Due process; Delay in filing charges & between warrant & arraignment; Actual & substantial prejudice; People v Woolfolk; Warrantless entry; Exigent circumstances; Probable cause; People v Cartwright; Search of a bed; Inevitable discovery; People v Hyde; Motion for mistrial; Unresponsive police testimony; Prosecutorial error; Alleged burden shifting

The court held that: 1) defendant’s due-process rights were not violated by the delays in filing charges or arraigning him, 2) the evidence obtained from his apartment was not subject to suppression despite an improper warrantless search of his bed, 3) a police witness’s unresponsive testimony did not require a mistrial, and 4) the prosecution did not improperly shift the burden of proof. He was convicted of second-degree murder, felony-firearm, and evidence tampering after police received 911 calls indicating that he had killed a woman and later found her body in a storage unit. He failed to establish actual and substantial prejudice from the eight-month investigative delay before charges were filed or the later delay before arraignment while he was in federal custody. The record showed investigators continued gathering evidence and attempting to locate witnesses, and an investigative delay undertaken to collect sufficient evidence did not violate due process. As to the apartment search, the corroborating 911 calls supplied probable cause, and information that defendant was seeking help moving the body created an exigency justifying entry. But lifting a blanket from the bed was not justified by exigent circumstances because no specific facts showed evidence on the bed was in imminent danger of destruction. Suppression was nonetheless unwarranted because the blood-stained mattress “would have been inevitably discovered” pursuant to the subsequently obtained search warrant, which was supported by independent information. The trial court also properly denied a mistrial after a police witness briefly suggested defendant was on probation because the isolated remark was immediately stricken and not repeated. Finally, the prosecutor’s statement that defendant never denied using the gun referred to defendant’s admitted text messages, not his failure to testify or present evidence, and therefore did not shift the burden of proof. Affirmed.