State v. Needs
| Decision Date | 26 February 1979 |
| Docket Number | No. 12648,12648 |
| Citation | 591 P.2d 130,99 Idaho 883 |
| Parties | The STATE of Idaho, Plaintiff-Respondent, v. Sally Joanne NEEDS, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | Idaho Supreme Court |
Ellison M. Matthews, Charles F. McDevitt, Alan E. Trimming, Boise, for defendant-appellant.
Wayne L. Kidwell, Atty. Gen., David H. Leroy, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Lynn E. Thomas, Eugene A. Ritti, Deputy Attys. Gen., Boise, for plaintiff-respondent.
Sally Joanne Needs appeals her conviction and sentence for life imprisonment for murder in the first degree of Ronald Needs, her husband. In late June, 1976, a resident of Emmett, Idaho discovered a torso, without head and arms and partially burned, in Ada County near the Gem County line. Following investigation and examination of the corpse authorities tentatively established the identity of the corpse to be that of Ron Needs. Further investigation led Idaho authorities to arrest Sally Needs for the murder of her husband. Defendant pleaded not guilty. After a trial by jury, Needs was found guilty. The trial judge then sentenced her to life imprisonment.
On appeal defendant alleges six assignments of error relating to proper proof of venue, proof of the corpus delicti, adverse pretrial publicity, the prejudicial effect at trial of admitting various photographic evidence as well as testimony about the defendant's prior assault on Ron Needs, the failure of the trial court to give the jury a cautionary instruction with respect to certain testimony adduced at trial, and the trial court's imposition of a life sentence on the defendant.
Needs' first contention here, as at trial, is that the trial judge should have granted the defense motion for acquittal on the ground that the state failed to prove venue beyond a reasonable doubt. On Tuesday, June 29, 1976 at approximately 3:30 p. m., Louis Burke discovered a partially burnt human body without head and arms, wrapped in a bed sheet and covered by a door in Ada County approximately five miles south of the Ada-Gem County line and .7 of a mile east of State Highway 16. The Ada County Sheriff's Office began their investigation later that afternoon.
At the scene, investigators found some broken green glass and a white bottle cap about 20 feet from where the body was located. Near the body and towards the upper portion, investigators found two wooden match sticks. The area around the body was burned and there was quite a bit of partially burned debris and unburned cloth material near the body. Specifically, Officer Roberts of the Ada County Sheriff's Office testified to the finding of a partially burned piece of red pullover type bodyshirt, some zipper fragments, and a piece of blue synthetic type of fabric which may have come from a ski jacket or a sleeping bag. The body of the victim had some clothing on it as well; namely, the elastic band of a size 30-32 pair of jockey shorts and the upper band of a pair of brown levi type trousers.
Idaho's murder venue statute provides:
The jurisdiction of a criminal action for murder . . . when the injury which caused the death was inflicted in one county and the party injured dies in another county or out of the state, is in the county where the injury was inflicted.
I.C. § 19-312. In denying defendant's motion for acquittal the trial judge stated that the fact that the body was found in Ada County was sufficient evidence from which the jury could infer that the injury was inflicted in Ada County. We agree.
Idaho originally adopted its present murder venue statute from a California murder venue statute, which was in effect until 1939 and was prior to 1939 identical to our present statute. Subsequently, California amended its statute to allow for jurisdiction of a criminal action for murder in the county in which a body was found. However, prior to this amendment, a California district court of appeals had occasion to apply California's earlier murder venue statute to a fact situation remarkably similar to that now before us. In People v. Peete, 54 Cal.App. 333, 202 P. 51 (1921) the state tried the defendant for murder in Los Angeles County. Authorities had discovered the victim's unrecognizable body in the basement of a house leased by the victim to the defendant in Los Angeles County. The court there held that venue was established where the uncontradicted circumstantial evidence showed that the body was found in the City of Los Angeles, in the basement of the house which the victim had leased to the defendant, many miles from the county line, covered with a mound of dirt, canvas and other articles, indicating that someone had physically placed the body there.
