Appeals court upholds Marshfield woman’s homicide conviction

The Wisconsin Court of Appeals District III upheld a former Marshfield woman’s conviction of first-degree reckless homicide and other charges stemming from her delivery of heroin that led to a fatal overdose.

Cassandra M. Staab was convicted of multiple charges in 2017, including first-degree reckless homicide. She appealed her conviction saying she did not deliver heroin to the man who died from an overdose since he pulled it out of the garbage.

According to court documents, Staab delivered the heroin to Ben, who subsequently overdosed on the drug, on Jan. 30, 2017. His roommate, Allen, suffered from a fatal overdose after using some of the same heroin that Staab had sold to Ben and another man, Dakota.

Ben’s father found him on the bathroom floor with syringes and “a pack of something in tinfoil” nearby. He threw everything away and told Ben. When Dakota came to pick Ben up for work, he heard about what happened.

While at work, Ben left to make a delivery and stopped at his home. He searched the garbage but did not find the remaining heroin, so he returned to work. During the day, Dakota and Allen had lunch and discussed what happened with Ben’s heroin that morning. After Ben and Dakota finished work, they returned to Ben’s home where they found Allen on his bed unresponsive. He was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead. The medical examiner testified Allen’s cause of death was heroin and synthetic fentanyl toxicity.

After Allen died, Dakota told the police that Staab was his source for the heroin. He agreed to help police with a controlled buy from Staab, after which she was arrested by police.

An analyst from the Wisconsin State Crime Laboratory testified the substance Dakota purchased from Staab tested positive for several substances, including caffeine, which is uncommon in heroin. Allen’s blood taken after his death also contained caffeine and the other substances found in the heroin purchased from Staab in the controlled buy.

A jury found Staab guilty of first-degree reckless homicide and first-degree recklessly endangering safety, along with other charges. She was sentenced to 12 years in prison followed by 13 years of probation on the first-degree reckless homicide count, with shorter concurrent sentences on the remaining charges.

After her conviction, Staab filed postconviction motions saying, among other things, that there was not enough evidence to convict her, and that additional evidence would show another person sold the heroin to Ben and Dakota. The court held an evidentiary hearing but denied her claims. She then took her claim to the appeals court.

Staab claimed under Wisconsin Statute 940.02(2)(a) the state needs to prove someone delivered the controlled substance directly to the deceased victim. She argued the state did not prove that she — or anyone else — delivered a controlled substance directly to Allen so her first-degree reckless homicide conviction must be vacated.

The appeals court denied Staab’s argument saying the statute says that anyone who “causes the death of another human being” by a delivery of a controlled substance is guilty of a Class B felony. “Instead, the statute merely requires that the defendant delivered a controlled substance, and that the victim later used that substance and died as a result,” the court said.

Agreeing with the state, the court said Staab was attempting to add an extra element to the statute that didn’t exist.

Staab also argued for a new trial based on evidence that another person may have provided the heroin that caused Allen’s death. Staab’s mother reported that another woman sometimes sold drugs to Ben and Dakota. The woman admitted to selling heroin at times to the two men but told a private investigator that she did not remember selling them heroin at the end of January 2017.

Staab argued the woman’s statements was newly discovered evidence and could create reasonable doubt about her guilt. The appeals court agreed with the circuit court that the new evidence would not be admissible under the Denny test for third-party perpetrator evidence since Staab had not shown a “legitimate tendency” that the woman could have committed the crime.