State v. Isaiah Gadson, Jr.

THE STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA
In The Court of Appeals
The State, Respondent,
v.
Isaiah Gadson, Jr., Appellant.
Appellate Case No. 2018-001041
Appeal From Beaufort County
Brooks P. Goldsmith, Circuit Court Judge
Opinion No. 5979
Heard November 10, 2021 – Filed April 19, 2023
AFFIRMED
Chief Appellate Defender Robert Michael Dudek and
Appellate Defender Taylor Davis Gilliam, both of
Columbia, for Appellant.
Attorney General Alan McCrory Wilson, Chief Deputy
Attorney General W. Jeffrey Young, Deputy Attorney
General Donald J. Zelenka, Senior Assistant Deputy
Attorney General Melody Jane Brown, Assistant
Attorney General Mark Reynolds Farthing, and Assistant
Attorney General William Joseph Maye, all of Columbia,
and Solicitor Isaac McDuffie Stone, III, of Bluffton, all
for Respondent.
MCDONALD, J.: Isaiah Gadson, Jr. appeals his 2018 convictions for murder,
first degree criminal sexual conduct (CSC), kidnapping, and armed robbery arising
from a 1980 incident, arguing the circuit court erred in admitting evidence of his
1983 rape of a different victim (Victim 2). We affirm the convictions.
Gadson's 2018 convictions arose from a cold case investigation of the 1980 rape of
Victim and the murder of her boyfriend. In 1999, the Beaufort County Sheriff's
Office (BCSO) reopened the investigation as part of a newly created cold case task
force. Captain Bob Bromage conducted the investigation; he reviewed the
evidence, re-interviewed witnesses, and returned items to the South Carolina Law
Enforcement Division (SLED) for retesting. SLED was unable to establish a DNA
profile in 1999 due to the limited DNA technology available at the time.
In 2002, Captain Bromage sent the evidence back to SLED for additional testing.
Due to improvements in technology, a SLED examiner was able to develop a DNA
profile from semen found on Victim's underwear. As a result of the DNA profile,
Captain Bromage eliminated a person of interest who was not a match. It was
further determined that Victim's deceased boyfriend was not a match.
In 2016, SLED notified Captain Bromage that it had received notification of a
match to the DNA profile in Victim's case from CODIS, the national DNA
indexing system. The BCSO then returned the evidence to SLED for testing along
with buccal swabs taken from Gadson. DNA technical leader Laura Hash
examined Gadson's buccal swabs and compared them to the DNA profile from the
semen previously found on Victim's underwear and pants. Gadson was a match to
the DNA profile of the semen.
Prior to Gadson's 2018 trial, the State filed a motion under Rule 404(b), SCRE,
seeking to introduce evidence of a 1983 sexual assault Gadson committed against
Victim 2. The State argued Gadson's conduct in the 1983 attack satisfied Rule
404(b)'s exception permitting introduction of "other crimes, wrongs, or acts" when
such evidence is offered to "show motive, identity, the existence of a common
scheme or plan, the absence of mistake or accident, or intent."1 During pretrial
proceedings, the circuit court heard arguments on the State's 404(b) motion, and
the State proffered testimony from both Victim 2 and Captain Bromage. The
circuit court found evidence of the 1983 assault was admissible because the
similarities of the sexual assaults and Gadson's behavior toward each victim
1
Gadson was indicted for first degree CSC following the 1983 attack on Victim 2
and pled nolo contendere to assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature
(ABHAN). The State sought only to introduce the underlying conduct from the
1983 assault that gave rise to Gadson's plea.
outweighed the dissimilarities and the probative value of the evidence outweighed
its prejudicial effect.
