Chapel v. State
| Decision Date | 16 November 1998 |
| Docket Number | No. S98A0976.,S98A0976. |
| Citation | 510 S.E.2d 802,270 Ga. 151 |
| Parties | CHAPEL v. The STATE. |
| Court | Georgia Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
John A. Pickens, Atlanta, for appellant.
Daniel J. Porter, District Attorney, Thomas N. Davis, Assistant District Attorney, Thurbert E. Baker, Attorney General, Paula K. Smith, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Elizabeth L. Jaeger, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee. FLETCHER, Presiding Justice.
A jury convicted Michael Chapel of malice murder, armed robbery, and possession of a firearm in the commission of a felony in the shooting death of Emogene Thompson.1 The state sought the death penalty, but the jury returned a verdict of life imprisonment. Chapel appeals, and raises several enumerations of error, including that newly discovered evidence warrants a new trial. Because the new evidence is not so material to have resulted in a different verdict and there is no reversible error in the remaining enumerations, we affirm. The evidence viewed in the light most favorable to the prosecution shows that on April 3, 1993, Ms. Thompson reported a burglary to the Gwinnett County police and Chapel was the officer who responded to the call. Ms. Thompson told Chapel that she had $14,000 cash hidden in her trailer home and that someone had stolen $7,000 of it and returned the remainder to its hiding place. She also told him that she and her son Michael Thompson lived alone in the trailer. Chapel told Ms. Thompson he suspected that her son had stolen the money. Ms. Thompson agreed but did not want to press charges. Chapel told her that he would try to retrieve the money. Ms. Thompson told several friends that she was planning to meet Chapel because he wanted to compare serial numbers on bills in his possession with serial numbers on her remaining money. On the evening of April 15, 1993 Ms. Thompson was shot in the head while she was seated in her parked car at a muffler shop on Peachtree Industrial Boulevard. Her remaining money was never recovered.
The state presented (1) DNA evidence showing that a spot of blood in Chapel's police car matched the blood of the victim; (2) witnesses who saw two cars, one of which was a Gwinnett County police car, at the muffler shop between 9:30 and 10:00; (3) testimony from Officer Stone that Chapel was at the fire station that evening and that he left between 9:20 and 9:30; (4) a witness who saw Chapel driving on Peachtree Industrial Boulevard near the muffler shop around 9:30 or 10:00; (5) evidence that Chapel was facing an IRS verification audit with the potential of $4000 in additional tax liability and that he owed a friend $1,400; (6) witnesses who saw Chapel spending $100 bills; (7) a witness who saw a large sum of money in the purse of Chapel's wife; and (8) a witness who said that Chapel responded to a call a little after 10:00 the night of the murder, refused to assist the complaining witness, and left, saying he had problems of his own.
Chapel testified that he was at a fire station with other officers and fire personnel until around 10:00, when he left to check on a gym that he owned, and then he responded to a call around 10:10. Chapel elicited testimony that shortly after the murder, Officer Stone told his superior officer that Chapel left the fire station between 10:00 and 10:15 and three fire personnel testified that he left around 10:00. Additionally, Chapel contended that the police failed to adequately investigate the case and tried to suggest that another officer, J.P. Morgan, who committed suicide shortly after the murder, and Michael Thompson were involved in illegal drug activities and that the murder and robbery were related to those activities.2
1. After reviewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the jury's determination of guilt, we conclude that a rational trier of fact could have found Chapel guilty of the crime charged.3
2. Chapel contends that newly discovered evidence warrants a new trial. Since the trial a new witness has come forward and the victim's purse has been recovered. To obtain a new trial on the basis of newly discovered evidence, Chapel must show among other factors that the new evidence is so material that it would probably produce a different result.4
At the motion for new trial hearing, Chapel called Quint Rutland who testified that he smuggled cocaine into Gwinnett County in 1991, paid off Officer Morgan for protection, the victim's son Michael Thompson worked with Morgan in the drug ring, and that Rutland's boss mentioned to him that the victim knew of her son's drug involvement with Morgan. Rutland testified that he had kept this knowledge to himself because he was in jail and feared reprisals, but was no longer incarcerated. The testimony connecting Thompson and Morgan was hearsay and therefore would be inadmissible. Rutland's testimony that drug dealers were bribing Morgan does not go to the heart of the state's case and we cannot conclude that it meets the high materiality requirement to warrant a new trial.
