State defends its Healea prosecution

Columbia police didn't violate Shayne Healea's rights when they arrested him in October 2014, a special prosecutor argued this week, so the courts shouldn't accept his request to block their case.

Healea, Moniteau County's prosecuting attorney, was to be tried this week in Shelbyville on five felony charges, including leaving the scene of an accident where there was an injury or property damage, and four counts of second-degree assault for operating a vehicle while intoxicated, resulting in an injury.

The trial was postponed after Healea's attorney - Shane Farrow, of Jefferson City - moved Oct. 3 to cancel the trial, arguing Columbia police had violated Healea's rights to a private conversation with his attorney.

Healea was arrested Oct. 25, 2014, after reportedly backing his pickup truck, with the tailgate down, into a glass-block window in the back of Addison's Restaurant in downtown Columbia.

Four people inside the restaurant were hurt by the broken glass.

Healea was arrested shortly after the accident. Farrow's motion argued Healea's basic rights were violated while he was in custody and asked to speak with his attorney.

"The arresting officer attempted to force (Healea) to speak to his attorney in the officer's presence, to which the defendant objected," Farrow wrote. "The arresting officer then allowed the defendant to speak to counsel in a holding cell, in which the officer had the ability to electronically observe the defendant visually and audibly and recorded the entire conversation."

Farrow argued the situation violated the U.S. Constitution's Sixth Amendment guarantee of the accused's right to assistance of counsel for his defense.

However, Healea's rights were not violated, Assistant Attorney General Julie Tolle told the court in an eight-page brief filed Monday.

She noted the arresting officer made contact with Healea near the crash site and smelled alcohol on the prosecutor's breath and noticed his eyes were glassy and bloodshot.

"(Healea) admitted to driving his vehicle prior to the accident, admitted to leaving the scene and admitted to consuming alcohol," she argued.

Tolle was assigned as the special prosecutor in the case after Boone County Prosecutor Dan Knight recused himself and his office because he and Healea work together as officers of the Missouri Prosecuting Attorneys Association.

She noted Healea refused to take a field sobriety test or a preliminary breath test, and the Columbia officer arrested him.

The police investigation also included surveillance footage from the Boone County National Bank's camera, showing Healea's truck pulling into the parking lot behind the restaurant, crashing into the wall and causing it to collapse, and then leaving the parking lot.

Tolle wrote Healea called his attorney from a Columbia Police Department booking room under video and audio surveillance. However, she noted the state wasn't aware it had a copy of the recording and "has never viewed" it.

Also, she wrote the officer who arrested Healea did not know the phone call had been recorded and never had reviewed it.

So, Tolle argued, that recording played no part in the decisions to seek a grand jury indictment or to pursue a case against Healea.

"Under the 6th Amendment," she wrote, "a defendant is not guaranteed absolute privacy while making a phone call to his attorney."

She cited a 1995 Missouri Supreme Court ruling "it is essential that officers observe (someone in a booking room) at all times to insure that no material is ingested, or that he does anything which might alter a breathalyzer test."

No date has been set for a hearing.