At trial, Gadson did not contemporaneously object to Victim 2's testimony about
the 1983 assault, and the testimony did not occur immediately following the circuit
court's ruling on the pretrial motion. Therefore, we find the question of whether
evidence of the 1983 assault of Victim 2 was properly admitted in the current case
is not preserved for our review. See State v. Atieh, 397 S.C. 641, 646, 725 S.E.2d
730, 733 (Ct. App. 2012) ("A ruling in limine is not final; unless an objection is
made at the time the evidence is offered and a final ruling procured, the issue is not
preserved for review."); State v. Smith, 337 S.C. 27, 32, 522 S.E.2d 598, 600
(1999) ("A pretrial ruling on the admissibility of evidence is preliminary and is
subject to change based on developments at trial."); id. (holding the issue of the
admissibility of the defendant's prior conviction was not preserved when the circuit
court ruled it was admissible during pretrial proceedings and the defendant failed
to object to the State's questions about the conviction at trial).
However, if this question were preserved, we would find the circuit court acted
within its discretion in admitting evidence of the 1983 sexual assault under Rule
404(b), SCRE because Victim 2's testimony was relevant to establish Gadson's
identity as the perpetrator of Victim's attack as well as his modus operandi. See
State v. Clasby, 385 S.C. 148, 154, 682 S.E.2d 892, 895 (2009) ("The trial judge
has considerable latitude in ruling on the admissibility of evidence and his decision
should not be disturbed absent prejudicial abuse of discretion."). Both victims
were young, white, tall, and slender females. Both victims were sexually assaulted
on dark dirt roads in the same Lowcountry community. In both sexual assaults,
Gadson performed oral sex on the victims before vaginally raping them. Victim
was raped at gunpoint after her boyfriend was shot, and in perpetrating Victim 2's
sexual assault, Gadson twice threatened to "blow her brains out."
Other—more unique—characteristics of the separate sexual assaults support
admissibility: (1) Gadson apologized to Victim 2 after he raped her; Victim
testified her assailant also apologized to her and (2) after raping Victim 2, Gadson
asked her if she enjoyed it; similarly, someone, whom Victim believed to be
Gadson, called Victim a few months after her sexual assault and asked her if she
was the girl who was raped and whether she enjoyed it. Finally, in his statement to
law enforcement in the 1983 case, Gadson told officers he grew up on Glaze Drive
in the Burton area of northern Beaufort County; Glaze Drive is less than two miles
from the isolated location of Victim's 1980 attack.
We find these facts establish the necessary "logical connection" between the two
sexual assaults for admissibility purposes. See e.g., State v. Perry, 430 S.C. 24, 41,
842 S.E.2d 654, 663 (2020) (holding that to meet the "logical connection" standard
for admission of other crimes under Rule 404(b), "[t]here must be something in the
defendant's criminal process that logically connects the 'other crimes' to the crime
charged"); see also State v. Cotton, 430 S.C. 112, 113, 844 S.E.2d 56, 57 (2020)
(reconfirming "the continued viability of the common scheme or plan exception");
Perry, 430 S.C. at 72, 842 S.E.2d at 679–80 (2020) (Kittredge, J., dissenting)
(noting "the hallmark of the common scheme or plan exception is that the charged
and uncharged crimes are connected in the mind of the actor by some common
purpose or motive" and recognizing that with the modus operandi exception,
"identity is interwoven with common scheme or plan").
Additionally, we find the circuit court acted within its discretion in balancing the
probative value of the evidence of the 1983 attack with its prejudicial effect for
Rule 403 purposes. See State v. Brooks, 428 S.C. 618, 635, 837 S.E.2d 236, 245
(Ct. App. 2019) (reiterating that an "appellate court reviews the circuit court's Rule
403 ruling 'pursuant to the abuse of discretion standard'" and a "decision regarding
the comparative probative value and prejudicial effect of evidence should be
reversed only in exceptional circumstances" (quoting State v. Collins, 409 S.C.
524, 534, 763 S.E.2d 22, 28 (2014))).
Accordingly, Gadson's convictions are
AFFIRMED.
WILLIAMS, C.J., and LOCKEMY, A.J., concur.