State v. Buenaventura

• Decision Date: 02 April 2003
• Docket Number: No. 02-0429.,02-0429.
• Citation: 660 N.W.2d 38
• Parties: STATE of Iowa, Appellee, v. John Cyril Lapid BUENAVENTURA, Appellant.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

660 N.W.2d 38

STATE of Iowa, Appellee, v. John Cyril Lapid BUENAVENTURA, Appellant.

No. 02-0429.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

April 2, 2003.

Linda Del Gallo, State Appellate Defender, and David Arthur Adams, Assistant Appellate Defender, for appellant.

Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, Mary E. Tabor, Assistant Attorney General, Denver D. Dillard, County Attorney, and Russell G. Keast, Assistant County Attorney, for appellee.

TERNUS, Justice.

Appellant, John Buenaventura, a Philippine citizen, was not advised of his right to contact his consulate prior to the police questioning him regarding the beating death of his sister-in-law. In his later prosecution for first-degree murder, the trial court overruled Buenaventura's motion to suppress statements he made during the police interrogation, rejecting a claim that Buenaventura's rights under Article 36 of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations were violated. The court also refused to allow witnesses to testify as to incidents of vandalism and harassment suffered by the victim before her death.

On Buenaventura's appeal of his subsequent murder conviction, we affirm the trial court's ruling on the defendant's motion to suppress, as well as the court's refusal to permit testimony regarding prior vexatious acts against the victim. Rejecting the defendant's challenge to the adequacy of the evidence against him, we find sufficient evidence to support the trial court's submission of first and second-degree murder charges to the jury. We preserve Buenaventura's claim of ineffective assistance of counsel for a possible post conviction relief action.

I. Background Facts and Proceedings.

The defendant, John Buenaventura, is a Philippine national who, at the time of the crime, resided in Cedar Rapids, Iowa with his wife, Shirley, and their young daughter. Shirley's sister, Sally Malacas, also lived with them prior to her brutal murder on the evening of March 8, 2001.

The evidence at trial showed that Shirley worked the night shift at a Cedar Rapids nursing home on the night of Malacas's death. While she was gone, neighbors living in the same building were awakened around 2:30 a.m. by the sound of a woman screaming and a man yelling. When Shirley returned home the next morning her sister was not there, even though her purse was in the apartment. Later in the day, when Malacas was still not home, Shirley and friends of the sisters began to look for Malacas. Buenaventura was angry about the search, reminding Shirley that Malacas had run off once before. Rather than joining in the efforts to find Malacas, the defendant rented a carpet cleaner and cleaned the carpets in the apartment where they lived.

Eventually the police were notified that Malacas was missing. Nonetheless, Shirley and others continued to search for her. Finally, on March 11, one of the searchers looked in a utility closet in the apartment building where Malacas lived and discovered Malacas's body. She was fully clothed and was wearing her coat. An autopsy revealed that Malacas had been dead for approximately two and one-half days. She had been brutally beaten, her death caused by severe head injuries. The victim suffered several skull fractures from an unidentified object and extensive injuries to her abdomen and chest, including broken ribs, a punctured lung, internal bleeding and a lacerated liver.

Later that day, the police asked to talk with Buenaventura at the police station. Buenaventura waited in a locked room for four hours while the police interviewed other witnesses. At 8:00 p.m., detectives began their interrogation of the defendant. They first ascertained that Buenaventura understood English. (It is undisputed that Buenaventura can read and understand English even though his native language is Tagalog.) The defendant was given his Miranda rights and then he signed a waiver-of-rights form. He did not request an attorney. Although the police knew that Buenaventura was a Philippine citizen, they did not inform him that he had a right to contact the Philippine consulate under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations.

Buenaventura remained calm during the interview and denied any knowledge relating to Malacas's death. He told the police that he had last seen his sister-in-law prior to taking his wife to work on March 8, 2001. Buenaventura denied cleaning the carpets in his apartment on March 9, until the police informed him that they knew the carpets had been cleaned. The defendant then admitted he had cleaned the carpets, asserting they were stained and he was concerned they would not get their damage deposit back from their landlord. He acknowledged, however, that there was no urgency to this task, as the family had no intention of moving any time soon.

