Arizona Supreme Court to hear arguments over DNA in Allison Feldman murder case

PHOENIX (AZFamily) — The Arizona Supreme Court is set to hear on Wednesday oral arguments on whether DNA can be used in the 2015 murder case of Allison Feldman.

DNA at the crime scene matched a man named Ian Mitcham, but it’s how that DNA was obtained that’s come into question.

Mitcham was arrested for the murder of Feldman, who was sexually assaulted, strangled and beaten to death at her Scottsdale home in February 2015.

We talked to Allison Feldman’s father, Harley Feldman, about his daughter and the case on the eve of the hearing.

He recalled her choosing which college she wanted to go to.

“She came to me Monday and she said, ‘Dad, I think the University of Arizona,’” Harley Feldman remembered many years ago.

Harley was so proud of his daughter graduating from the UofA, and eventually thriving in medical device sales in Scottsdale.

But in an instant, in 2015, that life was stolen from the 31-year-old.

“The call I got was from the detective,” Harley recalled. “He said, ‘Are you driving?’ And I said yes. He said pull over. And I knew what was coming next.”

Police said Allison Feldman had been murdered inside her own home. Her boyfriend, Alex Sukhodolov, found her minutes before police got to the scene.

“They interrogated Alex for a long time, didn’t feel, didn’t make him innocent, but didn’t feel it was him,” Harley said.

Three years later, there was a break in the case.

“I got a call from [Scottsdale Police Assistant Chief Scott] Popp. All he said was, we found him,” Harley said.

Using familial DNA, Scottsdale police got a lead to a man already in prison.

They believed the inmate’s brother, Mitcham, may be the suspect, and after DNA testing, it came back a match.

Mitcham was arrested for Allison’s murder in 2018.

“As far as you know, was there any connection at all between Ian and Allison prior to her death?” asked True Crime Arizona correspondent Briana Whitney.

“No,” Harley said.

“As of today, nine years later, you still don’t know a motive?” asked Whitney.

Harley shook his head no.

Then, an unexpected twist that would change the entire case.

“The last pretrial conference, another lawyer of his brought up this issue of the DNA from the DUI arrest,” Harley said.

Turns out Mitcham had been arrested for DUI in 2015 before Allison was killed.

Police took his blood to test it.

“In Scottsdale, when somebody is arrested for DUI, they’re told DNA will be kept for 90 days,” said Harley. “And they kept it for two years.”

“He consented to it being used for a drug and alcohol test but not for being used to build a DNA profile?” asked Briana.

“That’s right,” said Harley.

So, when police got that familial hit to Mitcham’s brother, they went back into the evidence vault and found Mitcham’s blood and DNA profile from his 2015 DUI arrest without obtaining a warrant to do so.

In December 2022, a Maricopa County Superior Court judge ruled it was improperly collected.

However, Mitcham was convicted of other felony crimes in 2022 after Allison’s death, so eventually, his DNA would have entered the system, and police would have gotten their hit to the Feldman crime scene years after they did, prosecutors argued.

That is called the doctrine of inevitable discovery.

In August 2023, the Arizona Court of Appeals reversed the decision, saying probable cause supported his arrest, and once he pleaded guilty to the felony charges, the DNA profile was properly in the state’s possession.

Mitcham’s defense appealed and in May, the state Supreme Court agreed to hear the case about whether the DNA case be used .

“Do you hold any resentment for the protocol breach that happened within Scottsdale PD?” Briana asked.

“I was with them. They were trying to do the right thing and believed that it was legal,” said Harley.

Nine years after he lost Allison, Harley never expected to be in the state Supreme Court.

“You expect to lose your parents because they’re older and that’s natural evolution, and I call that losing your past. When you lose your child, you’re losing your future,” Harley said. “My focus is on getting a result and a verdict against the guy who killed my daughter. And that’s what keeps me going.”

No word on when the court will make a ruling.

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