Adams

Defendant Michael Adams was convicted at a 2001 jury trial of 20-year-old charges of first degree murder with rape and sodomy special circumstances. On appeal, he contends his constitutional rights were violated on a number of grounds including exclusion of third party culpability evidence.

FACTS

Around 10:30 a.m. on Wednesday, June 17, 1981, Sylvia Edgren was found dead in her yellow Pinto on Casanova Avenue in Monterey. The body was kneeling, barefoot, and facedown on the front seat. It was nude from the waist down, and there was dried fluid on the inner thighs. Blood was concentrated around the head and shoulders and was also found on the right rear side and back windows. A blouse, shorts, and underpants were crumpled up in the backseat of the car.

Identification found in the Pinto gave Edgren’s name and address. At her apartment complex, a pool of still-wet blood was on the floor of her empty parking stall. There was a tire track through the blood and two or three footprints. The lightbulbs in the carport had been shattered and a floodlight outside the carport had been unscrewed. One neighbor reported hearing a woman scream either late at night or early in the…