Brunson v. State

• Decision Date: 14 December 2006
• Docket Number: No. CR 06-710.,CR 06-710.
• Citation: 368 Ark. 313,245 S.W.3d 132
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court
• Parties: Larry Darnell BRUNSON, Appellant, v. STATE of Arkansas, Appellee.

245 S.W.3d 132

368 Ark. 313

Larry Darnell BRUNSON, Appellant, v. STATE of Arkansas, Appellee.

No. CR 06-710.

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

December 14, 2006.

Montgomery, Adams & Wyatt, PLC, by: Dale E. Adams, Little Rock, for appellant.

Mike Beebe, Att'y Gen., by: LeaAnn J. Irvin, Ass't Att'y Gen., for appellee.

ANNABELLE CLINTON IMBER, Justice.

This is the second appeal of Appellant Larry Darnell Brunson's first-degree-murder convictions for the shooting deaths of Gloria Brunson and Frankie Shaw. In Brunson v. State, 349 Ark. 300, 79 S.W.3d 304 (2002), this court reversed Brunson's conviction and remanded the case to the Circuit Court of Jefferson County. Upon retrial, Brunson was again convicted on two counts of first-degree murder and was sentenced to two consecutive terms of life imprisonment. On appeal he raises five points of error: (1) that two ex parte orders of protection were admitted into evidence in violation of his Sixth Amendment right to confrontation, (2) that certain testimony admitted into evidence under Ark. R. Evid. 403 and 404(b) was introduced purely for prejudicial effect, (3) that the circuit court erroneously denied his motion for directed verdict, (4) that the State was erroneously allowed to challenge prospective juror Susan Brown for cause, and (5) that the circuit court improperly refused to submit a lesser-included offense instruction to the jury. We find no error and affirm on all points.

I. Sufficiency of the Evidence

Brunson contends that the State presented insufficient evidence to convict him of first-degree murder and therefore the circuit court erred by denying his directed-verdict motion. On appeal, a motion for directed verdict is reviewed as a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence. Ross v. State, 346 Ark. 225, 57 S.W.3d 152 (2001). While the sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenge was not Brunson's first point on appeal, due to double jeopardy concerns, we review this issue before reaching the other issues on appeal. See Isom v. State, 356 Ark. 156, 148 S.W.3d 257 (2004).

The test for determining sufficiency of the evidence is whether substantial evidence, either direct or circumstantial, supports the verdict. Ross v. State, supra. Substantial evidence is evidence of sufficient certainty and precision to compel a conclusion one way or another and pass beyond mere suspicion or conjecture. Id. On appeal, we review evidence in the light most favorable to the appellee and consider only the evidence that supports the verdict. Id.

Circumstantial evidence may constitute substantial evidence to support a conviction. Id. Guilt can be established without direct evidence and evidence of guilt is not less because it is circumstantial. See id. The longstanding rule is that for circumstantial evidence to be substantial, it must exclude every other reasonable hypothesis than that of guilt of the accused. Howard v. State, 348 Ark. 471, 79 S.W.3d 273 (2002). Stated another way, circumstantial evidence provides a basis to support a conviction if it is consistent with the defendant's guilt and inconsistent with any other reasonable conclusion. Id. Such a determination is a question of fact for the jury to determine. Id. We will disturb the jury's determination only if the evidence did not meet the required standards, leaving the jury to speculation and conjecture in reaching its verdict. Id.

It is well settled that the credibility of witnesses is an issue for the jury and not this court. Ross v. State, supra. Furthermore, the jury is free to believe all or part of any witness's testimony and may resolve questions of conflicting testimony and inconsistent evidence. Howard v. State, supra. In doing so, the jury may choose to believe the State's account of the facts rather than the defendant's. Id.

Brunson points out that the majority of the State's evidence at trial was circumstantial, and argues that the evidence was not sufficient for the jury to reasonably exclude any hypothesis other than his guilt. Specifically, he argues that the testimony of the witnesses at trial establishes that he did not have an opportunity to commit the murders and that he was not at the crime scene that evening. The record, however, does not support Brunson's sufficiency argument.

Brunson and Gloria Brunson were married in 1983 and had four children. The family lived in Pine Bluff, and Gloria worked for the Social Security Administration from 1979 until her death in 1999. According to the couple's children and Gloria's co-workers, the couple's relationship was volatile. In the three years leading up to the murders, Brunson would call Gloria at work and at home numerous times a day and routinely showed up at her work unannounced. Gloria would often arrive at work showing signs of physical abuse. During this turbulent period, Gloria became romantically involved with Frankie Shaw.

