State v. Mata

• Decision Date: 09 May 1996
• Docket Number: No. CR-77-4104-AP,CR-77-4104-AP
• Citation: 916 P.2d 1035,185 Ariz. 319
• Parties: STATE of Arizona, Appellee, v. Luis Morine MATA, Appellant. /PC .
• Court: Arizona Supreme Court

Page 1035

916 P.2d 1035

185 Ariz. 319

STATE of Arizona, Appellee, v. Luis Morine MATA, Appellant.

No. CR-77-4104-AP/PC [4101].

Supreme Court of Arizona, In Banc.

May 9, 1996.

Grant Woods by Paul J. McMurdie, Chief Counsel, Criminal Appeals Section, Crane McClennen, Assistant Attorney General and Jack Roberts, Assistant Attorney General, Phoenix, for Appellee.

Stompoly, Stroud, Giddings & Glicksman, P.C. by Elliot A. Glicksman, David L. Horley, Tucson and Arizona Capital Representation Project by Denise I. Young, Tempe, for Appellant.

Brown & Bain by Michael W. Patten and Charles C. Van Cott, Phoenix, for Amicus Curiae Jose Jesus Ceja.

MOELLER, Justice.

THE PRESENT PROCEEDINGS

In 1977, defendant Luis Mata was convicted of the first degree murder of Debra Lopez and sentenced to death. After protracted litigation in state and federal courts, this court issued a warrant scheduling Mata's execution for July 12, 1995. On June 23, 1995, Mata moved this court to stay the execution. Although the motion presented numerous arguments, the court concluded that only two of the legal questions warranted a temporary stay in order to provide adequate opportunity to fully brief, argue, and decide them. Those two issues are:

1. Whether principles of federal or state constitutional law require that defendants who were sentenced to death prior to this court's opinion in State v. Gretzler, 135 Ariz. 42, 659 P.2d 1, cert. denied, 461 U.S. 971, 103 S.Ct. 2444 (1983), be resentenced if the sentencing judge used the statutory aggravating circumstance of "especially heinous, cruel or depraved" (now appearing at A.R.S. § 13-703(F)(6)), in whole or in part, to death-qualify the 2. Whether defendant is entitled to any relief by reason of his present claim, asserted in his fourth Rule 32 petition for post-conviction relief, that he did not receive effective assistance of counsel at his second sentencing in 1978.

                [185 Ariz. 321] defendant.  See, e.g., Richmond v. Lewis, 506 U.S. 40, 113 S.Ct. 528 [121 L.Ed.2d 411] (1992);  State v. Richmond, 180 Ariz. 573, 886 P.2d 1329 (1994);  State v. King, 180 Ariz. 268, 883 P.2d 1024 (1994);  Lewis v. Jeffers, 497 U.S. 764, 110 S.Ct. 3092 [111 L.Ed.2d 606] (1990);  and Gretzler, 135 Ariz. 42, 659 P.2d 1.   A sub-issue is whether a finding of cruelty should be treated differently in this respect than findings of heinousness or depravity
                

With respect to the first issue, we conclude that defendant need not be resentenced. We conclude that the second issue is precluded. Because defendant is entitled to no relief on the two issues that led us to issue a temporary stay, we now quash the temporary stay and will, upon motion of the state, issue another warrant of execution.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

Mata was convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to death in 1977. On appeal, pursuant to the requirements of Lockett v. Ohio, 438 U.S. 586, 98 S.Ct. 2954, 57 L.Ed.2d 973 (1978), and State v. Watson, 120 Ariz. 441, 586 P.2d 1253 (1978), cert. denied, 440 U.S. 924, 99 S.Ct. 1254, 59 L.Ed.2d 478 (1979), this court remanded for resentencing to assure that his sentencing was not tainted by any limitations on mitigating evidence. He was again sentenced to death and again appealed. While his appeal was pending, Mata filed his first petition for post-conviction relief (PCR). That PCR related to alleged transcript errors, and this court stayed the second appeal while the trial court made findings of fact. In affirming the conviction and sentence, we summarized the facts of the case as follows:

In the early morning hours of March 11, 1977, police found the body of Debra Lee Lopez at the side of a road in West Phoenix. The twenty-one year old woman had died as the result of her throat being severed through to the spine. The defendant and his brother Alonzo Mata were arrested and charged with first degree murder.

Testimony at trial revealed the following account of the events leading up to the victim's death. After an evening out, the Mata brothers were joined by the victim and George Castro Harrange, both acquaintances of the Matas. All four left a neighborhood bar, walked to the Mata's nearby apartment, and began watching television. According to Castro, the victim got up to leave after about ten minutes, at which point Luis grabbed her by the hair and announced that they were going to rape her. Thereafter, the Mata brothers beat the victim, Luis with his fists and Alonzo with a rifle, and successively raped her. At one point, Luis and the victim fell off the bed, whereupon Luis picked her up by the hair and beat her head against the cement floor. The victim soon regained consciousness and attempted to run away after Luis announced that they were going to kill her and throw her in the river. A neighbor testified that he heard terrified screams, that he saw Alonzo throw a rifle inside a car, and that another man carried either a person or a box to the car and deposited it in the front seat. The car departed. According to the confessions of the brothers, after the beatings and rapes, the men drove the then unconscious victim away from the apartment, and Luis killed her at the side of the road by cutting her throat with a knife.

