Com. v. Benoit
| Decision Date | 10 June 1983 |
| Citation | 389 Mass. 411,451 N.E.2d 101 |
| Parties | COMMONWEALTH v. Richard C. BENOIT. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Thomas E. Finnerty, Boston, and James M. McDonough, Jr., West Roxbury, for defendant.
Daniel C. Mullane, Asst. Dist. Atty. (Ellen A. Donahue, Asst. Dist. Atty., with him), for the Commonwealth.
Before HENNESSEY, C.J., and WILKINS, LIACOS, NOLAN and LYNCH, JJ.
On June 19, 1979, the defendant, Richard C. Benoit, was found guilty by a jury of murder in the first degree and armed robbery. The trial judge sentenced the defendant to a term of life imprisonment on each conviction, the sentences to be served concurrently. The defendant appealed from these convictions to this court and we reversed the defendant's convictions and ordered a new trial. Commonwealth v. Benoit, 382 Mass. 210, 415 N.E.2d 818 (1981).
The indictments were then scheduled for retrial in the Suffolk Superior Court. The trial judge heard pretrial motions and the defendant subsequently sought an interlocutory appeal of the judge's denial of his motion to suppress. A single justice of this court denied the appeal. The second trial commenced on October 15, 1981. On October 23, 1981, the jury returned verdicts of guilty of murder in the second degree and larceny from the person. The judge imposed a mandatory life sentence on the murder charge and a consecutive sentence of from seven to ten years on the larceny conviction.
The defendant filed a notice of appeal from the convictions in the Appeals Court, and we transferred the appeal to this court on our own motion. 1 The defendant argues that the trial judge erred in (1) denying his motion to suppress certain statements he made to the police; (2) admitting a statement of the defendant to another person that he intended to kill someone; (3) allegedly treating defense counsel unfairly; (4) refusing to instruct the jury on manslaughter; (5) admitting the testimony of the victim's daughter; and (6) refusing to grant defense counsel a short recess to interview a prospective witness and in not allowing defense counsel to call such witness. The defendant also urges that we should exercise our power under G.L. c. 278, § 33E, 2 to reduce the verdict on the murder indictment because of the number of alleged errors committed by the judge and because of the judge's treatment of the issue of extreme atrocity or cruelty. 3 We conclude that the judge erred in admitting the defendant's statement that he was going to kill someone and in denying defense counsel a short recess to interview the prospective witness but that these errors do not require reversal of the judgments. We reject the remainder of the defendant's arguments and decline to reduce the murder verdict or to grant a new trial under G.L. c. 278, § 33E. Accordingly, we affirm the judgments.
At approximately 1:30 p.m. on Monday, November 13, 1978, the assistant manager of the Castle-Mar Motel in Revere discovered the bludgeoned body of a woman, later identified as Mary K. Ballard, in a room of the motel. He immediately called the Revere police, who arrived within minutes. The State police arrived shortly thereafter. The police officers entered the room where they saw a body partially covered with a sheet. Upon removing the sheet, the officers observed the victim's nude, bloody body with a gaping hole in the head. There was a broken wine bottle near the body and fragments of glass were found about the shoulders and side of the body. A State police officer photographed the victim's body as well as the motel room.
The police officers ascertained that the defendant had checked into the motel room on November 11, 1978. By tracing the telephone calls made from the motel room, the police located one Judy Cooper. Cooper had met the defendant on November 11, while she was on Revere Beach Boulevard in Revere. The defendant stopped her and asked her where he could find a motel. She told him that the hotels were at the other end of the beach. She asked the defendant for a ride; they rode together along the beach and at some point they stopped to buy some beer and some toothache medication. They then went to the Castle-Mar Motel where the defendant registered for a room, and they spent the day together watching television and talking. Cooper talked mostly about her daughter and a pending custody suit; the defendant told her that he had come to Massachusetts to see his children.
Cooper testified that she stayed at the motel room with the defendant until early Monday morning, November 13. During that time she had several beers and smoked some marihuana while the defendant drank beer continuously. The defendant left the motel several times to buy beer. After one of these trips he returned with a bottle of wine.
