53 Cal.3d 1179A, People v. Beardslee

• Decision Date: 25 March 1991
• Docket Number: No. S004609,S004609
• Citation: 279 Cal.Rptr. 276
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: A, 53 Cal.3d 68, 806 P.2d 1311 The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Donald Jay BEARDSLEE, Defendant and Appellant. Crim. 23593.

Page 276

279 Cal.Rptr. 276

53 Cal.3d 1179A, 53 Cal.3d 68, 806 P.2d 1311

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Donald Jay BEARDSLEE, Defendant and Appellant.

No. S004609.

Crim. 23593.

Supreme Court of California In Bank.

March 25, 1991.

As Modified on Denial of

Rehearing June 5, 1991.

Richard L. Phillips, Sacramento, under appointment by the Supreme Court, and Thomas Lundy, Santa Rosa, for defendant and appellant.

John K. Van de Kamp, Atty. Gen., Steve White and Richard B. Iglehart, Chief Asst. Attys. Gen., John H. Sugiyama, Asst. Atty. Gen., Ronald S. Matthias, Morris Beatus and Dane R. Gillette, Deputy Attys. Gen., Daniel E. Lungren, Diepenbrock, Wulff Plant & Hannegan, Sacramento, for plaintiff and respondent.

ARABIAN, Associate Justice.

Defendant Donald Jay Beardslee was charged under the 1978 death penalty law with the first degree murders of Paula (Patty) Geddling and Stacy Benjamin under two special circumstances. A jury found defendant guilty of committing both murders with premeditation and deliberation (Pen.Code, §§ 187, 189; all section references are to that code unless otherwise indicated) and further determined that each murder was committed under two special circumstances: concurrent conviction of multiple murders (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(3)) and intentional killing for the purpose of preventing the victim from testifying as a witness to a separate crime (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(10)). Defendant also was found to have personally used a firearm in the murder of Patty Geddling (§§ 1203.06, subd. (a)(1), 12022.5) and a knife in the murder of Stacy Benjamin (§ 12022, subd. (b)).

A penalty trial was then held before a different jury, which determined that defendant should suffer the death penalty for the murder of Patty Geddling and life imprisonment without possibility of parole for the murder of Stacy Benjamin. (See §§ 190.3, 190.4, subd. (a).) The trial court denied defendant's motions to strike the special circumstances and to modify the penalty, and entered a judgment of death. (§ 190.4, subd. (e).) Defendant's appeal is automatic. (§ 1239, subd. (b).)

We conclude that one of the multiple-murder and both witness-killing special circumstances must be set aside, and that the judgment otherwise be affirmed.

GUILT PHASE EVIDENCE

Patty Geddling, age 23, and Stacy Benjamin, age 19, were murdered at separate locations on April 25, 1981. At the time of their deaths, they were living together as close friends. Stacy sold drugs and had a reputation for "ripping people off." Patty on occasion also sold drugs.

Defendant, age 37, was then living in his studio apartment in Redwood City with Ricki Soria, whom he had met two months earlier while she was hitchhiking. Defendant wanted to help Soria stop using drugs and to separate her from Ed Geddling (Patty's estranged husband) and Frank Rutherford, who were drug dealers. Rutherford had a reputation for carrying guns and collecting drug debts, and had bragged that he would never go to jail because he or his brothers would take care of any witnesses. He was prosecuted separately for the present killings, and defendant's transcribed testimony at Rutherford's preliminary hearing comprised a principal part of the prosecution's guilt phase evidence against defendant.

On April 23, Soria told defendant that Stacy had cheated William Forrester in a drug deal. The next afternoon, defendant agreed with Soria and Rutherford to help Forrester get back at Stacy and Patty that evening in defendant's apartment. Forrester came to the apartment, and defendant picked up Rutherford, who had a shotgun. The four discussed plans for trapping the victims. Rutherford cut a wire and twisted the ends around shotgun shells. At defendant's request, Soria went out and bought tape for gagging the victims. It was agreed that when the victims arrived, Soria would sit on the sofa, defendant would open the door, and Rutherford and Forrester would hide. Defendant testified he expected Rutherford and Forrester to "rough [the victims] up a little bit," tie and gag them, take their money and drugs, and leave.

The victims arrived around 6:30 p.m. As defendant opened the door and they approached Soria, defendant heard the shotgun fire. He then saw that Rutherford was holding the gun and that Patty was wounded in the left shoulder. Defendant took her into the bathroom and tried to stop her bleeding. Both victims' hands and feet were tied. Rutherford told Patty they would take her to the hospital, and repeated this statement in Stacy's presence while winking at defendant. Between 9 and 10 p.m., defendant and Forrester left and brought back Rutherford's car.

