David Viens

Sometimes a case is less about the guilt or innocence of a person and more about the legalities of the trial and the evidence submitted. This is what constitutes that someone gets a “fair” trial. For most prosecutors while one goal is to get as much evidence entered into the court that they can, the other goal is to make sure that evidence is entered properly so that if they obtain the conviction they are looking for there is less reason for a court to overturn a verdict. More often than not verdicts are overturned on minor things such as a statement that is made in court that likely should not have been or the appeals court decides a judge allowed something into evidence that they believe was prejudice against the defendant. Sure there are the cases that are overturned from blatant disregard of the rules of the court made by prosecutors, among other things. Now, to be fair, the case against David Viens has not been overturned as of now and in 2014 the appeals court upheld his conviction. Also, let me be clear in the fact that I am not saying that I believe David Viens to be innocent in any way but I do wonder about some of the evidence that was admitted in his trial, particularly his reported confession to authorities.

In October of 2009 Dawn Viens, David's wife, disappeared from her Long Beach California home. She had last been seen on October 18^th. David was a chef who owned his own restaurant in the area called Thyme Contemporary Cafe. Dawn was apparently a hostess at the restaurant. It is uncertain just when Dawn was reported missing but people had their suspicions early on, especially when they learned that David was telling different stories to different people about the whereabouts of his wife and the circumstances surrounding the last time he had seen her. A few days after she disappeared he told a friend that he had put her in rehab for a drinking problem. He told others that he had intended to put her in rehab but that after an argument about just that Dawn had taken off and he had no idea where she was. Her close friends did not seem to buy it. While it seems that there was little dispute as to the fact that Dawn likely had a drinking problem, most agree that she was no the only person in that house dealing with alcohol demons.

Still, while it appears that people, including investigators were attempting to locate her it would be eight months before the authorities decided to open up a homicide case. That would take us until about June of 2010 but it would be another nearly eight months before they felt they had enough information to charge David Viens in the murder of his wife.

Of course when someone goes missing the first people that authorities suspect are those closest to the victim and David was no exception. They quickly learned from friends that Dawn had been apparently hiding money from David so that she could get away from him. She had told her friends that David was controlling and abusive. Unlike the last case in which I discussed where the wife had claimed there was abuse without any collaboration from others, it seemed that in this case others had seen the reported abuse. But, in fairness, as I said earlier, most agree that Dawn had a drinking problem and was not a complete angel herself.

By February of 2011 authorities had were preparing to arrest David have several things had come to light. First one of David's daughters from a previous marriage talked to them. Jacqueline Viens had moved out to California to live with her dad and work at the restaurant soon after Dawn disappeared. Between David, Jacqueline and David's new girlfriend, Kathy Galvan, a twenty-three year old waitress from the restaurant who had quickly moved in, they had all but quickly removed all of Dawn's belongings from the house. But, according to Jacqueline one night, not so long later her father (and possibly she too) was intoxicated and told her a story of what had happened to Dawn.

According to Jacqueline her father told her that he had been trying to get some sleep and Dawn would not stop “needling” him. He claimed that at some point he put a dresser against the bedroom door to keep her out but it had failed, so he had tied her to a chair and covered her mouth with duct tape and went to sleep. He then told his daughter that when he woke up the next morning Dawn was dead and he assumed she had choked on her own vomit. It appears that he only told Jacqueline that Dawn's body would never be found but did not say what he had done with it. He then convinced Jacqueline to take Dawn's phone and send a text message to one of her friends telling them she was in Florida (where the couple used to live) and was fine. Jacqueline would later admit that after sending the text she had got rid of the phone in an attempt to protect her father. It is unclear if it was based on this information, or prior to this that authorities had gone to the restaurant and had torn apart the flooring and other areas, looking for evidence. They had also found blood inside David's home that was either proven or suspected at the very least to be Dawn's. On February 23, 2011 the newspaper would publish an article about the blood found and that he was a suspect. It was also said that David learned on that day that Jacqueline had been talking to the police. Research indicates that the police were actually literally on his tail and chasing him while he was in a car with his girlfriend. He instructed the girlfriend to stop on the edge of cliff area and before authorities could catch up David jumped over the eighty foot cliff. Amazingly he landed on his feet and survived, although severely injured.

Once he was able to be interviewed again by the police David had endured surgery for his injuries and was on pain medications. It was then that he apparently gave a confession to the police that would later be used at his trial. The story he gave seemed to match Jacqueline's to the point of what happened leading up to Dawn's death. However, he added in his confession that he had taken Dawn's body to the restaurant, placed it in a 55 gallon drum with water and left it to simmer for four days. He proceeded to go on and say that he had disposed of the waste and the bones for the most part in the garbage. In one story, as it seems he told this more than once, he claimed that only the skull survived the boiling and that he had taken it to his mothers home but despite a search it was never found.

In September of 2012 David Viens went on trial for the murder of his wife. The prosecutor was asking for a first degree murder conviction. You know the saying that goes “Any man who represents himself at trial has a fool for a client”? Well, apparently David Viens had a fool for a client. But, despite that it does seem that while it was not successful, he did argue that his confession in the hospital should not have been entered into the court due to the fact that he was on high doses of pain medication at the time. In fact, by the time he went to trial he was still obviously injured as he spent his time in court in a wheelchair. Apparently neither the judge, nor the jury, agreed with him when it came to the medication issue. However, instead of convicting him of first degree murder, the jury decided on second degree murder. Basically what that verdict said was that they did not believe that David meant to kill Dawn, but that his actions had caused her death. According to Jacqueline's testimony her father had expressed this in his confession to her also. The other issue that likely bothered the jury was the fact that there was no body found, hence there was no opportunity to determine if David's story of her death matched the issues with the body.

In March of 2013 David Viens was sentenced to fifteen years to life. He has argued, unsuccessfully with the appeals courts as they upheld his conviction and sentence in 2014. He apparently maintains that the story of “cooking” his wife is untrue and only a result of his mind playing tricks on him through his medication. Due to the fact that the California Department of Corrections inmate site not giving any information aside from the fact that an inmate is in custody I cannot tell you when he may or may not be eligible for parole.