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Kylie Lowe (15:47)

Four days after police discovered the murder scene in New Britain, they were still trying to track down Yashika's husband, Patrick Miles. In the meantime, police had interviewed a known associate of his, a guy named Daniel Thomas. Daniel explained that he and Patrick were together when Patrick picked up his and Yashika's daughter on the day of the murder, April 7th. Patrick was driving a gray Chevrolet Malibu that actually belonged to Daniel's mother, which he apparently borrowed or had access to from time to time. Daniel said that he and Patrick hung out for a few hours before Patrick and his daughter went home. The next time he talked to Patrick was later that night after he heard that Yashika was dead. In Daniel's version, his phone rang with a call from Patrick and Patrick asked Daniel what was going on. Daniel told him that people were saying, quote, that you killed your girl, end quote. Patrick allegedly replied something like for real? That's what they're saying and alluded that he probably wasn't going to see his daughter. Daniel asked Patrick what was happening and according to Daniel, Patrick responded with something like I don't want to tell you, I don't know. I snapped. I don't know what happened after that. End quote I took the sucka way out. End quote. Daniel said that the next morning he got a text from Patrick asking him to Google quote how much time imma get, end quote. Patrick's cell phone records, later obtained by police, showed that he deleted that text message along with another message containing just one mistake. At that point, Daniel told Patrick he'd better park the Chevy Malibu somewhere and take the license plate off so his mother, who owned the car, wouldn't get wrapped up in any criminal investigation. Patrick asked Daniel to come get the car in Brooklyn and he agreed. He said. He picked up Patrick and together they dropped the Chevy off at Daniel's mother's house and then Daniel took Patrick's cell phone. Daniel disclosed that he kept Patrick's cell phone because at one time he was a drug runner for Patrick and Patrick wanted him to keep the phone to tie up any loose ends relating to drug deals. Daniel told police that Patrick called him on April 10 before he was apprehended and talked about how he saw no way out of the situation and wanted to die by suicide. Now police had obtained video surveillance footage from an intersection near Yashika's apartment on the night of her murder. It showed a gray Chevy Malibu driving through that intersection around 10pm in New York where Patrick's sister lived and where he dropped off his daughter. Additional security cameras picked up the Chevy Malibu in various locations between 1 and 2:30am on April 8. By day four of Patrick on the Lamb, information garnered from the early investigation pointed authorities to an undisclosed address on Memorial Avenue in West Springfield, Massachusetts. Officers from the Massachusetts State Police Violent Fugitive Apprehension Section and West Springfield Police staked out the house on the night of Tuesday, April 11. According to reporting by Connor Barry for Mass Live, authorities arrested Patrick just after midnight on April 12th. He had two cell phones in his possession when he was taken into custody and police figured out that he had been swapping SIM cards between the two phones to avoid being found. Upon Patrick's arrest, he was advised of his right to remain silent pursuant to Miranda v. Arizona, which is the precedent setting case that would ultimately require law enforcement officers to inform suspects of their constitutional Fifth Amendment right to an attorney and to remain silent before custodial interrogation. Patrick chose to exercise those rights and did not speak to police after that. The fact that Patrick was out of state violated the terms of his probation and so he would first be arraigned in Massachusetts as a fugitive from justice and then be returned to Connecticut to face murder charges for the shooting death of his wife. On April 26, Patrick was arraigned in New Britain Superior Court on charges of murder, criminal possession of a firearm, criminal use of a weapon. He was held on $2.5 million bond. Patrick and his attorney indicated that they would not waive his right to a probable cause hearing, which meant prosecutors had to show there was enough evidence to justify moving forward with the case to trial. A Probable cause hearing isn't required in Connecticut, but can be requested and usually is when a defendant believes the evidence might be insufficient. Or, as Don Stakeham points out in reporting for the Hartford Courant, if there's reason to believe the evidence is tainted in some way. It took months to get this probable cause hearing scheduled, well past the required time frame, due in part to both sides needing more time to look at everything the investigation had uncovered. However, at the end of August 2017, Patrick and his attorney changed their minds for reasons unknown. Before the hearing could even happen, they wanted to go straight ahead to a jury trial for the murder charge and withdrew their request for a probable cause hearing. There's basically zero source material covering the trial of Patrick Miles or any pretrial hearings or anything relating to the case of Yashika Grant covered in news media between the end of 2017 and when the trial concluded in December 2019. For reasons you'll soon hear, I can't get my hands on really any documents pertaining to this case. However, parts of the trial, including witness testimony, opening and closing statements by attorneys, and evidence presented to the jury, are part of other court opinions. There was no direct physical or forensic evidence against Patrick at the time of Patrick's trial. There were no eyewitnesses, no DNA, and nothing to conclusively prove Patrick killed Yashika. But as prosecutor Brett Salafia was prepared to show the jury, what the case did have was an overwhelming amount of circumstantial evidence relying on motive, means and