Brooks v. State

• Decision Date: 01 September 1994
• Docket Number: No. 836,836
• Citation: 655 A.2d 1311,104 Md.App. 203
• Parties: Dionne Chevelle BROOKS, v. STATE of Maryland. ,
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

Page 203

104 Md.App. 203

655 A.2d 1311

Dionne Chevelle BROOKS, v. STATE of Maryland.

No. 836, Sept. Term, 1994.

Court of Special Appeals of Maryland.

March 30, 1995.

Louise Kelley, Student Atty. (Rule 16) (Margaret L. Lanier, Asst. Public Defender and Stephen E. Harris, Public Defender on the brief), Baltimore, for appellant

Gwynn X. Kinsey, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen. (J. Joseph Curran, Jr., Atty. Gen., on the brief), Baltimore, for appellee.

Submitted Before MOYLAN, DAVIS and JAMES S. GETTY (Ret.), Specially Assigned, JJ.

DAVIS, Judge.

Appellant, Dionne Chevelle Brooks, was charged with several crimes relating to the death of Margaret Kobic. Following a jury trial in the Circuit Court for Baltimore County (Fader, J.), appellant was convicted of first degree felony murder and robbery with a dangerous and deadly weapon. The State sought the death penalty. After appellant waived her right to jury sentencing, the court, sitting without a jury, imposed a sentence of life without parole for the felony murder conviction. The robbery conviction was merged.

Appellant presents three questions for our review, which we renumber for our convenience:

I. Did the trial judge err when he refused to instruct the jury that all murder is presumed to be murder in the second degree?

II. Did the consideration of the underlying felony of robbery in both the guilt/innocence and sentencing phases of appellant's trial violate her right under the Maryland Declaration of Rights and the federal constitution to be free from cruel and unusual punishment?

III. Was the trial judge's advice to appellant regarding her waiver of jury sentencing flawed, thus rendering the waiver ineffective?

FACTS

It is undisputed that appellant killed Margaret Kobic. The central question for the jury was appellant's state of mind at the time of the homicide.

As a witness for the State, Sam Goodwin testified that he and his mother, Ms. Kobic, shared a two-bedroom apartment in Baltimore County. Goodwin was employed doing maintenance work and carpentry. He kept a bucket of tools in his bedroom, including a carpenter's plane. In March of 1993, Goodwin became friends with Brooks while participating in a drug treatment program. Before she was released from the program, appellant told Goodwin that she "had nowhere to go," and he offered to let her stay with him and his mother. On March 31, 1993, appellant moved into Goodwin's apartment. Goodwin slept on the couch and let appellant use his bedroom.

On April 2, 1993, Goodwin left for Pennsylvania to visit his son. On April 16, he spoke with appellant by phone, and told her that he planned to move to Pennsylvania. According to Goodwin, both appellant and his mother were upset by his announced plans. After observing that his mother was intoxicated, Goodwin hung up on her.

On Sunday, April 16, Goodwin returned to retrieve his belongings and found his mother dead on the kitchen floor. There was blood on the floor, walls, and ceiling. Brooks was gone, but Goodwin found her jacket on a path leading from the apartment complex to a nearby shopping center. The police Dr. Anne Dixon, a medical examiner who supervised the autopsy, testified that there were multiple injuries to the right side of the head. Dr. Dixon estimated that there were at least twenty-five separate blows, but added that the injuries were overlapping, and that it was impossible to make an accurate count. There were also multiple skull fractures.

found no signs of forced entry. A crime lab technician testified that the victim was lying on her back, with her clothing pulled up toward her neck. There was a massive head wound around the eye.

Appellant testified on her own behalf. After learning that Goodwin intended to move, she and Kobic left the apartment to get liquor, cigarettes, and beer. Kobic used her ATM card to get money, and appellant memorized the PIN number. Appellant stated that she hoped to steal the card, and planned to buy drugs with money stolen from Kobic's account.

Appellant and Kobic returned to the apartment and continued drinking. According to appellant, the pair quarrelled, and Kobic slapped appellant in the face. Kobic apologized, and the pair began to discuss their plans to live together after Goodwin moved out. At some point, Kobic allegedly touched appellant's breasts without any warning. Appellant explained that this unwanted touching made her feel "weird" and "creepy." She responded by hitting Kobic over the head with a bottle, and wrapping an electrical cord around her neck. Appellant then proceeded to Goodwin's bedroom, retrieved his carpenter's plane, and struck Kobic repeatedly over the head.

