Also charged in the homicides were Jervarceay Tapley, a longtime friend of the Shorts who set up the crime to rob them of cash, clothes, a video game console and some games, and Raheam Gibson, who has agreed to plead guilty, and testified for the prosecution Tuesday.

Tapley pleaded guilty to three counts of murder last week, leaving only Burks to go to trial.

Back in January 2016, Gibson was 19; Tapley was 16; and Burks was 15.

Now 17, Burks is being tried on 10 counts: three counts of malice or intentional murder; three counts of felony murder for allegedly killing the three victims while committing the felony of aggravated assault; two counts of auto theft; and one count each of kidnapping and first-degree burglary.

This story was originally published February 9, 2018 at 3:21 PM with the headline "Which graphic autopsy photos will triple-murder trial jurors see? Attorneys debate."