A judge will allow the defense to introduce an Oregon teen’s polygraph results at trial that indicate he never intended to carry out an alleged bombing and mass shooting plot at a Washington mall.
Columbia County Circuit Judge Nickolas Brajcich granted the defense motion Tuesday afternoon for Beau Michael Carr, 14, of Clatskanie.
Authorities arrested Carr in May after FBI investigators said he had used the profile “Zodiac99” to post plans on an extremist online network to kill people and then himself at the Three Rivers Valley Mall in Kelso.
The teen’s attorney, Chris Heywood, successfully argued that the polygraph results are crucial to his case.
“Despite the state’s characterization of Beau as a fourteen-year-old-would-be-domestic-terrorist, the reality is that (in addition to lacking any ability to carry out the alleged plan of attack) Beau never intended to carry out the fantastical plot that underlies the state’s attempted murder charge,” Heywood wrote in a court motion.
Deputy District Attorney Sarika Kathuria countered that the polygraph results are unreliable and irrelevant.
FBI agents said Carr plotted to set off a chlorine bomb to flush people out of the mall’s movie theater and then shoot them, complete with a map that showed his intended path through the shopping center, now called Three Rivers Crossing.
Carr has pleaded not guilty to allegations of attempted second-degree murder, attempted assault, two counts of unlawful possession of firearms, disorderly conduct, two counts of unlawful use of a weapon and tampering with physical evidence.
The ruling will allow the defense to call Derry L. York, a licensed polygraph examiner, as a witness at the teen’s trial, set for Jan. 27.
York tested Carr on Aug. 13 at the Portland office of the teen’s lawyer.
York found Carr truthfully answered when he responded “no” to two questions: Did you intend to carry out the attack on the mall and were you going to actually attack the mall?
“It is my scientific and professional opinion that the physiological responses recorded during the polygraph examination, in reference to the relevant questions, are consistent with the usual indications of truthfulness,” York wrote in his report.
The judge found the polygraph results are relevant and admissible in the juvenile delinquency proceeding.
He noted that state law generally bars polygraph evidence from court proceedings based on a 1984 Oregon Supreme Court decision in State v. Brown. But he ruled that the decision doesn’t appear to apply to trials decided by judges in juvenile hearings.
“In fact, the Brown court was careful to explicitly note, albeit in a footnote, that its holding did not apply to certain hearings held in Oregon courts" — notably those before a judge versus a jury, which “may be overly impressed or prejudiced” by polygraph results without conducting its own assessment, Heywood wrote in his motion.
Heywood noted that polygraphs are used widely outside the courtroom, including by the FBI in its background checks of prospective agents who apply to work at the bureau.
The judge cited a U.S. Justice Department memo on the FBI application and background process that says failure to pass the background polygraph leads to automatic disqualification from FBI employment.
The FBI polygraph test includes questions about whether applicants have U.S. citizenship, any felony convictions, student loan defaults and illegal drug use.
Columbia County District Attorney Joshua Pond didn’t respond to an emailed message seeking his comment on the judge’s ruling.
Carr remains on home detention after the judge in June ordered his release with electric monitoring.
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