Judge Rejects Bid to Exclude Kraft’s Statements to Police in 1975

The judge in the Randy Steven Kraft trial on Thursday denied the defense’s newest effort to keep out of the case damaging statements Kraft made to Long Beach police in 1975.

Kraft’s lawyers claimed that a recent state Supreme Court ruling was grounds for throwing out Kraft’s admission to police that he had driven Keith Daven Crotwell to Orange County on Easter weekend in 1975. Crotwell, whose skeletal remains were found in Laguna Hills later that year, is one of 16 men Kraft is charged with killing.

In its ruling, the state Supreme Court reversed the death penalty of Richard Boyer for the murder of a Fullerton couple. The court ruled that Boyer’s confession had not been voluntary because Boyer believed that he was in custody even when he was not.

Kraft’s lawyers argued that Kraft also believed that he was in custody and that he had to talk to the police. Because he had not been read his rights, his statements about Crotwell (which jurors already have heard) should not be considered as evidence, the defense claims.

But Superior Court Judge Donald A. McCartin in Santa Ana answered that he didn’t think the Boyer and Kraft situations were at all the same. Kraft went to the police station on his own; Boyer had been escorted there by the police, the judge pointed out.

McCartin said Kraft probably “wanted to try to get this behind him” when he answered the officers’ questions.

The hearing Thursday was the latest involving dozens of motions the defense has made since Kraft’s May 14, 1983, arrest. But it may be the last hearing before the case finally reaches the jury, which could come as early as next week.

The prosecution is scheduled to put on one or two last rebuttal witnesses on Monday, and the defense is expected to take no more than a day or two with its own rebuttal.

One issue raised last week which has still not been cleared up in public is the discovery that one of the witnesses interviewed by authorities was a brother-in-law of one of the jurors. But the judge has made no announcements in open court, and there is no indication that the juror will be asked to leave the trial.