Bland v. State

Decision Date16 May 2000
Docket NumberNo. F-98-152.,F-98-152.
Citation2000 OK CR 11,4 P.3d 702
PartiesJimmy Dale BLAND, Appellant, v. STATE of Oklahoma, Appellee.
CourtUnited States State Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma. Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma

Mark Barrett Indigent Defense System, Norman, Sara Bonnell, Purcell, for Appellant at trial.

John Wampler, District Attorney, Brad Leverett, Dan Deaver, Assistant District Attorneys, Altus, for the State at trial.

Sandra Mulhair Cinnamon, James H. Lockard, Indigent Defense System, Norman, for Appellant on appeal.

W.A. Drew Edmondson, Attorney General of Oklahoma, Jennifer B. Miller, Assistant Attorney General, Oklahoma City, for the State on appeal.

OPINION

LUMPKIN, Vice Presiding Judge:

¶ 1 Appellant Jimmy Dale Bland was tried by jury and convicted of First Degree Malice Aforethought Murder (21 O.S.1991, § 701.7), Case No. CF-96-90, in the District Court of Tillman County. The jury found the existence of two(2) aggravating circumstances and recommended the punishment of death. The trial court sentenced accordingly. From this judgment and sentence Appellant has perfected this appeal.1

¶ 2 Appellant was convicted of the premeditated murder of Doyle Windle Rains. The victim was a longtime resident of Manitou, Oklahoma. He was retired and worked handyman jobs in the area. In November 1996, the victim worked at the Horton family ranch in Tillman County building dog pens and erecting a chain link fence. The victim had hired Appellant to assist him in the job. On November 12, 1996, Appellant and the victim were paid $882.00 for their work. Based upon a prior agreement, the check was made out to Appellant. Between 2:30 p.m. on November 12 and 2:30 p.m. on November 13, 1996, Appellant and the victim cashed the check at the First Southwest Bank in Frederick, Oklahoma.

¶ 3 On November 14, 1996, Appellant drove the victim's Cadillac to Oklahoma City to see Connie Lord, his girlfriend. While in Oklahoma City Appellant spent almost all of the cash in his possession, approximately $380.00. Most of this money was spent on drugs, some of which Appellant and Lord ingested at the time. Appellant left Oklahoma City later that afternoon. Lord gave him $10.00 so he could return home. Appellant drove to the victim's home where he shot and killed him. Appellant retrieved the keys to the victim's pickup from the victim's front pants pocket. He loaded the victim's body into the pickup and drove to a rural area where he deposited the body and covered it with logs and leaves. Appellant returned to the victim's home where he spent the night.

¶ 4 On November 15, 1996, Appellant returned to the home he shared with his mother, Ruby Hess, in Davidson, Oklahoma. Appellant was driving the victim's Cadillac. Appellant said he was going to work with the victim. Instead, Appellant switched vehicles and drove the victim's pickup to Oklahoma City. Meeting Connie Lord, he told her he had killed the victim. Later that evening, Lord phoned her sister, Frances Lewis, and asked her to call Hess to check on the victim's welfare. Hess and the victim were dating and had discussed marriage. As a result of her conversation with Lewis, Hess phoned the Tillman County Sheriff.

¶ 5 On November 17, 1996, Sheriff Billy Hanes went to the victim's residence. No one answered his knock at the front door. He noticed the victim's Cadillac in the driveway, but did not see the pickup. Sheriff Hanes then went out to the property where the victim ran cattle, but again found no sign of the victim. Returning to the victim's home, Hanes, with the assistance of agents from the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation (O.S.B.I) entered the house and observed several spots of blood on the garage floor. Sheriff Hanes subsequently listed the victim and his pickup on the NCIC register of missing persons. With that entry, anyone who had any contact with the victim or his pickup were to contact Sheriff Hanes.

¶ 6 On November 16, 1996, Appellant, driving the victim's pickup, was involved in a one-car accident near Stroud, Oklahoma. Appellant had driven the pickup off the side of the road. Appellant was arrested for driving under the influence. Appellant was subsequently released on bond, but not before the arresting trooper noticed Appellant had over $300.00 in cash on his person. Appellant was taken to the Econo-Lodge in Chandler, Oklahoma, where he paid for his room with a one hundred ($100.00) dollar bill. On November 17, 1996, Humberto Martinez picked up Appellant from the Econo-Lodge and drove him to the home of James Baker in Oklahoma City. Appellant was subsequently located by the authorities at Baker's home and arrested on November 20, 1996. Initially arrested for the unauthorized use of the victim's pickup, Appellant was taken to the Tillman County Sheriff's office where he confessed to killing the victim and hiding his body. Appellant took officers to the rural area where he had left the body. The body was badly decomposed. However, an autopsy was subsequently performed and the cause of death was found to be a bullet wound to the back of the head.