opportunity. Patrick's associate, Daniel Thomas, who at the time of his testimony was incarcerated for the sale of narcotics, spoke about the conversations and interactions he had with Patrick in the days following Yashika's death. He testified to those alleged incriminating text messages from Patrick about how much time he would get and his alleged comments that he snapped and the series of events involving his mother's Chevy Malibu. Another prosecution witness, Yashika's former girlfriend, Kai, testified to Patrick's alleged threats towards her and the incident when Yashika called 911 after Patrick stormed into their room, shouting derogatory things at them. The prosecution also presented evidence that Patrick was trying to get Yashika to reconsider ending their relationship. Cell phone records show that Yashika and Patrick were texting on the very day she was shot. Patrick had asked Yashika to give him one more chance. Yashika's mother, Adriane, took the stand for the prosecution, too, telling the jury how Patrick was abusive towards Yashika during their relationship. And as Adrian recalled, less than a month before Yashika's death, Patrick said that he was going to kill her. According to the prosecution, the motive here was jealousy. Yashika was moving on with someone else, and Patrick couldn't handle it. Security footage placed the car Patrick was known to drive near the scene of the murder and other key locations identified by the investigation on the same timeline as the murder, which, in the prosecution's view, demonstrated Patrick's opportunity. As for means, that came down to some assumptions. Based on Patrick's criminal history. The jury heard undisputed evidence that Patrick was known to sell illegal drugs, and he was often in possession of large quantities of cash and narcotics. He'd previously been arrested for drug sales, criminal mischief, and interfering with police. Previous court decisions have ruled that we allow a fact finder to infer a connection between drugs and firearms when a defendant distributes quantities of illegal drugs because firearms are viewed as a tool of the trade for drug dealers. So it was reasonable for the jury to make the assumption that Patrick had access to a firearm. When it came time for Patrick's rebuttal to the case against him, the defense decided what better person to explain his side of the story than Patrick himself? And so Patrick testified in his own defense. It's something you don't see very often. And when Patrick took the stand, he told a story that police and prosecutors had never heard before.

C (25:07)

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Kylie Lowe (26:42)

Patrick Miles told the jury that someone else killed his wife during a robbery gone wrong, and he fled that day, not because he was guilty, but because he was afraid. Patrick was transparent with the jury, testifying that he was a convicted felon and he sold illegal drugs. He also admitted that on the day of Ishika's murder, he drove to Hartford with his young daughter in the car to buy weed. He said he did not drive the Chevy Malibu that he used to pick up his daughter from school, the same car that was at the center of the investigation. Instead, Patrick testified that he drove a blue Acura that he had access to because it had a hidden compartment under the seat he referred to as a stash box. According to his testimony, Patrick got back to the North Mountain Road apartment in New Britain he once shared with his wife around 9pm on the night of April 7, 2017. He said he saw Yashika's truck parked in the lot and noticed that the door to the apartment was left open. When he got inside, he realized that a large amount of cash and drugs were missing, an estimated $83,000 and 600 grams of heroin. Patrick said he placed his daughter on the couch while he searched the apartment in a panic, and that's when he found Yashika dead on the bedroom floor. Patrick said that out of fear, he grabbed their daughter and ran out the door, hopping back into the blue Acura and heading towards New York to get the little girl to safety. It was when he was en route to New York when Patrick claimed he got a call from Daniel. And Patrick learned from Daniel that people were saying Patrick killed his own wife. Patrick also learned about the Amber Alert, describing him as armed and dangerous. He testified that he was afraid to contact police at that point because he knew or assumed he was a suspect in Yashika's murder. Patrick told the jury that he dropped his daughter off at his sister's house and then asked Daniel to pick him up in Brooklyn. That part of their testimony aligns. But where they diverge, according to Patrick, was the part about who was driving which vehicle. Patrick said that Daniel arrived driving the Chevy Malibu. Patrick testified that Daniel then drove him to a girlfriend's house in New London, and that's where he stayed for two days before Daniel gave him another ride to Massachusetts, again in the Malibu. That's where Patrick was arrested about A day and a half later. So, as it is described in court documents, Patrick had raised a third party culpability defense. He suggested that his associate and admitted former drug runner Daniel Thomas also had motive, means, and opportunity to kill Yashika. As the defense counsel pointed out, Daniel had possession of Patrick's cell phone in the days Patrick was on the run and was supposedly driving the Chevy Malibu that was seen on surveillance video leaving the scene of the murder. The defense suggested that Daniel was motivated by the money and drugs he knew were in the apartment and that Yashika was collateral damage during the robbery. The problem with Patrick's testimony and his version of what happened was that he placed himself at the scene of the murder within an hour of the 911 call, reporting sounds of fighting and bodies being tossed around. He claimed Yashika was dead when he got there, but that doesn't align with the 911 call either. His story also doesn't account for why the Chevy Malibu was seen on traffic cameras in New York