After she realized that Kobic was dead, appellant took jewelry from the body. She ransacked the bedroom and retrieved Kobic's wallet, checkbook, and ATM card. She also took a television set and Goodwin's paycheck. Before leaving the apartment, appellant washed the blood from her hands and placed the plane, bottle, and electrical cord in a plastic bag, which she left in a dumpster. Over the next two days, appellant used the ATM card, pawned two rings, and purchased drugs with the money. On April 20, 1993, she turned herself in to the police. She later gave a full confession.

At trial, appellant argued that she was not criminally responsible for the killing. Pamela Taylor, a social worker, testified that appellant was reared in a dysfunctional family and had suffered for years from sexual and physical abuse. According to Taylor, one of appellant's stepfathers forced her to have intercourse with him from the time she was thirteen years old. He also tried to sodomize her and threatened to kill family members if she told anyone what he had done. At the age of fifteen, appellant became pregnant with her stepfather's child, had an abortion, and thereafter attempted suicide.

Appellant also offered the testimony of Dr. Stephen Siebert, a psychiatrist. According to Dr. Siebert, appellant suffers from a borderline personality disorder arising from the trauma of her childhood abuse. Appellant's already-vulnerable personality was weakened by years of substance abuse, which yielded paranoid symptoms. As a result, Dr. Siebert explained, appellant "snapped" when Kobic touched her, because she perceived the touching of her breasts as a "prelude to rape." Dr. Harminder Mallik, the State's expert witness, also testified that appellant suffered from a mental disorder. In his view, however, appellant knew what she was doing and did not lack the capacity to control her conduct.

A jury convicted appellant of first degree felony murder and robbery with a dangerous and deadly weapon. She was acquitted on charges of first degree premeditated murder, as well as second degree murder. The State sought the death penalty, and appellant waived her right to a jury sentencing. The only aggravating circumstance was the fact that appellant committed the murder during the course of a robbery. The mitigating circumstances found by the judge included appellant's surrender and subsequent confession, the "horrible" circumstances of appellant's upbringing, the absence of any prior criminal history involving a crime of violence, and the fact that the murder was not premeditated. ¹ After weighing

the circumstances, the judge sentenced appellant to life without parole. This appeal followed.

LEGAL ANALYSIS

I

Appellant first contends that her conviction must be reversed because the trial court refused to give an instruction regarding the applicable law. Defense counsel requested that the lower court instruct the jury that "the defendant is entitled to an assumption that all murder is only murder in the second degree. The State must prove that it rises to first degree...." The judge rejected the proposed instruction. In support of her position, appellant refers us to Abney v. State, 244 Md. 444, 448, 223 A.2d 792 (1966), cert. denied, 387 U.S. 925, 87 S.Ct. 2043, 18 L.Ed.2d 981 (1967), wherein the Court of Appeals noted that "[a] felonious homicide is presumed to have been committed with malice aforethought and so to constitute murder in the second degree." In Hook v. State, 315 Md. 25, 28 n. 5, 553 A.2d 233 (1989), the Court again noted that felonious homicide "is presumed to be murder in the second degree," and that "[t]he burden is on the state to show that the killing was within the statutory definitions of first degree murder...." See also Oates v. State, 97 Md.App. 180, 186, 627 A.2d 555 (1993) (describing second degree murder as "the baseline from which everything proceeds up or down").

At the request of a party, the trial court must "instruct the jury as to the applicable law...." MD.RULE 4-325(c). The requirements of this rule are mandatory. When a requested instruction correctly states a point of law that is relevant to the facts of a case, the failure to give that instruction is error, unless the point has been fairly covered by the instructions actually given. Binnie v. State, 321 Md. 572, 581-83, 583 A.2d 1037 (1991).

In Evans v. State, 28 Md.App. 640, 679-80, 349 A.2d 300 (1975), aff'd, 278 Md. 197, 362 A.2d 629 (1976), we noted that there are good reasons for avoiding the statement that "[a]ll murder will be presumed to be murder in the second degree." As Judge Moylan explained, such a statement "is simply a circuitous and roundabout way of saying that the burden is on the State of proving beyond a reasonable doubt all elements that go to make up murder in the first degree." Id. at 679, 349 A.2d 300.

In the case at hand, the relevant point was fairly covered by the instructions given. With regard to first degree murder of the premeditated type, the trial judge properly instructed the jury that the killing must be wilful, deliberate, and premeditated. With regard to second degree murder, the court's instructions included the following:

Now, second degree murder does not require premeditation or deliberation. It is a lesser offense. More needs to...