Brooks v. State

• Decision Date: 22 June 2000
• Docket Number: No. 1998-KA-01111-SCT.,1998-KA-01111-SCT.
• Citation: 763 So.2d 859
• Parties: Terry Allen BROOKS v. STATE of Mississippi.
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

763 So.2d 859

Terry Allen BROOKS v. STATE of Mississippi.

No. 1998-KA-01111-SCT.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

June 22, 2000.

Leland H. Jones, III, Greenwood, Attorney for Appellant.

Office of the Attorney General by John R. Henry, Attorney for Appellee.

EN BANC.

PRATHER, Chief Justice, for the Court:

STATEMENT OF FACTS AND CASE

¶ 1. On the night of August 18, 1997, Keith Williams ("Williams") was shot and killed outside the Rising Sun apartments in Greenwood. Deputy Charlie Cooley of the Leflore County Sheriff's Department testified that he was patrolling in the area when he heard a cry for help, and found Williams lying on the ground. Williams told him that he had been shot by a man named Stewart.

¶ 2. On January 30, 1998, Terry Allen Brooks ("Brooks") was indicted by a Leflore County grand jury for murder. The grand jury found in its indictment that:

Terry Brooks, acting in concert with Corkceno Stewart, Walter Stewart, and Sammie Grant, each together with the other, on or about the 18th day of August, 1997, in Leflore County, Mississippi, did unlawfully, wilfully, feloniously, and of his malice aforethought, kill and murder Keith Williams, a human being.

On May 18, 1998, Brooks was tried for murder in the Leflore County Circuit Court. The circuit judge allowed Brooks to conduct voir dire as well as part of the arguments at trial, but the judge refused Brooks' request to be permitted to cross-examine prosecution witnesses. On May 20, 1998, the jury found Brooks guilty of murder, and Brooks timely appealed to this Court.

I. As the Appellant was charged under Miss.Code of 1972 § 97-3-19, as annotated and amended, and the indictment charged Brooks, with killing and murdering a human of his own malice aforethought while acting in concert with others, and the State offered no proof that Brooks did kill and murder the victim, the jury verdict is contrary to the evidence presented at trial. Further that the trial court erred in overruling Brooks' motion for a directed verdict on the ground at the close of the State's case-in-chief.

¶ 3. Brooks argues that the evidence at trial was legally insufficient to convict him of the murder of Keith Williams. Miss.Code Ann. § 97-1-3 (1994) provides that "[e]very person who shall be an accessory to any felony, before the fact, shall be deemed and considered a principal, and shall be indicted and punished as such; and this whether the principal have been previously convicted or not." In a prosecution of an accused for having aided and abetted a felony, the State must establish in the proof, "beyond a reasonable doubt and to the exclusion of every other reasonable hypothesis that the crime charged was committed by another, and to further prove ... that the accused was present, consenting, aiding, and abetting such person in the commission of the crime charged." Van Buren v. State, 498 So.2d 1224, 1227 (Miss.1986).

¶ 4. Upon conviction of the criminal defendant, the presumption of innocence is replaced by a presumption that the conviction is valid and may only be rebutted by a finding of reversible error on appeal. Gollott v. State, 646 So.2d 1297, 1300 (Miss.1994). When a defendant challenges the sufficiency of the evidence to support a conviction, the evidence which supports the verdict is accepted as true by the reviewing court, and the State is given the benefit of all reasonable inferences flowing from the evidence. Rhodes v. State, 676 So.2d 275, 281 (Miss.1996).

¶ 5. The prosecution's case against Brooks was based largely upon the testimony of Sammy Grant. Sammy Grant testified that a dispute had arisen between Corkceno Stewart and Keith Williams on the night before Williams was murdered. According to Grant's testimony, Corkceno Stewart and Williams were engaged in a rivalry over the affections of Tina Grant, Sammy Grant's sister. Sammy Grant testified that Brooks drove him, Walter Stewart, and Corkceno Stewart to the Rising Sun apartments on the night of Williams' murder. Grant testified that:

Q: Okay. And once y'all made it out to Rising Sun, what happened? Grant: That's when they went to talking about—Corkceno Stewart went to talking about asking Walter Stewart for the gun, and he wouldn't give it to him. He asked Terry Brooks. He wouldn't give it to him.... Then he asked Walter Stewart again. He wouldn't give it to him. He asked Terry Brooks again. Terry Brooks said, "(expletive deleted). Handle your business, n* * *er." Just like that right there.

Q: That's at the point where he handed him the gun? Grant: That's when he handed him the gun.