On Sunday, November 12, Cooper and the defendant spent the day sleeping and watching television. 4 When she awoke around 7 p.m., the defendant was not in the room, although his clothes and belongings were still there. Cooper left the motel room to look at an apartment. The defendant was still out of the room when she returned.
That evening the manager of a bar in Revere and the organist who entertained in the bar saw the defendant with the victim. The manager last noticed the defendant and the victim at 1:15 a.m. At 2 a.m., when the bar closed, the manager observed that the defendant and the victim were not there. The organist left the bar at 1:30 a.m. and testified that they were still at the bar at that time.
Cooper testified that the defendant returned to the motel room with the victim between 2:15 and 2:30 a.m. Upon seeing Cooper, the victim became verbally hostile, but after the defendant explained to the victim that Cooper had some child custody problems, the victim calmed down. The victim wrote her name and telephone number on a matchbook and told Cooper to get in touch with her as she could possibly help her with the custody suit. The victim then undressed and removed a necklace and a pair of earrings which she gave to Cooper. The victim asked Cooper to stay and engage in sexual acts with them, but Cooper declined. The defendant then gave Cooper some money for taxi fare. When Cooper left the motel room, the victim and the defendant were embracing in bed.
Dr. George Katsas, a medical examiner, testified that the victim died as a result of blunt injuries to the face and head. The victim had sustained a fracture of the skull, subdural hemorrhage, and contusions of the brain. At least twelve blows had been struck to her head; three or four of these wounds penetrated to the bone. Dr. Katsas could not determine how long the victim had remained conscious nor could he ascertain the order of the wounds.
On November 14, 1978, at 1:17 p.m., at a bank in Peabody, the defendant cashed a check payable to him and bearing the victim's forged signature.
On December 7, 1978, the Hartford, Connecticut, police located a car that was reported stolen from the Boston area and was involved in a murder investigation. A search of the car located a key to a motel room in Connecticut and slips of paper with some telephone numbers on them. Detective James Doyle obtained the names and addresses that corresponded with the telephone numbers. Doyle and Officer George Kingsley then went to Windsor, Connecticut, to speak with a woman whose telephone number appeared on one of the papers. Doyle and Kingsley arrived at approximately 6 a.m. and learned that the woman had received a telephone call from the defendant earlier that morning. The defendant had called from a Texaco gasoline station in Hartford, near an interstate highway.
Doyle and Kingsley arrived at the gasoline station at about 7 a.m. and found the defendant, who appeared to be asleep, in a tow truck, parked in the back of the station. Kingsley and Doyle rapped on the window. The defendant awoke and the officers identified themselves, and assisted him out of the truck. The officers patted down and handcuffed the defendant, and informed him that he was under arrest. The defendant then walked with the officers approximately thirty feet to the police car. The officers observed that the defendant had no difficulty walking, and appeared calm and sober.
The officers drove the defendant to the police station where they took him to an interrogation room. At this time the officers gave the defendant Miranda warnings. Doyle testified that he asked the defendant whether he understood his rights and the defendant responded that he did. Kingsley testified, however, that the defendant did not respond at all to Doyle's question. The officers informed the defendant again that he was under arrest and that there was a murder warrant for him from Massachusetts for the death of Mary K. Ballard.
The defendant then made an extensive statement to the officers. He told them that he had met the victim in a bar in Revere and had invited her back to his motel room; she agreed to go with him. When they arrived at the motel room, there was already a young woman in the defendant's room. The victim was interested in having sex and invited the other woman to join them. The other woman declined, however, so the defendant gave her $3, and asked her to leave, which she did. After the woman left, the defendant and the victim engaged in sexual intercourse for a period of a few hours. Thereafter the victim fell asleep and the defendant robbed her, taking her purse and her car keys, and then left the motel in the victim's car. Doyle asked the defendant several times whether he had killed the victim. The defendant first responded, "No," and later stated, "if I killed her, I don't remember killing her." The defendant explained that he had a drinking problem and that in the past, when drinking, he had done various things of which he later had no memory.
Doyle observed that the defendant's demeanor during the interrogation was very calm, subdued,...
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