State v. Glass
| Decision Date | 14 May 1984 |
| Docket Number | No. 83-KA-1735,83-KA-1735 |
| Citation | 455 So.2d 659 |
| Parties | STATE of Louisiana v. Jimmy L. GLASS. |
| Court | Louisiana Supreme Court |
William J. Guste, Jr., Atty. Gen., Barbara Rutledge, Asst. Atty. Gen., Henry N. Brown, Dist. Atty., for plaintiff-appellee.
Glenn F. Armstrong, Maurice Loridans, Bossier City, for defendant-appellant.
Defendant, Jimmy Glass, was indicted by a Webster Parish Grand Jury on two counts of first degree murder. Because of pretrial publicity, venue was changed from the Twenty-Sixth Judicial District to the Fifteenth Judicial District in Lafayette. Glass was found guilty as charged and the jury recommended the death penalty. 1 In this appeal defendant argues fifteen assignments of error.
In this opinion we will treat the four assignments of error (assignments 5, 10-11, and 9), which are potentially the most serious, and review the sentence. The remaining assignments involve legal issues governed by clearly established principles of law. They will be treated in an appendix which will not be published, but which will comprise part of the record in this case.
Because we find none of defendant's assignments of error meritorious, defendant's conviction and death sentence will be affirmed.
The facts as adduced at trial are as follows. Defendant Glass, who was in prison following his conviction and sentence for armed robbery, and one Jimmy Wingo, who was awaiting trial on two counts of burglary, escaped from the Webster Parish Jail in Minden, Louisiana, on Christmas Eve, December 24, 1982. Around eight o'clock that evening, the two men were being allowed to make telephone calls to their families. When the deputy had to leave them unattended momentarily, because of a disturbance in the cells, they descended in the elevator and escaped.
What happened at the crime scene comes largely from the trial testimony of the defendant. According to Glass the escape was Wingo's idea. Once outside, the two men made their way from Minden to Dixie Inn, Louisiana, for the most part walking through fields. Defendant testified that they came out on a road and found some kind of business and a house (with no one evidently at home). As they tried to enter a window at the back of the house, a car turned into the driveway. According to Glass' testimony the duo watched Mr. and Mrs. Brown get out of the car and go into the house. Since the keys were not left in the parked car, Wingo decided to check out the storeroom located in the carport area. He found a refrigerator containing beer. 2 They retreated beyond the hedge and drank beer. According to Glass' testimony Wingo decided that they should wait until the couple went to sleep, smash the patio door, then go in, surprise the couple, and tie them up. During the planning and drinking, Glass also consumed some champagne.
The defendant testified that, pursuant to Wingo's instructions, he cut the telephone wires with a pair of hedge clippers and threw a piece of petrified wood through the glass of the patio door. Glass and Wingo then opened the door, entered the house and ran down the hall to the bedroom where they found Mrs. Brown standing on the side of the bed screaming and Mr. Brown lying in the bed. Mr. and Mrs. Brown were told to lie face down on the bed. By that time Wingo had acquired a shotgun and rifle. Defendant Glass rooted through the man's billfold and through various furniture drawers, etc. In the nightstand drawer Glass found .38 caliber shells. He asked Mr. Brown where the pistol was kept and was told that it was in the closet. He went to the closet where he found the gun. While searching for the gun Glass cut his thumb on a saw that was on the closet shelf. 3 Mrs. Brown told defendant Glass the location of her purse which he then emptied in the living room. As defendant looked through other rooms for possible loot, he called out Wingo's name and asked him what to do next. Wingo told Glass to shut up. After taking liquor from the kitchen cabinet and putting it in the back seat of the Browns' car, defendant was allegedly told by Wingo that he, Glass, had to kill the couple, who had been bound and gagged, since Glass had called out Wingo's name when they were in the house.
Defendant testified that Wingo poked him in the back of the head with the shotgun barrel and told him that he was to kill them, or Wingo would "splatter [his] brains all across this room." 4 Glass testified that Wingo kept the shotgun at defendant's neck or back as Glass made his way back to the bedroom. Then Glass allegedly put his knee on the foot of the bed, more on the man's side, bent over, closed his eyes and pulled the trigger. 5 As the woman raised her head and started to scream, defendant allegedly pointed the gun, closed his eyes, and pulled the trigger. 6 Glass testified that, before leaving the room, he pulled the covers up over the victims' heads.