Sammy Grant testified that, after Brooks gave Stewart the gun, he (Sammy Grant) went up to the apartment where his sister and Keith Williams were visiting. Grant testified that he tried to warn his sister about "what was about to go on" but his sister did not seem to comprehend his warnings. Sammy Grant testified that, at this point, Keith Williams came out of the apartment:

And I was steady trying to tell her what was about to go on, and at that time right there that's when Keith Williams came out, and Keith Williams asked the same thing "Who is that?" That's when Terry Brooks said, "What's up, Player?"

Just like that right there. Then Keith said, "What's up?" Just like that right there. And they kept saying "Who is that?" I kept trying to tell them what was going on, pulling my hair out and scratching my head and stuff, and I thought since they didn't want to listen if I just walk away they'll go into the house. So when I walked away, that's when Corkceno Stewart came out, and he said something. I couldn't hear what he was saying. He said something and went to shooting.

Sammy Grant also testified as to Brooks' behavior after the shooting:

(Brooks) turned the lights off the car at one time. Then he turned them back on. Then he went to talking. It was just him. He went to talking saying, "Well, we know your sister ain't going to snitch, it will be one of us, and if we find out who snitched, we're going to handle them too."

In the view of this Court, the testimony of Sammy Grant alone was sufficient to put the issue of Brooks' guilt before the jury. Grant testified that Brooks gave Stewart his loaded pistol as he told Stewart to "handle his business." Grant further testified that, after the shooting, Brooks warned the other witnesses in the car not to "snitch," lest they be "handle(d)" as well. Sammy Grant's testimony, if deemed credible by a jury, was sufficient to lead a reasonable juror to conclude that Brooks had the necessary mens rea to assist Stewart in the murder of Williams.

¶ 6. In addition, the testimony of Tina Grant is consistent with Sammy Grant's testimony and contradicts Brooks' sworn testimony that he was not present at the scene of the murder. Tina Grant testified that Keith Williams was visiting with her that Sunday night when Sammy knocked on the door and urged Williams to come outside. Tina Grant testified that:

Me and Keith walked on to the road, and I looked back, and seen Corkceno Stewart. He came out shooting a gun. I was like "Run, Keith, run." And Keith took off to running and stuff. He shot about five times. I heard—the fourth and fifth time I heard Keith hollering "oh, oh." And I ran into the house and tried to wake Terena up.

Q: Did you see anyone else out there?

A: I seen Terry Brooks.

Q: Is that the same person that's sitting here at the counsel table?

A: Yes, ma'am.

Q: You saw him. Where did you see him?

A: In the road. He had on all black, with a black hat and some black boots and a black outfit or something. I know he had on all black.

Q: I think you'd already told us that you'd known him about six months prior to this?

A: Yes, Ma'am.

¶ 7. In the view of this Court, there is sufficient evidence in the record to support the jury's conclusion that Brooks was "present, consenting, aiding, and abetting... the commission of the crime charged." The issue of Brooks' guilt was properly put before the jury, and this point of error is without merit.

II. The verdict of the jury was the result of prejudice in that the prosecutor's closing arguments made reference to a plea bargain which was offered to Brooks and declined.

¶ 8. Brooks argues that the prosecutor committed reversible error when, during her closing arguments, she informed the jury that Brooks had been offered a plea bargain but that he had refused to accept the offer. The prosecutor argued before the jury that:

And you heard a lot of testimony about Grant, Sammy Grant. What they didn't tell you is that he was offered the same thing Grant was. He just didn't take it. He took a chance rolling the dice. He's relying on you to turn him loose when he knows he's guilty, just as all of the [sic.] are.

After the prosecutor had finished her closing arguments, counsel for Brooks approached the bench and objected to the prosecutor's arguments:

Mr. Jones: Judge, I would request the record indicate an objection to improper rebuttal by—argument by Ms. Chiles when she argued that the defendant was offered a plea like Grant and he chose to roll the dice. I don't know how to cure that. I didn't want to call attention to it at the time. That's the reason I'm making —may not be—a little tardy on being contemporaneous, but I didn't want to interrupt her and I didn't want to call special attention to it, but I didn't go into that. She was not—it's just certainly not proper for her to argue that this defendant was offered a plea bargain and decided not to take it.

The Court: All right—let the record reflect ...

Mr. Jones: I don't know how to cure it.

The Court: Let the record reflect the defendant's objection.

¶ 9. In the view of this Court, the prosecutor's reference during closing arguments to Brooks' failure to accept a plea bargain was clearly error, and the only issue is whether it should be considered reversible error. Prosecutors are afforded the right to argue anything in the State's closing argument presented as evidence. Hanner...