In the summer of 1998, the couple separated. Gloria remained in the family home with the children, and Brunson moved into the home of his brother and sister-in-law Alfred and Vivian Brunson. In July 1998, Gloria obtained a temporary protection order against Brunson, which order was extended in December 1998. In November 1998, Gloria filed for divorce. After the divorce was filed, Brunson's behavior towards Gloria became even more aggressive, and despite the protection order, he continued to harass his wife.

In late November 1998, Gloria was promoted and went to Dallas to begin twelve weeks of job training. Employees at the Social Security Administration office in Pine Bluff were instructed not to release any information to Brunson regarding Gloria's whereabouts. Brunson proceeded to call several administration employees to get the information, alleging that he was in the hospital and needed to reach Gloria. Eventually, Brunson discovered Gloria's whereabouts and travelled to Dallas. At the hotel, Dianne Williams, a co-trainee, witnessed Brunson yelling and beating on Gloria's hotel-room door. The next day, Brunson appeared unannounced at the training center and confronted Gloria. Williams and another co-worker, Janet Johnson, testified that Gloria was visibly shaken by the confrontation. After the incident, Gloria supplied the security personnel at the training center with copies of the protection order, and Gloria was escorted to and from the hotel.

During December 1998, Gloria took a three-week break from training and returned home to Pine Bluff. On December 19, Gloria took her children to Little Rock for some shopping, and the police received an anonymous phone call reporting that a woman, meeting Gloria's description and driving a car like Gloria's, was traveling towards Little Rock with drugs in the car. She was stopped and police found crack cocaine under the dash of the car — exactly where the informant had told police it would be. Gloria became hysterical and told the officers that Brunson must have planted the drugs, and the officers let her leave without making an arrest. A couple of days later, the police received another anonymous call giving the exact description and location of Gloria's car and reporting that the car contained drugs and a murder weapon. However, upon stopping and searching the vehicle, officers found nothing. Brunson later admitted to making the second call for harassment purposes.

Brunson also repeatedly violated the protection order by calling the family home and hanging around the house. After his family had the locks changed, Brunson even went so far as to call a locksmith to open the front door. Additionally, witnesses testified at trial that Brunson made strange and threatening statements regarding Gloria during the six months leading up to the murder. Lorraine Graham, Gloria's friend and co-worker, testified that Brunson came to her house one night during the fall of 1998 and told Graham "I go to sleep at night, and I wake up. I look over at her there sleeping. I want to get the gun out of the drawer and just blow her head off." According to the couple's daughter, Latisha Brunson, her father told Latisha that if Gloria was with Shaw, "somebody's going to die, me or him" and "if I'm not with your mom, nobody is going to be with her." Additionally, Brunson allegedly asked his son, Larry Jr., to smell his mother's panties to see if she was doing anything with other men. Larry Jr. also testified that one afternoon he and his father stopped by Shaw's house, and Brunson took pictures of Gloria's car outside the house.

On April 25, 1999, the day of the murders, Latisha borrowed her father's Ford Explorer to go to Conway with friends. Latisha returned to Pine Bluff around 1:00 p.m. and returned the vehicle to Brunson shortly thereafter. At approximately 5:00 p.m., one of Shaw's neighbors, Jennie Green, saw an unidentified black man park a dark-colored Lexus near Shaw's house, walk to Shaw's house, and begin an argument with Gloria and Shaw in the front yard. Green overheard the man say to Gloria that "he would see her dead before he saw her with another man." The man then reached behind him and grabbed an "L-shaped," or gun-shaped, object in the back of his pants. The confrontation ended soon thereafter.

In the early evening, Gloria woke Latisha from a nap and handed her the keys to Brunson's Lexus. At approximately 7:00 p.m., Latisha took her younger brother to the park and returned home around 8 p.m. At about 8:00 p.m., Brunson called Latisha and asked her to fix him a plate of food for dinner. He picked up the plate around 8:15 p.m. and then left. Danny Jenkins, a neighbor of Alfred and Vivian Brunson, reported that Brunson came to his home around 6:00 p.m. and was still there when Jenkins went to bed at 8:00 p.m. However, when Jenkins awoke a couple hours later, Brunson was gone.

Alfred and Vivian Brunson, who had been visiting friends that evening, arrived home at about 8:30 p.m., and Brunson arrived there approximately thirty minutes later. According to Erica Waddell, the...