Wingo and Glass then took the Browns' car 7 toward Vivian, Louisiana, so that Wingo could see his girlfriend. In Vivian, the two men were forced to abandon the car which had broken down after hitting high water which had flooded the road. The pair walked to the house of Wingo's sister and picked up Gwen Hill, Wingo's girlfriend, and spent a day in the woods. Glass testified that the three then took a truck and drove to Atlanta, Texas, where Wingo and Gwen stayed in a motel room, while defendant took the truck and went on to Little Rock, Arkansas, and eventually to a friend's house. In the meantime, state troopers began looking for Glass. He then allegedly took a bus to Ventura Beach, California. From there he went to San Diego where he was eventually picked up.
Defendant Glass contends that the trial judge erred when he refused to appoint another psychiatrist to examine defendant after one of two psychiatrists who had been appointed failed to examine defendant with respect to his sanity at the time of the offense.
Prior to trial defendant was allowed to change his "not guilty" plea to a plea of "not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity." At the time defendant requested that he be allowed to withdraw his original plea, he also requested a continuance of the trial date. Defendant, an indigent, requested this continuance hoping that he would be able to obtain a psychiatric examination by physicians of his own choice at the expense of the Indigent Defender Board. The trial court refused to grant a continuance but gave defendant the opportunity to request the appointment of a Sanity Commission. Defendant took advantage of the opportunity. The court appointed Dr. Robert L. Turner and Dr. James H. Blackburn to examine defendant in order to assess his mental condition at the time of the offense.
Dr. Blackburn examined defendant and submitted a psychiatric evaluation in which he found that defendant was not suffering from any mental illness or emotional disorder which would have affected him severely at the time of the offense. He recited also that defendant was able to assist in his own defense. Defendant did not object to the sufficiency of Dr. Blackburn's report.
Defendant did object to the one sentence report of Dr. Turner which read: "I have examined Jimmy Glass and find him to be competent, capable of understanding the charges against him with an understanding of the difference between 'right' and 'wrong', and capable of assisting counsel in his defense."
In objecting to Dr. Turner's report defendant argued that it did not discuss the issue of sanity at the time of the offense. In response to his objection, the trial judge allowed defendant to subpoena Dr. Turner in order to cross-examine him, out of the presence of the jury, with respect to defendant's sanity at the time of the offense.
At the hearing Dr. Turner elaborated on his brief written report. Dr. Turner testiifed that he conducted a psychiatric interview with defendant in which he questioned defendant about such things as his thought content, intellectual functioning, past history, sensorium, mood, and his state of mind at the time of the offense. It was Dr. Turner's opinion that defendant has an antisocial personality disorder. However, he was of the view that defendant was not suffering from any type of mental disease or defect which would have prevented him from knowing the difference between right and wrong.
A fair reading of the testimony of Dr. Turner, coupled with his brief report, including its reference to defendant's knowing the difference between right and wrong, the appropriate test for time of offense insanity under La.R.S. 14:14, leads us to conclude that the doctor did examine for and testify to defendant's sanity at the time of the offense. Under these circumstances, it was not error for the trial judge to refuse to appoint another doctor. 8
Having determined that the sanity commission appointed by the trial court fulfilled its duties, we find that this assignment of error is without merit.
With these assignments of error defendant contends that the trial court erred when it charged the jury that the defense of coercion is not available to one charged with the murder of an innocent person. Defendant also argues that the trial judge erred when it refused to charge the jury, in accordance with defendant's requested special jury charges nos. 7 and 9, that the jury "must analyze defendant's personal intent based upon the 'mental element proved at trial' and 'may not attribute to him any such specific intent which may have existed on the part of another person.' " 9
The trial judge's instruction to the jury, that the defense of coercion is not available to one charged with the murder of an innocent person, 10 was based upon La.R.S. 14:18 which provides in part:
The fact that an offender's conduct is justifiable, although otherwise criminal, shall constitute a defense to any crime based on that conduct. This defense of...
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