State v. Barton
| Citation | 998 S.W.2d 19 |
| Decision Date | 03 August 1999 |
| Docket Number | No. 80931,80931 |
| Parties | STATE of Missouri, Respondent, v. Walter BARTON, Appellant. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Court of Missouri |
J. Christopher Spangler, Special Public Defender, Sedalia, for Appellant.
Jeremiah W. (Jay) Nixon, Atty. General, Gregory L. Barnes, Assistant Attorney General, Jefferson City, for Respondent.
Appellant, Walter E. Barton, was convicted of the class A felony of murder in the first degree, in violation of 565.020, RSMo 1994, for which he was sentenced to death. Appellant appeals his first degree murder conviction and his sentence. Affirmed. 1
The evidence is viewed in the light most favorable to the verdict. State v. Kreutzer, 928 S.W.2d 854, 859 (Mo. banc 1996). On the morning of October 9, 1991, Carol Horton, a resident of Riverview Mobile Home Park in Ozark, Missouri, visited the trailer of Gladys Kuehler at approximately 9:00 a.m. Kuehler, eighty-one years of age, served as manager of the park. Kuehler was unable to move about without the assistance of a cane. Horton assisted Kuehler with some tasks and last saw Kuehler at 11:04 a.m.
The owners of the trailer park, Bill and Dorothy Pickering, visited Kuehler's trailer some time between 1:15 p.m. and 2:00 p.m. to collect rent receipts. Ted and Sharon Bartlett, former residents of the trailer park, arrived for a visit with Kuehler between 2:00 p.m. and 2:15 p.m. and remained until about 2:45 p.m. Kuehler told the Bartletts that she was going to lie down because she was not feeling well.
Appellant was visiting Horton in her trailer on October 9, 1991. At approximately 2:00 p.m., appellant left her trailer. Appellant said that he was going to Kuehler's trailer to borrow twenty dollars. He returned to Horton's trailer ten or fifteen minutes later saying that Kuehler told him to return later and that she would write him a check. Appellant left Horton's trailer again at approximately 3:00 p.m. He told Horton that he was going to Kuehler's trailer.
At approximately 3:15 p.m., Bill Pickering telephoned Kuehler's trailer. A man, later determined to be appellant, answered the telephone and stated that Kuehler was in the bathroom and could not come to the telephone. Debra Selvidge, Kuehler's granddaughter, spoke with Kuehler on the telephone some time after 3:00 p.m. She telephoned Kuehler again between 3:30 p.m. and 4:00 p.m., but received no answer.
Appellant returned to Horton's trailer at approximately 4:00 p.m. Appellant was acting "totally different," seemed to be in a hurry, and asked Horton if he could use her restroom. Horton detected a smell of blood on Barton's person. After noticing that appellant had been in the bathroom for a long time, Horton went to check on him. Appellant was washing his hands. He said that he had been working on a car.
At approximately 4:15 p.m., Horton told appellant that she was going to Kuehler's trailer. Appellant told her not to go because Kuehler had told him she was going to lie down and take a nap. Appellant left Horton's trailer. Horton then went to check on Kuehler. She received no response when she knocked on Kuehler's door. She tried to open the door, but it was locked. She returned to Kuehler's trailer again at 6:00 p.m. and again received no response.
Debra Selvidge, who had been attempting to reach Kuehler by telephone, drove to Kuehler's trailer. She knocked on the door but received no answer. At approximately 7:30 p.m., Selvidge went to Horton's trailer and expressed her concern. Horton, Horton's son, and Selvidge went to Kuehler's trailer. They knocked and received no response. On their way to make telephone calls, they saw a police officer, Officer Hodges, who agreed to meet them at Kuehler's trailer after he answered another call. The two women saw appellant at another trailer in the trailer park. Selvidge asked him if he would go with them back to Kuehler's trailer. Appellant agreed to go but said that he would go later.
The women drove to Kuehler's trailer. After a time, appellant arrived. The women knocked on Kuehler's door. Appellant walked over to the side of the trailer, where he began to pound on the wall of the trailer under the bedroom window near where Kuehler's body was later found.