After a discussion with Rutherford about taking the victims somewhere in their own van, defendant believed the victims would be killed. But when Rutherford handed him some shotgun shells, defendant said, "I'm not going to do this." Forrester said, "Well, I guess I'm going to do it." Patty was loaded into the victims' van, which was driven away by Forrester with defendant as a passenger. Soria followed in defendant's car. Rutherford stayed behind with Stacy.

Forrester drove south on Highway 1 and on to Bean Hollow Road, where they stopped. Patty got out of the van and began pleading for her life. Defendant loaded the gun for Forrester, who shot Patty twice. Defendant reloaded and also fired at her twice.

Leaving Patty's dead body in a ditch beside the road, they departed, Soria and Forrester in the van and defendant in his own car. When the van ran out of gas, the three wiped off their fingerprints and abandoned it. Defendant and Soria then dropped off Forrester and returned to defendant's apartment. While there, they received a telephone call from Rutherford, asking them to join him at the nearby apartment of his girlfriend, Dixie Davis. Arriving at Davis's apartment between 3 and 3:30 a.m., they found Stacy watching television. Out of Stacy's hearing, defendant told Rutherford that Forrester had "chickened out" and defendant had to finish the job. Rutherford said defendant should have killed Forrester; defendant replied that Soria had refused to give him more shells for that purpose. Then, in Stacy's presence, defendant and Rutherford had a conversation implying that Patty was in the hospital.

About 5 a.m., defendant, Rutherford, Soria, and Stacy left in defendant's car. They stopped at a service station where Stacy collected money she was owed for drugs, stopped in Pacifica where Soria obtained cocaine, and made two more stops to consume the cocaine before crossing the Golden Gate Bridge. They stopped to see Rutherford's brother in Sebastopol, where defendant heard Rutherford obtain advice from the brother on where to "drop off" Stacy. Defendant understood this to refer to killing Stacy and leaving her body somewhere.

They headed north on Highway 101 and turned onto a winding side road. Defendant was driving. Rutherford told Stacy they were going to Lakeport to obtain drugs. They stopped at a turnout. Stacy was upset, but Rutherford coaxed her out of the car, and all four walked up the hill. Soria and Rutherford went back to the car, and Stacy asked if defendant was supposed to strangle her then. He said, "No." When Soria returned with Rutherford, she told defendant in a low voice that Rutherford had "fixed up" the wire. Defendant and Soria walked further, where they could not see Rutherford and Stacy. Defendant heard some commotion, however, and Soria urged him to go help Rutherford.

Defendant found Rutherford sitting on Stacy, strangling her with his left hand. A broken wire lay under her neck. Rutherford called Stacy a "die hard bitch." Defendant saw Stacy give him a pleading look, and he punched her in the left temple, attempting unsuccessfully to knock her out. Defendant then held one end of a wire wrapped around Stacy's throat while Rutherford pulled on the other end. Rutherford took both ends of the wire, pulled it tight, and twisted it. The two men dragged Stacy to a more secluded area. Defendant asked for Rutherford's knife and used it to slit Stacy's throat twice. After she was dead, defendant, at Rutherford's suggestion, pulled down her pants to make it appear that she had been assaulted sexually. Late that afternoon, Rutherford, Soria, and defendant returned to the Davis apartment.

Early that morning, Patty's body was found by joggers. A shoe repair claim ticket, recovered from her clothing, bore defendant's telephone number. Accordingly, Detective Sergeant Robert Morse of the San Mateo County Sheriff's Office called on defendant, who agreed to come to the sheriff's office to give a statement. Morse began the interview by talking about the difference between a witness and a suspect, and then asked defendant if he were involved in the case. Defendant replied: "Well, Frank [Rutherford] shot her but I guess I'm involved because I shot her in the head twice myself. I was afraid." Defendant was advised of his Miranda rights and gave a detailed, taped statement about both killings. From defendant's directions, officers found Stacy's body near the Hopland Grade Road in Lake County, as well as numerous items of physical evidence at scattered locations in San Mateo County. A transcription of defendant's statement, as well as the tape itself, became a prosecution exhibit at the trial.

Defendant testified in his own behalf. His trial testimony, his prior testimony at the Rutherford preliminary hearing, and his taped statement were essentially consistent, except for differences in his versions of the fatal blows.

At trial and in prior testimony at the preliminary hearing, defendant said that after Forrester fired twice at Patty, defendant felt her pulse and decided she was dead. Nonetheless, he retrieved the gun from Forrester and fired twice in the direction of her head but did not think he hit her. He did this out of fear that Rutherford would have him killed if he were only a witness and not a participant in Patty's...