Roommate convicted of murder, steals identity, do background checks at Intelius.com

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An aspiring U.S. Marshal found guilty of capital murder. Police went to his apartment to check on his roommate and found a horrifying scene. The body of Andreas Galanis found wrapped in blood-soaked blankets. His body badly bit, beaten. His skull cracked. Prosecutors said Bobby Batiste is a thief. And a murderer, that he stole money from the victim, and when Batiste realized he'd been caught, savagely beat Galanis with a metal tire tool. A rushed cleanup job, not enough to conceal what happened. Police finding blood on the walls and ceiling while pools of blood seeped through hastily cleaned carpet, leaving stained concrete underneath. Now that Batiste has been found guilty, he could be facing the death penalty. This is Mississippi versus Batiste. And this is In Session. Welcome back to In Session. I'm Ryan Smith. A jury convicted Bobby Batiste of robbing his college roommate and savagely beating him to death. Now, the jury must decide whether Batiste should be put to death. The defense is calling witnesses from Batiste's past to convince the jury that he deserves to live. Now, on the stand is Batiste's high school principal. Let's watch.

Did you know that he pled guilty to a felony in Kemper County?

No, sir.

You never knew that? I didn't know. You didn't know then that in 2004 he pled guilty to a credit card fraud? No, sir. Once again, the Bobby Batiste that you knew, would he have beaten another human being to death?

That was not his temperament.

In high school.

And we have an expert on personal safety here with us right now. Robert Siciliano, author of "The Safety Minute," joins me from Boston. Robert, great to have you with us.

Thank you.

All right, Robert, you know, this is part of the typical college experience. When I went to college, I was matched up randomly with roommates as well. What can happen sometimes in these experiences? We see these two circumstances of these situations going horribly wrong, but what can kids do to combat that? Because when you go to college, you're just going, you wanna have a good time. You're not thinking about, whether or not something like this could happen.

Yeah, well, right off the bat, uh, I would recommend that that student, uh, wherever— whoever you're housed with, you do a quick background check on that person. Uh, with today's technology, the transparency of information, doing a background check on someone is very easy to do, and you can find out if they have some type of a criminal history. And therefore, if you find that out, you bring it to the attention of the administrators, and you request additional or a change in housing.

But Robert, as a student, you're a freshman. When I went to school, I was what, 17, 18 years old? All I was thinking about was, hey, I'm gonna go out and have a good time. Doing a background check on my roommates, I mean, I know I went to school a lot, a little while ago, not that long ago, but is the situation here, I mean, is that reasonable to expect kids to do these kinds of checks or is it just today's society what needs to happen?

Look, it is 2010, and to not do a background check, in my opinion, is irresponsible. The availability of information in that regard is free to a small fee, and the parent can do one easy enough, the student can do one easy enough, and you simply go online, do a quick search, you know, there's companies all over the place, Intelius being one, that you can do a background check and you know instantly if that person has a criminal record. This is due diligence that you need to do in today's day and age. Employers doing one on the potential hire to work at any fast food restaurant or any place that student may go. Even the college and universities often are doing on new students. So, you know, we're in a new time. This is a new age. Information is everywhere, and you need to take responsibility for yourself, for your child, for their personal security, and do that. It's a different world we're in today.

Yeah, and Robert, you see this particular case right now with Bobby Batiste and Andreas Galanis, and the case I just talked about with Mia Henderson. What do you see? You've been also a victim of these kinds of crimes, of these, of not this particular type of crime, but you've been a victim of assaults as well. What do you see in Bobbi Batiste in that relationship with Andreas Galanis? Was there something that you see that was curious that maybe Andreas Galanis might have picked up on over time based on what you know of this case?

Here's the deal. Batiste is a predator by nature. He is a predator. And predators often give off signs and signals that they are a bad guy. They have, you know, an antisocial personality disorder that separates them from empathy and sympathy and value for others. Batiste crossed a lot of boundaries. And, you know, he obviously had committed fraud in the past and been caught for it. He was committing fraud, you know, and eventually he got caught for it. And chances are he was exhibiting some type of signs in his in the way in which he communicated, that would be a red flag to anyone who's paying any attention that there's something wrong with this guy. And when you're giving off these signals, when you're giving off those red flags that you don't have any sympathy and empathy, that you're very selfish in that way, very narcissistic, you pick up on those things and you must always think of your personal security in that regard because predators, you know, they take advantage of other people. They take advantage of people that are good, kind, nice, caring, and cordial. Those same people may be slightly naive, which is, you know, nothing wrong with that. But that civilized conditioning where you're brought up to trust and love and give kisses and hugs and be nice to one another can kind of, you know, negate your ability to see a predator and what makes them tick and to detect those things. You have to pay close attention and pay attention to the human behavior.

All right, Robert Siciliano, thank you so much for joining us. Sounds like people really need to be vigilant in these cases, even when you think College experience is just about going, you meet new people, you have fun. There's that little extra layer that you might have to do. Thank you very much, Robert.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.

And you know, here with me now from New York, In Session legal contributor Midwin Charles. And I want to bring back from Boston our expert on personal security and identity theft, Robert Siciliano. And Midwin, let me start from you. We've got another witness up here that— and these, these character witness, by the way, they seem really credible to me. They seem like good, solid people. Who knew Bobby when he was growing up, but at the same time they haven't seen him in a long time. Do you think that although they haven't seen him, the jury can still look at these witnesses and say, you know what, these are good people and they wouldn't just vouch for someone as good as they are if they didn't believe that this is not the penalty that should happen?

I, I think the jury will think that, but again, one of the biggest questions here is why is the defense not putting on a character witness from someone that is most recently acquainted with Bobby Batiste? And I think that question will linger on the jury. And of course, You know, these character witnesses are going to say that they don't want Bobby to die and that he was a great kid, but what else would they say, you know, basically is what I'm saying. And another thing, too, that I see here, Ryan, that may backfire on the defense is that everyone is saying how great Bobby was as a child. There are no major issues with him, i.e., abuse, any kind of thing that would indicate him doing this. So I wonder if that might even backfire from the perspective of the jury, like, you know, there isn't anything they can bear to mitigate this situation.

Mm, that's interesting. And you know, Bob, the interesting thing that you said a little while ago, you talked about students needing to do background checks on their roommates. But one thing that strikes me about the testimony that we're hearing now is all of these people are good people. If you did a background check on Bobby Batiste based on the witnesses that we've seen on the stand, he would be a saint. He would be an angel. And you still wouldn't know about this. What are people to do when they're doing these kinds of checks? And how do they avoid a situation like that? Because, you know, based on the people we're seeing, He's a great guy.

Well, if you actually look at the documentation and the fact that he had, what, pleaded guilty in 2004 to credit card fraud?

Right.

That would have shown up— that may have shown up in a background check. So any felony, any conviction shows up. I mean, there's a paper trail there. So with that type of due diligence, you know, for the $50 that it might cost the parent or the student, to do that check, it makes a lot of sense. You know, we live in a litigious society, and people are getting background checks every day before they get hired at a particular corporation because the, you know, the corporation doesn't want the liability of hiring a bad seed, hiring a bad employee who steals from the company, who's convicted of crime, and so forth. So it's an absolute, you know, necessary tool in modern society. And for your own personal security, why wouldn't you do it? You know, for a potential roommate, a date, whatever the case is. I mean, you do these things today because you know that if you don't, that bad things can happen. And the paper trail doesn't lie. He may lie. He may have bamboozled all these people in his past, but the paper trail doesn't lie.

Okay, Bob Medwin, thank you very much. And folks—