Likewise in the case now before us, the state presented uncontradicted evidence at trial that the authorities discovered the victim's decapitated body in Ada County some five miles from the Ada-Gem County line wrapped in a linen sheet and covered by a door showing as in the Peete case that someone had placed the body there. This evidence, unexplained, together with the evidence of other articles found at the scene were sufficient to justify the jury in concluding that the homicide was committed in Ada County.
Needs next argues that the state failed to prove the corpus delicti of the homicide beyond a reasonable doubt and that as a result the trial court erred in not granting defendant's motion for judgment of acquittal. It is Needs' more specific assertion that the prosecution did not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the body discovered off of State Highway 16 was the body of defendant's husband, Ron Needs.
In Idaho the corpus delicti in a homicide case consists of two elements, each of which the prosecution must prove to the satisfaction of reasonable men beyond a reasonable doubt. State v. Cutler, 94 Idaho 295, 486 P.2d 1008 (1971). The first element is the death of the person named in the charge (here Ron Needs). The second element is that the criminal action or means of the defendant caused the victim's death. Id. The state may prove each of these elements either by direct or circumstantial evidence. Id.
The state, in its case in chief, presented circumstantial evidence to identify the body found as that of Ron Needs. Dr. Delbert Scott, a pathologist, performed the autopsy within six hours of its discovery on June 29, 1976. Although Dr. Scott observed six stab wounds on the body, he testified that those stab wounds did not contribute to the victim's death. He stated that gunshots, decapitation, or a slit throat may have caused the victim's death. He noted that the body was that of a 25-30 year old man. The extent of decomposition and charring, as a result of the body having been burned from the waist down, precluded observation of any superficial scars. The individual was circumcised. Based on his observations, Dr. Scott stated that the victim's death could have occurred anywhere from 471/2 to 531/2 hours prior to the time that he performed the autopsy. But it was also possible that death had occurred anywhere from 2 to 5 days prior to the autopsy. Dr. Scott noted that due to the existence of blow fly eggs on the body, that the body had been at the scene where it was discovered for 6 to 14 hours prior to its discovery.
A specialist in anthropology testified that the joint surface of the victim's pubic symphysis indicated that the victim was somewhere between 24 to 36 years of age. Analysis of the victim's femur bone indicated that he was in his early to middle 30's. Further analysis indicated that the victim was somewhere between 67 to 75 inches tall and most likely in the area of 71 inches tall. His weight was somewhere between 165 to 205 pounds. The specialist stated that from the standpoint of the bones analyzed the victim was male, probably Caucasian, and relatively healthy.
Ronald Needs' Idaho driver's license which was admitted into evidence indicated that he was 35 years of age, male, 71 inches tall, and weighed 175 pounds.
There was extensive testimony about the scar tissue found on the bottom of the victim's big toes as well as evidence of scars on the bottom of Ronald Needs' big toes. Dr. Robert Richards, a pathologist, testified that examination of the victim's feet showed scarring on the bottom of both big toes. There was more prominent scarring on the left rather than the right. It was Dr. Richards' opinion that the victim had injured both big toes during life.
Ronald Needs' first wife testified that Needs had scars on both big toes of his feet. The scar on his left big toe was the result of running onto a knife when he was a child. She testified that that injury was larger than the injury to his right toe. She stated that the injury to his left toe cut his tendon which precluded him from bending his left toe down. While they were married, she massaged this tendon most evenings after work. Consistent with this testimony, Dr. Richards testified that he found scarring in the left toe tendon and tendon sheaf of the victim which would have had the effect of restricting the movement of the tendon and therefore the left toe.
With respect to Needs' right big toe, Needs' first wife testified that Ron Needs had cut it while swimming in a river in the summer of 1969 and that she took him to a hospital where a Dr. Krause cleaned it up. Dr. Krause testified that he had in fact treated Needs in the summer of 1969 for a laceration on his right foot.
The testimony of Ron Needs' girlfriend from Twin Falls provided the jury with more circumstantial evidence from which it could have concluded that the body discovered was that of Ron Needs. She testified that on Sunday, June 20, 1976 Needs visited her in Twin Falls to do some fishing and to show her the motor home which he had just purchased. She stated that on the following Tuesday, June 22, 1976, she thoroughly cleaned Needs' motor home while he went fishing. Needs left her residence later that day, and she never heard from him again.
Needs' girlfriend testified...
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