¶ 7 Appellant admitted to shooting the victim, but claimed he did not intend to kill him. Appellant stated he had borrowed the victim's Cadillac and while it was in his possession, the car had a flat tire. Appellant changed the tire but in so doing, damaged the hubcap. When he returned the car to the victim and explained the situation, Appellant said the victim became very angry. Appellant said the victim's anger escalated to the point where he took a swing at Appellant. Appellant said he was not sure if the victim actually struck him. He said he thought he may have kicked the victim. Both men fell to the floor. Appellant said that a gun he had been carrying, wrapped up in a pair of coveralls, fell to the ground. Appellant said he picked up the gun and fired one shot, hitting the victim in the back of the head. Appellant said he attempted to clean up the garage area where the altercation had taken place. He then took the victim's body to a field and covered it with a pile of logs.

JURY SELECTION

¶ 8 In his first assignment of error, Appellant contends the State's reasons for excusing venirepersons Flores and Aldape-say from the jury panel were not race-neutral but were pretextual, and the excusal of the prospective jurors violated the Equal Protection Clause under Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 98, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 1724, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986). The record reflects the trial court overruled Appellant's objections to the exclusion of the prospective jurors. In so ruling, the court noted that Appellant was not of a minority race.

¶ 9 In Turrentine v. State, 965 P.2d 955, 964 (Okl.Cr.1998), cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1057, 119 S.Ct. 624, 142 L.Ed.2d 562 (1998) we stated:

In Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 98, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986), the Supreme Court held that a defendant can raise an equal protection challenge to the use of peremptory challenges at his own trial by showing that the prosecutor used the challenges for the purpose of excluding members of the defendant's own race from the jury panel. Id., 476 U.S. at 96, 106 S.Ct. at 1723-24, 90 L.Ed.2d at 87.
Batson established a three (3) part analysis: 1) the defendant must make a prima facie showing that the prosecutor has exercised peremptory challenges on the basis of race; 2) after the requisite showing has been made, the burden shifts to the prosecutor to articulate a race neutral explanation related to the case for striking the juror in question; 3) the trial court must determine whether the defendant has carried his burden of proving purposeful discrimination. The Court noted the race neutral explanation by the prosecutor need not rise to the level justifying excusal for cause, but it must be a "clear and reasonably specific" explanation of his "legitimate reasons" for exercising the challenges. Id.,476 U.S. at 98 n. 20,106 S.Ct. 1712,90 L.Ed.2d 69. The trial court's findings as to discriminatory intent are entitled to great deference. Id.,476 U.S. at 98 n. 21,106 S.Ct. 1712,90 L.Ed.2d 69; Hernandez v. New York, 500 U.S. 352, 111 S.Ct. 1859, 1868-69, 114 L.Ed.2d 395 (1991) (plurality opinion). Therefore, we review the record in the light most favorable to the trial court's ruling. Neill v. State, 896 P.2d 537, 546 (Okl.Cr.1994), cert. denied, 516 U.S. 1080, 116 S.Ct. 791, 133 L.Ed.2d 740 (1996); Black v. State, 871 P.2d 35, 43 (Okl.Cr.1994).

¶ 10 In the present case, we need not determine whether Appellant made a prima facie showing of intentional discrimination as the issue is moot. "Once a prosecutor has offered a race neutral explanation for the peremptory challenges and the trial court has ruled on the ultimate question of intentional discrimination, the preliminary issue of whether the defendant has made a prima facie showing becomes moot." Id. quoting Hernandez, 500 U.S. at 359,

111 S.Ct. at 1866,

114 L.Ed.2d at 405.

¶ 11 A review of the record in this case shows the prosecutor offered race-neutral explanations for striking the prospective jurors from the panel.

A neutral explanation in the context of our analysis here means an explanation based on something other than the race of the juror. At this step of the inquiry, the issue is the facial validity of the prosecutor's explanation. Unless a discriminatory intent is inherent in the prosecutor's explanation, the reason offered will be deemed race neutral.

Id. at 964.

¶ 12 The prosecutor used his third peremptory challenge to excuse Ms. Flores. He explained to the court that he wanted to excuse Ms. Flores because she had three close relatives who were incarcerated and that she had initially expressed some reluctance when asked about the death penalty. The State's ninth peremptory challenge was used to excuse Mr. Aldape-say. The prosecutor explained that he was concerned about Mr. Aldape-say's inability to understand the English language and that he had expressed sympathy for the defendant.

¶ 13 None of...

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