along the same timeline that he admits he drove there to drop his daughter off to a family member. Patrick also did not make any known attempts to get help for Yashika, which the prosecution found suspicious. But the biggest problem the prosecution had with Patrick's story is was that they'd never heard it before and they weren't about to let the jury forget that fact. During closing arguments, the prosecution went in on Patrick's version of events. The prosecutor kept pointing out that the first time anyone was hearing of this alleged robbery gone wrong theory was during the trial. And Patrick's delay in telling investigators in the eye of the prosecution was another sign of his guilt. I'm going to read excerpts from the prosecutor's closing statements because it's important to hear them word for word to have context for what comes after the trial. Quote, now, the defendant told you today his fear was the reason for taking the child to New York. Considering your common sense, would it be reasonable to tell your close family about the event? I submit to you that the first time we're hearing anything about this sequence of events or the basis was this morning through the defendant's testimony, end quote. The prosecutor continued, quote, this fear reaction and the actions that the defendant testified to you today that he took, does that fit your common sense view of how a parent would behave in the wake of the violent death of his spouse? Or would that parent be taking every step possible to comfort, to shield his daughter from what had just happened and to try very hard if there were an alternative Theory, and I submit to you that there isn't to make sure that that theory was properly investigated. But the defendant didn't do that, end quote. The prosecutor continued to emphasize that it was the first time that morning anyone heard about the trip to New London and the large sum of money that was missing. The prosecutor suggested common sense would indicate that kind of information would be important to direct the investigation into what happened to Yashika had it actually been communicated closer to the time of the crime. But Patrick didn't share that information. And so the investigation did not follow that direction because that's not where the evidence led. As the prosecutor put it, Patrick couldn't have it both ways. He couldn't say police should have investigated a robbery angle but not tell them that a robbery occurred. Another verbatim excerpt from the prosecutor's closing statements. Quote, if the police had information closer to the time of this incident that this was a robbery involving a very large quantity, essentially more than most people's annual income, was on this kitchen table. If you're to believe that the police probably would have changed the tactics that they used to investigate this crime, we'll never know. Because they didn't know that. Because the first time you heard about it was this morning. End quote. Now, the defense attorney raised a similar argument over delay in statements to police during their closing argument questioning the credibility of Kai Yashika's former girlfriend, who testified that Patrick had threatened her with a gun and yet she apparently didn't tell police about the incident until four months later. The prosecutor said during rebuttal statements that that's just how the timing happened with the interview. And besides, the delay of Patrick telling his version of events was much longer. After the jury was excused, the defense counsel objected to the prosecution's use of Patrick's silence as demonstration of guilt. He had a constitutional right to remain silent after all. However, the trial court overruled the objections. At the conclusion of the trial, the jury found Patrick guilty of murder. The other charges were decided by the judge and he was found guilty of criminal possession of a firearm. He was also convicted of two counts of violation of probation. Patrick was sentenced on December 4, 2019, to 55 years in prison for murder with a concurrent 10 year sentence for criminal possession of a firearm. After the guilty verdict, Patrick's defense counsel filed a motion for a new trial claiming in part that Patrick's constitutional rights had been violated. When the prosecutor commented on his post Miranda silence and focused on the fact that his exculpatory story was told for the first time at trial. The trial court denied the motion finding that the statements the prosecution made weren't specifically about the post arrest silence, but about the pre arrest silence which is allowed. Patrick appealed this decision, doubling down on his claims that he was denied a fair trial based on the prosecutor's commentary. This time, the state conceded that the prosecutor's rebuttal statement about the much bigger delay in disclosing the missing money was improper because the context referred to both pre and post arrest Miranda silence. However, the state still argued that the comment was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt and the other comments didn't violate any of Patrick's rights because they were in reference to his silence before he was read his Miranda rights. The state argued that the comments focused on what Patrick could have told police before he was arrested. The Connecticut Supreme Court officially released their opinion in regards to Patrick's appeal on September 2, 2022. The decision considered several factors Patrick and his attorney had raised. First, the state's highest court found that the evidence submitted at trial was sufficient to find Patrick guilty beyond a reasonable doubt from the opinion directly, which uses only the first letter of Yashika's name. Although there was no direct evidence linking the defendant to Wise murder, the cumulative impact of the circumstantial evidence was sufficient to support a reasonable inference that it was the defendant who murdered Y with a firearm. End quote. The second and perhaps most critical issue under review was the prosecutor's comments about Patrick's silence. The court found that the