Officer Hodges arrived and unsuccessfully attempted to open the door. He radioed a dispatcher to send a locksmith. The officer left on another call. When the locksmith arrived, he opened the door. After the locksmith opened the door, Selvidge and Horton, followed by appellant, entered the trailer. After calling out for Kuehler and receiving no answer, Selvidge started down the hallway toward Kuehler's bedroom, followed by Horton and appellant. Appellant told Selvidge not to go down the hall. Selvidge did, however, and noticed Kuehler's clothing on the floor in front of the toilet in the bathroom. Selvidge also noticed that the lid of the toilet had been left up. Selvidge discovered Kuehler's body in the bedroom. Kuehler's partially nude body lay on the floor between the bed and the wall; there was a large amount of dried blood on the bed and the floor. Officer Hodges returned to Kuehler's trailer. Selvidge directed him to Kuehler's bedroom where he saw her body between the bed and the wall.
Appellant did not appear to be surprised at the time the body was discovered and showed no emotion whatsoever. Officer Hodges asked appellant when he had last seen Kuehler. Appellant said that he had last seen Kuehler at her trailer between 2:00 p.m. and 2:30 p.m. He had gone there to borrow money. Kuehler had agreed to lend him some money, but could not write the check at that time because she did not feel well and was going to take a nap. Appellant said that he had returned later, but Kuehler did not answer the door. Appellant said that he had never received the check.
Sergeant Jack Merritt of the Missouri Highway Patrol assisted with the investigation. He discovered at the scene a pocketbook and checkbook on a vanity across from Kuehler's bed. Although check number 6027 was missing from the checkbook, there was no entry in the check register for that check. All other checks written prior to that appeared to have been entered in the check register. The first remaining check in the checkbook was number 6028.
Sergeant Merritt was aware that Bill Pickering had telephoned Kuehler's trailer at 3:15 p.m. and that a man had answered at that time. Merritt asked appellant what time he answered the telephone in the trailer. Appellant admitted to having answered Pickering's call. Sergeant Merritt then asked appellant to go to the sheriff's department, and appellant agreed. Upon arrival, Sergeant Merritt advised appellant of his Miranda rights.
While Sergeant Merritt fingerprinted appellant, Officer Hodges noticed what appeared to be a bloodstain on the elbow of appellant's shirt and what appeared to be a bloody handprint on the shoulder of his shirt. The officers later noticed some blood on appellant's jeans. Officer Hodges recalled that he might have noticed some blood on appellant's boots. Officer Hodges asked appellant how the blood got on his clothing. Appellant replied that he had pulled Selvidge away from her grandmother's body and must have gotten it then. Selvidge confirmed that appellant had reached around her, pulled her away from Kuehler's body, and taken her out of the bedroom. Selvidge did not, however, get close enough to the victim to get into the blood.
Forensic testing confirmed small amounts of human blood on appellant's boots and jeans in addition to the blood found on his shirt. The amount of human blood on the boot was insufficient to compare with known samples. The blood on appellant's jeans had been diluted so that there was an insufficient amount to make a comparison. The serologist was able, however, to make a comparison of the blood stains found on appellant's shirt. The blood found on appellant's shirt could have come from Kuehler but not from appellant. DNA analysis of the blood on appellant's shirt showed that only one person out of 5.5 billion persons would have similar blood characteristics.
The blood found on appellant's shirt was determined to be very tiny blood drops, "high velocity blood." The drops were caused by a blow, an impact applied to a wound or to a pool of blood. Simply coming into contact with something bloody would not have produced the very tiny spots of blood that were seen on appellant's shirt.
Dr. James Spindler, a pathologist, conducted the autopsy of Gladys Kuehler. Kuehler's shirt was saturated with blood. There were thirty-four cuts in the front and back of her shirt. Kuehler's brassiere had eleven cuts. Kuehler sustained five blunt-force injuries to her head, consistent with a heavy cylindrical object such as a baseball bat. Kuehler had been stabbed and slashed several times in the eye area. Her right eye had been slashed through, and she sustained a stab wound to her left eyelid. The right eye slash was inflicted before Kuehler's death. Kuehler sustained at least four stab/slash wounds to her neck, the most serious of which severed her jugular vein and cut down to the bone in the back of her neck. Because of the multiple stab wounds to the chest, Kuehler's left lung was deflated and she suffered extensive bleeding into the chest cavity. Dr. Spindler concluded that Kuehler's breasts were being held down while she was being stabbed in the chest. Four large, deep slashes had been cut into Kuehler's abdominal area, forming two X's. One of the X-wounds was so deep that Kuehler's intestines protruded from the wound. There were four defensive wounds to the back of Kuehler's hands and arms. Examination of Kuehler's genitalia revealed "a lot" of bruising and tears in the vaginal area. The injuries were not caused by a knife, but by some blunt instrument or a penis. There was an absence of sperm.
Dr. Spindler concluded that Kuehler died from a combination of blood loss, shock,...
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