The victim's purse was found in 1996 near where the victim and her son lived and in an area that had been searched by police in 1994 after Chapel's incarceration. The police were unable to lift any fingerprints from the purse or its contents. This evidence provides some support for the defense argument that Michael Thompson was involved in the murder, but it is not so compelling that one must conclude that a different verdict would probably have resulted had it been introduced. Therefore, the trial court did not err in denying the motion for new trial on this ground.
3. (A) The state contended that Chapel's raincoat showed a "high velocity blood spatter" pattern. A state's expert marked spots constituting this pattern. The expert testified that although the spots had not been tested to determine if they were human blood, the spots were consistent with human blood and the pattern of spots was consistent with Chapel shooting Thompson. He also testified that he did not mark the spatter pattern until May 1995, and that he reported his findings in a crime lab report dated June 22, 1995. Chapel contends that the trial court erred in admitting the raincoat because the marks on the coat used and referred to by the state's expert were not on the coat when defense counsel viewed it in March 1995. Chapel, however, has not established that the disclosure to defense counsel through the June crime lab report denied counsel a meaningful opportunity to examine and prepare for this evidence.5 Therefore, we find no reversible error in the admission of the evidence regarding the blood spatter pattern on the coat.
(B) Chapel contends that the introduction of his raincoat was more prejudicial than probative because there was no evidence that the blood spatters on it were human blood. The raincoat, however, was not gory or gruesome, and the lack of evidence connecting it to the victim goes to weight not admissibility.
(C) Chapel sought a continuance in the motion for new trial hearing in order to present an expert to testify on trajectory and blood spatter pattern. Chapel represented to the trial court that the expert would testify that Chapel could not have fired the fatal shots and that the blood pattern on his raincoat could not have been made from the victim's wounds. Chapel represented to the court that the expert would not testify until he had seen the actual autopsy photographs and that Chapel was as yet unable to obtain the original photographs from the medical examiner, because the doctor who performed the autopsy had left his prior employment. The expert was relevant to Chapel's contention that trial counsel was ineffective in not presenting an expert on bullet trajectory. Because the trial court and this court were able to address the ineffectiveness claim in the absence of the expert testimony,6 we find no abuse of the trial court's discretion in denying the continuance.7
4. Chapel challenges the admission of testimony from three of Thompson's friends that shortly before her death Thompson had told each of them that she planned to meet with Chapel to compare the serial numbers on her remaining money with some money that Chapel had obtained. Prior to trial, the trial court held a hearing at which these friends testified that each had known Thompson for a long time and each spoke with her on a regular and frequent basis, often several times a day. Each testified that Thompson was upset and worried that someone stole half of $14,000.00 in cash she had in her trailer and that she suspected her son. They also testified about Thompson's statements regarding the planned meeting with Chapel and its purpose.8 Prior to the admission of the evidence at trial, the trial court heard the witnesses again, weighed the testimony's probative value against its prejudicial effect, and limited their testimony substantially.
Under the necessity exception9 to the hearsay rule, hearsay statements are admissible when the evidence is "necessary" and when there are "particular guarantees of trustworthiness."10 We have previously found that the first criteria is met when the declarant is deceased.11 However, death or unavailability of the declarant cannot alone satisfy the necessity component without allowing the exception to swallow the rule. Additionally, the proponent of the evidence must show that the statement is relevant to a material fact and that the statement is more probative on that material fact than other evidence that may be procured and offered.12 These additional elements will help ensure that the necessity exception does not render the rules of evidence meaningless and allow the conduct of trials by hearsay. These factors are met in this case because the testimony tended to establish that Chapel was the officer seen at the muffler shop where Thompson was shot and the state was unable to locate any witnesses to provide that identification.
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