Eventually Buenaventura consented to a polygraph test. After the test was completed, the detectives told Buenaventura that his polygraph examination showed he was providing false information. The defendant stuck to his story, however, and the police prepared to leave the interview room. At this point, Buenaventura asked for an attorney. Rather than providing the defendant with an attorney, the police stopped all questioning and released Buenaventura to go home.

The next contact between the police and Buenaventura occurred at Malacas's funeral. Seeing the detectives on his way into the church, Buenaventura asked the detectives what was going on. After the service, one of the detectives asked the defendant if he wanted to talk to them, but cautioned him that they could not speak to him unless he had an attorney or waived his right to an attorney. Buenaventura agreed to waive his right to counsel and went with the police to the station. The defendant was again given his Miranda rights and again signed a waiver-of-rights form that specifically stated he did not wish to have an attorney.

Prior to this second interview, the police had learned that blood and a large amount of detergent had been found in the family vacuum cleaner. In addition, they had discovered that the bottom of the carpet in Malacas's bedroom and the pad beneath the carpet had significant bloodstains. The blood was consistent with that of Malacas.

Buenaventura's second interview began around 9:15 p.m. The detectives focused their questioning on whether the defendant had recently used the family vacuum. Initially, Buenaventura denied ever vacuuming. When he was confronted with the information known to the detectives, however, he broke down and began to tell a different story. First he stated he was a cold-blooded killer and that he had killed Malacas with twelve blows to the head with his fists. Then he stated that he used a wooden baseball bat. Almost immediately after these admissions, he returned to his original account that he had not killed his sister-in-law. Buenaventura then asked to talk to the pastor of the church attended by his wife and Malacas.

The pastor arrived around midnight. He agreed to the police listening to his conversation with Buenaventura. The pastor told the defendant that their discussion would not be confidential. During the course of their talk, the pastor advised Buenaventura several times that he should get an attorney. The defendant did not, however, ask for a lawyer.

After talking with the pastor, Buenaventura decided he wanted to give the police a written statement. The defendant's description in this statement of what happened on March 8 varied significantly from any of his prior versions of the events of that evening. Buenaventura said Malacas was at the apartment when he returned home around 11:00 p.m. from dropping off his wife at work. The defendant stated that about 2:30 a.m. he saw two white males walking outside and it looked like they were smoking marijuana. He then invited them into the apartment. Malacas became mad and left. Buenaventura stated he did not know the men or their names. Nor could he describe them because he was high from smoking marijuana. After smoking three marijuana cigarettes, the defendant asked the men to leave and then he went to bed. He said he pushed his bed against his bedroom door so the men would not come back and harm him. Then he went to sleep. He did not recall whether he locked the apartment door.

Buenaventura claimed he woke up around 4:00 a.m. and checked to see if Malacas was home. It was then that he found a large amount of blood on the carpet in Malacas's room. "Because of the blood [he] knew Malacas was dead and [he] felt it was [his] fault." He tried to clean up the blood with water and detergent. Later in the day he used a vacuum cleaner; eventually he rented a carpet cleaner and further scoured the carpet.

When the police read his statement back to him, Buenaventura became so upset he vomited in the wastebasket. Afterwards, he signed the statement and the police then arrested him for murder. At no time during the interview or prior to his arrest was he informed of any rights under the Vienna Convention. The police did, however, notify the Philippine consulate in Chicago of Buenaventura's arrest, first by voice mail and later by facsimile.

After entering a not guilty plea to the charge of murder in the first degree, Buenaventura filed a motion to suppress the statements he made to the police in their two interviews of him. In addition to claiming that his statements were coerced, he argued they were inadmissible because they had been obtained in violation of his rights under Article 36 of the Vienna Convention. Specifically, he contended he had a right to consular notification and consultation prior to giving any statements to the police. The district court overruled the defendant's motion. Relying on our decision in State v. Lopez, 633 N.W.2d 774, 783 (Iowa 2001), the court held that Buenaventura had failed to show that he was actually prejudiced by the failure to notify him of his right to contact his consulate.

The case proceeded to trial and the defendant was found guilty...