prosecutor's references were ambiguous and referred generally to Patrick's delay in telling his side of the story. However, the court also found that the prosecutor improperly commented on Patrick's post Miranda silence. Among the more ambiguous statements. Let me walk you through this because it feels a little bit like mental gymnastics to decipher which statements by the prosecutor refer to which parts of Patrick's silence. So comments about Patrick's behavior in the four day period before he was arrested were allowed. This was pre Miranda. The prosecution was allowed to raise questions about whether an innocent person would flee and not tell family or police everything they knew or believed to be true about the murder so that it could be fully and properly investigated. However, that's not all the prosecutor was talking about. When the prosecutor referenced Patrick's testimony saying today, this morning and the first time Patrick told his story. This could have been seen by the jury to reference post Miranda silence. Furthermore, the rebuttal comments were found to be in reference to post Miranda silence. The Connecticut Supreme Court opinion concluded that the prosecution's remarks were fundamentally unfair and in violation of Patrick's 14th Amendment right to due process. The court also had to consider if the statements were harmless errors, meaning the jury would have reached the same verdict even if the prosecutor didn't make those statements. The state had argued that their errors were harmless, particularly the rebuttal comment they admitted to improperly making. But the court found that the prosecution didn't fulfill its burden to demonstrate the comments were harmless. So with that, in a 7, 0 ruling, the court reversed Patrick's conviction and remanded the case for a new trial. Following the state Supreme Court decision, Patrick filed a motion to dismiss, arguing that the prosecutorial misconduct was intentional, serious, and engaged for the purpose of preventing his acquittal. The motion argued that dismissal of the charges was necessary to protect Patrick from double jeopardy and to, quote, unquote, sanction the prosecution for misconduct. Now, double jeopardy does not apply when a defendant is retried after they have successfully appealed their convictions to be set aside for a new trial. However, double jeopardy can bar retrial when prosecutorial misconduct in the first trial was found to be deliberate in an attempt to prevent an acquittal. The court didn't see this as being the case though, and so after oral arguments on June 15, 2023, the motion was denied. I mentioned before that I was unable to obtain most records associated with this case, and that's because the convictions were overturned and so everything from the first trial basically gets impounded again. It remains to be seen how the prosecution and defense will change in their approach to telling each of their stories to a new jury, if at all. According to Connecticut Judicial Branch records at the time of this episode's recording, Patrick's second trial for Yashika's murder is currently awaiting scheduling. In October of 2018, Yashika's life was remembered as part of the Silent no More Candlelight vigil hosted by the Prudence Crandall center in New Britain. The Prudence Crandall center has been providing services and support to survivors of domestic violence in Connecticut for over 50 years. It is one of the only programs in the country that offers a full spectrum of shelter, housing and support services to provide a long term solution for the challenges faced by those experiencing domestic violence. The lives of over 10,000 adults and children are impacted by PCC each year. Lisa Backus covered the Silent no More event for the Herald, speaking to survivors of domestic violence who shared their stories of courage and strength in the face of trauma. The night was one of hope and reflection as well as awareness that domestic violence can infiltrate any home or relationship. In 2017, the year Yashika was murdered, 18 people lost their lives to intimate partner domestic homicides in Connecticut. Yashika's husband had not yet faced a judge and jury by the time of the vigil, but her name was among those remembered with flickering flames of candlelight. A candle was lit in honor of Yashika Muda to her friends and family, the woman who was born and raised in Hartford and attended Hartford Public Schools. The flame burned brightly just as she did so. Ambitious, spontaneous and independent, she was an adoring mother and a caring, supportive sister. She was a real fashionista, according to her family, and loved wearing Juicy Couture. Yashika's mother, Adrian, said the words a child always deserves to hear from a parent. She was so proud of Yashika and her drive to pursue bigger, better opportunities for herself and for her children. That's the Yashica we need to remember while justice is caught in suspension. Thank you for listening to Dark Down East. You can find all source material for this case@darkdowneast.com Be sure to follow the show on Instagram arkdowneast. This platform is for the families and friends who have lost their loved ones and for those who are still searching for answers. I'm not about to let those names or their stories get lost with time. I'm Kylie Lowe and this is Dark Down East. Dark down east is a production of Kylie Media and Audio Chuck. So what do you think, Chuck? Do you approve?

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Kylie Lowe (42:55)

Hi Dark Down Easters. It's Kiley, and here on Dark down east, we dig into the facts in order to solve the case. But for some mysteries, the truth lies in the unknown. Enter the realm of true crime's most bizarre occurrences and unravel all the possible explanations. Explanations, no matter how strange they may be. In Audio Chuck's newest weekly podcast, so Supernatural. Every Friday, some of the strangest stories are put under a microscope in order to try to discover what really happened. Follow and listen to so Supernatural now, wherever you listen to podcasts.