State v. Graham

OPINION

Justice FLAHERTY,

for the Court.

On January 1, 2002 — on what should have been a joyous day filled with anticipation of the new year — a lone gunman entered the Founder’s Brook Motel in Portsmouth, shot and killed the hotel manager, Sanjeev Patel, in front of his eight-year-old son, and left the victim’s bullet-riddled body for his wife to discover. In an effort to explain what at first appeared to be a random act of violence, 1 the police conducted countless interviews with persons of interest living in the Portsmouth area and nearby towns, as well as members and acquaintances of the…