Appellate attorneys for state argue circumstantial evidence ‘overwhelms’ any potential errors in Bliefnick case

QUINCY — The appellate attorneys for the people of the state of Illinois in the appeal case for convicted murderer Tim Bliefnick have filed a response brief in the Office of State Appellate Defender, Fourth District, arguing that a new trial is unnecessary.

The 36-page brief was prepared by Allison Paige Brooks, assistant appellate prosecutor with the Illinois office of the state’s attorneys appellate prosecutor. It was filed Monday, July 15 with Carla Bender, clerk of the Fourth District Appellate Court, in Springfield, hours before it was due at 11:59 p.m.

Becky Bliefnick, who had three sons with Tim Bliefnick, was found by her father in her home on Feb. 23, 2023. She was found dead after being shot 14 times. She was 41.

Bliefnick was convicted in May 2023 of murdering his estranged wife and received three life sentences on August 11, 2023. He now is lodged in the Menard Correctional Center in Menard.

A 50-page brief was filed April 4 by Catherine Hart, deputy defender with the Office of the State Appellate Defender, Fourth District, and James H. Waller, assistant appellate defender, who represent Bliefnick. They argued many mistakes were made in Bliefnick’s May 2023 trial while asking for a new trial.

The basis for Bliefnick’s appeal is based on three issues:

• Former Judge Robert Adrian admitted inadmissible evidence under the “forfeiture by wrongdoing” doctrine, without regard for whether that evidence was relevant or otherwise admissible. 
• Former Adams County Assistant State’s Attorney Josh Jones, who prosecuted the case, made representations to the jury of matters that were not in evidence. 
• Adrian denied the defense’s suggestion of conflict and allowed Jones to remain as the prosecutor in this case while Jones’ potentially adverse testimony against Adrian was pending in another matter before the Judicial Inquiry Board.

Brooks’ brief argued against each of those points.

‘An overwhelming circumstantial case’

Hart and Waller argued that Adrian mistakenly allowed Jones to call multiple witnesses to testify about “irrelevant and inadmissible” statements purportedly made by Becky Bliefnick, introduced to demonstrate her state of mind towards her husband during two years of divorce litigation.

Hart and Waller also argued that Adrian mistakenly ordered Becky Bliefnick’s divorce attorneys, Dennis Woodworth and Jerry Timmerwilke, to turn over her confidential client files to the prosecution. They said Adrian mistakenly allowed those attorneys to testify to private communications with Becky Bliefnick during her divorce litigation without regard to the admissibility of those statements – which they argue were permanently protected by the attorney-client privilege.

Hart and Waller termed the defense of Casey Schnack, Tim Bliefnick’s attorney, as “unreasonable” when she didn’t sign a court order presented by Jones that allowed Timmerwilke’s and Woodworth’s testimonies. Brooks said defense counsel could not have been ineffective for “failing to assert a meritless objection.” She also said Tim Bliefnick fails to cite authority for his proposition that the attorney-client privilege becomes “absolute” if the client dies.

“In the context of the attorney-client privilege, (Tim Bliefnick) cites nothing akin to the requirement that hospitals require physicians to file patient records,” Brooks wrote. “Instead, (Tim Bliefnick) was a stranger to the relationship between Becky and her divorce attorneys. (Tim Bliefnick) offers nothing on point to rebut the overwhelming weight of the authorities holding that a stranger lacks standing to invoke another’s attorney-client privilege.”

Brooks said Tim Bliefnick does not explain the supposed confidentiality of items in the divorce negotiations such as Becky wanting to get her gun back to protect herself from Tim or Becky not wanting her boys’ paternal grandfather to have visitation.

Brooks also said Tim Bliefnick did not show a reasonable probability that he would have been acquitted had Schnack objected. She then listed several items of evidence that created what she called “an overwhelming circumstantial case,” such as: 

• Police matched the eight 9mm shell casings left behind at the crime scene with 27 of the shell casings from Tim Bliefnick’s residence as having been fired from the same firearm.
• Plastic pieces discovered at the crime scene created an inference that Tim Bliefnick fired through an Aldi’s bag in a partially unsuccessful effort to catch the shell casings. The plastic pieces were tested with some support for the proposition that Tim Bliefnick was a contributor to the DNA sample.
• Tim Bliefnick’s preparation included a computer search in October 2022 for an improvised silencer made out of PVC pipe. Other computer searches were for matching shotgun shells to a specific gun, forcing a door with a crowbar and how to pick locks.
• Tim Bliefnick’s preparation also included buying a second bicycle with a “John Smith” Facebook account. The bicycle was found abandoned a short distance from his residence in the days after the murder. 
• Tim Bliefnick’s preparation also involved his efforts to identify Becky’s “paramour” through computer searches of the truck’s license plate and VIN number.
• Unusual late-night bicycle trips between the defendant’s house and Becky’s house were captured on surveillance cameras. Brooks noted several times when Tim Bliefnick’s cell phone was locked and his WHOOP, a screen-free health tracker with a wireless battery pack, was turned off in the days before Becky’s death. 

Brooks also noted Tim Bliefnick “acted suspiciously” like he knew Becky was dead after the murder but before it was discovered. She said he made sure his sons would not walk home on Becky’s day to have custody by calling their school and arriving an hour early. Brooks said Tim Bliefnick also lied about the school calling him to pick up the boys, and he also brought something for the boys to their grandfather’s house — where the boys had not been recently.