State v. Mata, 125 Ariz. 233, 236, 609 P.2d 48, 51 (1980). The United States Supreme Court denied certiorari. 449 U.S. 938, 101 S.Ct. 338, 66 L.Ed.2d 161 (1980) (footnote omitted).

After a class action challenge to the Arizona death penalty statute failed in the federal courts, Knapp v. Cardwell, 513 F.Supp. 4 (D.Ariz.1980), aff'd, 667 F.2d 1253 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 459 U.S. 1055, 103 S.Ct. 473, 74 L.Ed.2d 621 (1982), this court set an execution date in 1983. New counsel for Mata filed a second PCR and obtained a stay of execution from the trial court. A judge who was not the trial judge heard and denied the second PCR. Because it should have been In late 1984, this court denied review of the second PCR and set a second execution date for early 1985. New counsel then filed a preliminary petition for habeas corpus in the federal district court and obtained a stay of execution. Its resolution, adverse to defendant, did not become final until the United States Supreme Court denied certiorari a decade later in 1994. Mata v. Ricketts, --- U.S. ----, 115 S.Ct. 436, 130 L.Ed.2d 348 (1994). The Ninth Circuit thereafter denied Mata's motion to stay the mandate.

[185 Ariz. 322] heard by the trial judge, who was available, we remanded the second PCR to the trial judge pursuant to State ex rel. Corbin v. Superior Court (Evans), 138 Ariz. 500, 675 P.2d 1319 (1984). After a hearing, the trial judge denied relief on the second PCR and denied a motion for rehearing.

Meanwhile, in September 1992, Mata, again through new counsel, filed a third PCR in state court, contending primarily that he did not receive effective assistance of counsel from his original trial counsel at the resentencing. The trial court held the claim to be precluded and alternatively found the claim lacked merit. This court denied review, and the United States Supreme Court denied certiorari on October 31, 1994. Mata v. Arizona, --- U.S. ----, 115 S.Ct. 436, 130 L.Ed.2d 357 (1994).

In February 1995, current defense counsel filed a fourth PCR in the trial court, which remains pending. Shortly before the third scheduled execution date of July 12, 1995, defendant moved this court for a stay of execution with the results outlined above.

DISCUSSION

I. Do principles of federal or state constitutional law require that defendants sentenced to death prior to this court's opinion in State v. Gretzler be resentenced if the statutory aggravating circumstance of "especially heinous, cruel or depraved" was used to death-qualify the defendant?

The trial judge at Mata's second sentencing found Mata to be "death-qualified" under Arizona's death penalty statute by reason of the existence of two separate statutory aggravating factors. One aggravator was that he had committed the murder in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner within the meaning of A.R.S. § 13-703(F)(6). This factual finding was made in 1978, five years before this court issued its opinion in State v. Gretzler, 135 Ariz. 42, 659 P.2d 1, cert. denied, 461 U.S. 971, 103 S.Ct. 2444, 77 L.Ed.2d 1327 (1983).

Defendant contends that the statutory terms contained in § 13-703(F)(6) were not sufficiently narrowed so as to pass constitutional muster until our 1983 opinion in Gretzler. Defendant relies primarily upon the United States Supreme Court case of Lewis v. Jeffers, 497 U.S. 764, 110 S.Ct. 3092, 111 L.Ed.2d 606 (1990), and a footnote in this court's recent opinion in State v. Richmond, 180 Ariz. 573, 886 P.2d 1329 (1994). The footnote, referring to Jeffers and Godfrey v. Georgia, 446 U.S. 420, 100 S.Ct. 1759, 64 L.Ed.2d 398 (1980), stated that the (F)(6) factor "had not yet been adequately narrowed pursuant to Godfrey ... at the time of [Richmond's] second sentencing. This did not occur until State v. Gretzler. See Lewis v. Jeffers...." Richmond, 180 Ariz. at 576 n. 1, 886 P.2d at 1332 n. 1.

We are now called upon to determine whether, in light of the Richmond footnote we are, as Mata contends, required to remand his case for a third sentencing. We conclude that we are not.

A. The History of the (F)(6) Factor in This Case

The trial court found the murder of Debra Lopez to have been committed in an especially heinous, cruel, or depraved manner at the first sentencing. The trial court again found the (F)(6) factor at the second sentencing. This court also found the (F)(6) factor on direct appeal. In Gretzler, we cited Mata as a proper application of the (F)(6) factor. 135 Ariz. at 51, 659 P.2d at 10. In defendant's second PCR, which was post-Gretzler, he argued that (F)(6) was unconstitutionally vague and was applied arbitrarily. The trial court denied relief on the merits of that argument, and this court denied review of that order.

In his third...