The camouflage overalls Scott Doll wore the night of Feb. 16, 2009 were stained with human blood, not deer blood.
His knees were so saturated that it soaked through his correctional officer work pants and stained his skin. One of the excuses he offered when questioned by a Sheriff's Deputy that night was that he butchered deer.
When first approached by a deputy, he was carrying a jack and lug wrench in his pockets, and offered contradictory statements about what he was doing walking on North Lake Road in Pembroke.
Late morning and afternoon testimony on the first day of Doll's trial -- over the killing of Joseph Benaquist in an alleged business-partnership deal gone bad -- put the accused in the vicinity of the murder scene covered with blood and unable to fully explain the situation to deputies.
Deputy James Diehl was dispatched to Pembroke after a report of a suspicious person. Doll was northbound on the east shoulder of the roadway, wearing overalls and a white firefighter's hood sock, which covered his face and head except his eyes.
Diehl testified that Doll had bulges in both pants pockets. The officer pulled up within 20 feet behind him and an object fell out of Doll's left front pocket, onto the ground in front of a mailbox.
It was a tire jack, but he made no attempt to pick it up and continued walking toward the deputy's vehicle as he was motioned to do. Doll pulled a tire lug wrench out of his right front pocket to show the officer, too.
Diehl asked the Corfu resident why he was out walking in Pembroke. Doll replied that he had parked his car at a nearby repair garage and was taking tools to a friend's house. He was walking there in order to get a cardio workout, because he had a doctor's appointment the very next day and needed to lower his cholesterol and heart rate. He wore overalls because it was cold.
The deputy noticed "what appeared to be wet blood marks" on Doll's clothing. When asked about the bloody overalls and white sneakers, Doll said "I butcher deer."
Doll retrieved the tire jack, emptied his pockets -- a wallet, a lone car key, some Seneca cigarettes, a green Bic lighter and a screwdriver. Doll asked to be taken back to his van.
Things weren't adding up, Diehl said, and he told Doll he was taking him into custody until there were some answers. The deputy cuffed Doll, put him in the back seat, and the tools on the front seat, so they wouldn't scratch up the upholstery.
They drove to where the van was parked. (It was actually his mother Audrey's vehicle, which Scott was driving because his daughter had borrowed his truck.)
Pulling into the repair shop, the deputy saw a red Ford Windstar mini-van, a blue van and a white van. He noticed bloody work gloves, palms up, on the hood of the blue van, blood spatters on the door on the Windstar and its driver's seat.
On cross-examination, attorney Paul Cambria asked if Doll tried to flee after the object fell out of his pocket on North Lake Road. Diehl answered no. Cambria asked if Doll retrieved the object when asked to -- "he didn't try to throw it in a field." Diehl said no, he retrieved it. When Doll was asked for identification, he provided it, correct? Cambria asked. Yes, Diehl replied.
Cambria asked if Diehl had noticed bloody footprints in the snow, blood on the front headlight of the Windstar, along the driver's side, to the back lights. Yes, the deputy said.
Cambria asked if Diehl heard Doll ask for an attorney. Diehl said no, but he was told that Doll had indeed asked for one. Cambria asked if, when cuffing Doll and putting him into the patrol car, he had read him his Miranda warnings? No, was the answer.
(The Miranda warnings are a recitation of a person's Constitutional rights once taken into custody.)
Next on the witness stand was Deputy Patrick Reeves, a 13-year veteran of the Sheriff's Department and a Pembroke native. He knows Doll, used to work for the Doll family at the Super Duper and later the Jubilee Market. Reeves was shift commander the night in question and met up with the two men at the car repair shop.
Reeves said there were no lights on in the parking lot. Doll's coveralls were unzipped and his hair was disheveled. He asked Doll were he was headed and Doll said to see friends, but couldn't say where they lived. He told him about doing cardio, but Reeves noticed his shoes, which were so worn out they were practically soleless, were not appropriate for that activity in that kind of weather.
Reeves shined his flashlight on Doll and saw flecks of blood on his cheek, nose and on his knees, which Doll said was "old blood." The officer knows the Pembroke area intimately, knows about hunting. He pressed Doll about butchering deer and Doll said "It's not deer blood."
At that point, Reeves said his heart was pounding.
"I was getting scared," Reeves said.
He asked Doll if there was someone out there who was injured and needed an ambulance.
"Pat, you know me better than that," Doll replied.
Reeves then noticed various "dings and dents" around the bloodied vehicle and a single set of footprints and called an investigator to the scene.
"Things weren't adding up in my mind," Reeves said. "I thought maybe he was afraid of killing a deer out of season and losing his hunting license. I told him not to worry about that. Who cares?"
Doll replied, "Listen, I got three months to retire, Pat, I don't want to talk about it."
Reeves observed blood marks on the bottoms of Doll's shoes.
"It was clear to me that there was more to this, so I walked him back to the patrol car," Reeves testified.
District Attorney Lawrence Friedman asked if Doll said he wanted an attorney.
"I don't want to talk about the blood anymore," Reeves recalled Doll told him. "... Do what you gotta do."
So Reeves asked if there was anyone he wanted to speak to and Doll said an attorney. But because Reeves remained concerned there might be a person needing immediate medical attention, he continued his line of questioning without getting Doll an attorney, and felt legally justified in doing so.
Cambria asked if Reeves and Diehl later searched the roadways looking for any evidence. They had, Reeves said, noting they looked off the shoulders, in the ditches, in nearby brush and, in some places, up to the trees.
Cambria asked if Reeves was aware, that the few houses that were in the rural area had their garbage cans out. Yes, said the deputy. Did you look in any of the garbage cans for evidence? Cambria asked. No, only in front of one house, Reeves replied, and nothing was found.
Did Reeves recall being asked if Doll said "I didn't do it"? Reeves, said no, he couldn't recall that.
But Cambria produced testimony from Reeves on a pre-trial transcript, page 100, where Reeves states "He told me he didn't do it."
Under questioning, Reeves acknowledged that he concluded the bloody footprints were Doll's.
When Doll asked for an attorney, Cambria asked, "did you give him a phone?"
No, said the deputy.
"Did you give him any opportunity to get an attorney?"
No, said the deputy.
"The request was ignored, was it not?" Cambria asked.
"At that time," Reeves replied.
Doll, who turns 48 on May 16, was flanked by his attorneys during the testimony and appeared calm and attentive, wearing a charcoal-gray, pinstriped suit. The jury of five men and 12 women were equally attentive.
Courtroom sketch from today's proceedings depicts D.A. Lawrence Friedman questioning Investigator Kris Kautz about blood evidence. The sketch was drawn by Colin Dentino exclusively for The Batavian. To view a larger version of the sketch, click here.
Great coverage of this story!
Great coverage of this story!