“Although some of the items of evidence were small or not completely conclusive, they fit with the total picture that began with the match between the shell casings at both houses, which tied (Tim Bliefnick) to the same firearm that was the murder weapon,” Brooks wrote.

“The combination of circumstantial evidence would have overwhelmingly persuaded jurors of (Tim Bliefnick’s) guilt, even without the forfeiture-by-wrongdoing evidence providing additional motive than his admission to police that his divorce was brutal. … (Tim Bliefnick) has not persuaded that the trial court abused its discretion by admitting the portions of the forfeiture-by-wrongdoing evidence that he considers to be irrelevant.”

Brooks referred to Becky’s statements to Christine Moore, Nicole Bateman, Christine Mandel and Melissa Young as that they were all evidence of Tim Bliefnick’s motive.

“Even if some of Becky’s statements were improperly admitted, they would have been cumulative such that any error certainly would have been harmless,” Brooks wrote. “Those statements that were properly admitted merely added to what was already an overwhelming circumstantial case. No litigant is assured a perfect trial, so an error in the admission of evidence must be prejudicial or have materially affected the proceedings to constitute reversible error.

“Any issues with Becky’s statements could not have made any difference in the trial, in light of all of the other independent evidence that combined to prove most conclusively that (Tim Bliefnick) was the murderer.”

Information given in Jones’ rebuttal only ‘small part’ of overall case

Hart and Waller had claimed Jones gave unsworn testimony about what information had been or had not been released to the public in his rebuttal — when Schnack could not cross-examine those representations or respond in further argument. They said information about whether a crowbar had been used, gunshot power residue or an improvised silencer was not made available to the public in the early days of the investigation.

Brooks wrote that the Supreme Court of Illinois has noted that “comments in prosecutorial closing arguments will rarely constitute second-prong plain error because the vast majority of such comments generally do not undermine basic protections afforded to criminal defendants.”

“Second-prong plain error is error that is so serious that it affected the fairness of the defendant’s trial and challenged the integrity of the judicial process, regardless of the closeness of the evidence,” Brooks wrote.

“The defense argued that the computer searches ‘should indicate that it’s nothing more than (Tim Bliefnick) looking into the investigation like half of the town did and following the investigation as the news allowed us to follow the evidence,” Brooks wrote. 

She claimed the defense asserted that the news had allowed Tim Bliefnick to follow the investigation enough to make his computer searches. The prosecution was allowed to fight “fire with fire” by pointing out that investigators had been “tight-lipped” and did not release to the public that a crowbar and an improvised silencer were used.

“Even if the comment was improper, (Tim Bliefnick) has not shown that it was so prejudicial that real justice was denied or the verdict resulted from the error,” Brooks wrote. “Only a relatively small part of the overall case concerned the evidence of (Tim Bliefnick’s) searches about weapons, police response and forcing windows. It was only one component of a vast array of circumstantial evidence.”

Brooks: Adrian’s failure to recuse can’t be reviewed

While Adrian was the judge in Tim Bliefnick’s murder trial, proceedings were underway in which the Judicial Inquiry Board (JIB) had accused Adrian of improprieties. One of the primary victims of, and witnesses to, those improprieties was Jones — who also was prosecuting Tim Bliefnick.

Hart and Waller noted the JIB filed a three-count complaint against Adrian about 60 days before Tim Bliefnick was indicted and the final hearing on Adrian’s matter was held about 90 days before Tim Bliefnick was sentenced.

Tim Bliefnick was charged with murder on March 13, 2023. Schnack brought the potential conflict to the court’s attention three days later in a written filing. Hart and Waller said Adrian responded by sealing that filing, and all filings in the case, “due to the extensive publicity in this case.” Adrian was denying an issue “that could affect this case,” Hart and Waller wrote.

Hart and Waller referred to a 2024 Illinois case, People v. Main, where a defendant argued that the trial court erred by not recusing itself based on an appearance of impropriety. However, Brooks write that Schnack requested only that Jones be removed as a prosecutor.

“Therefore, Adrian’s failure to recuse due to an alleged appearance of impropriety cannot be reviewed and cannot be considered error,” Brooks wrote. “(Tim Bliefnick’s) brief contains the barest of reference to the failure to disqualify Jones as ‘an abuse of discretion,’ but he wholly fails to argue that point and has thus forfeited it.”

Brooks said Tim Bliefnick’s defendant’s brief does not identify any contemptuous behavior, only that Jones “liked” a Facebook post from a sexual-assault-survivors’ advocacy group that said, “Hold rapists accountable,” and that Adrian also told Jones to “get out” of a courtroom because he could not be fair with Jones.

“That would be the opposite of a fear that Adrian would favor Jones in any of Jones’ prosecutions,” Brooks wrote. “(Tim Bliefnick) cites no authority holding that due process requires recusal merely because Jones could testify at another proceeding involving Adrian.”

So what’s next?

A reply brief from Hart and Waller is due July 29.

The Appellate Lawyers Association’s “Guide to Illinois Civil Appellate Procedure” details the process for an appeal. After all briefs are submitted, the appellate court could grant oral arguments. The appellant speaks first, followed by the appellee, and then the appellant can address the appellee’s arguments during rebuttal. Each party is allowed up to 20 minutes to make their argument, and the appellant is allowed up to 10 additional minutes to rebut the appellee’s argument.

If any oral argument is held, the appellate court then will issue its decision in a “full, published, precedential opinion” or an “unpublished,” and generally nonprecedential, order.