Com. v. Chambers

• Decision Date: 26 September 2002
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Appellee v. Karl CHAMBERS, Appellant.
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

807 A.2d 872

570 Pa. 3

COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Appellee v. Karl CHAMBERS, Appellant.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

Submitted January 10, 2002.

Decided September 26, 2002.

Ellen Burkowitz, Philadelphia, for Karl Chambers, appellant.

Amy Zapp, Harrisburg, for the Com. of PA, appellee.

Before ZAPPALA, C.J., and CAPPY, CASTILLE, NIGRO, NEWMAN, SAYLOR and EAKIN, JJ.

OPINION

Justice NEWMAN.

Karl Chambers (Chambers) appeals from an Order of the Court of Common Pleas of York County (PCRA court) denying his Petition for Post-Conviction Relief pursuant to the Post Conviction Relief Act¹ (PCRA). For the reasons set forth herein, we reverse the PCRA court and remand the matter for proceedings consistent with this Opinion.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

The evidence submitted at trial, as summarized by this Court on direct review, established the following:

On Saturday, February 1, 1986, at or near 3:30 p.m., the victim, Anna Mae Morris, entered the C & M Variety store (hereinafter the "Fish Store") to purchase groceries with proceeds from her Social Security check which she had cashed the preceding day. The clerk filled her order and tallied her purchases. The victim then reached under her shirt for her wallet, tendered the amount due, put the change in her wallet, replaced her wallet under her shirt and left the store. At the same time, [Chambers] and a group of his friends were playing pinball and eating fish sandwiches in plain view of the victim. They had recently come from the home of Adam McKinney, a member of this group, where they had smoked some marijuana and drank some alcoholic beverages. These friends testified that [Chambers] neglected to place money into the common fund they collected for food purchases that day at the fish store and that moments after the victim departed, [Chambers] told his friends that he had something to do, adding he would meet them later in the evening at Adam McKinney's house. [Chambers] quickly left the fish store.

No one saw [Chambers], or the victim, until approximately 4:15 p.m. or 4:30 p.m. when Edgar Coder and Travis Wolfe stated that they saw [Chambers] and the victim on the Silver Bridge (so named because of its color). They were the last people to see the victim alive. These witnesses testified that, although they could not hear what [Chambers] and the victim were saying to each other, they appeared to be arguing. In addition, Edgar Coder testified that [Chambers] had what appeared to be a large stick in one of his hands. Sometime between 4:45 p.m. and 5:00 p.m., another witness, Kevin Hartmen, while walking his dog there, noticed a body under the Maryland Pennsylvania Railroad Bridge (hereinafter the "Black Bridge" so named because of its painted color). (The Black Bridge is in close proximity to the Silver Bridge and both of these structures span the Codorus Creek.) Kevin Hartmen immediately contacted his friend, Donald Snell, who also saw the body. Mr. Snell approached his father about what he had seen. His father then told a retired policeman. In turn, the retired policeman contacted the York Police Department and reported the body beneath the Black Bridge.

The police arrived at the scene at 8:35 p.m. and began their investigation. The police found the victim's numerous articles of clothing, her torn open, empty wallet, along with her upper and lower dentures strewn around her lifeless, nude body. The autopsy revealed the victim was beaten to death by a blunt instrument and the cause of death was later determined to be a subdural hemorrhage or brain hemorrhage. [Reproduced Record (R.), at 590.]

While the police were investigating the murder scene, [Chambers], armed with an axe handle, went to a local bar called the Shady Dell. Before he was permitted to enter the bar, the manager, John Ettline, ordered [Chambers] to leave this club outside because Mr. Ettline did not want patrons carrying weapons into his establishment. [Chambers] complied and meandered through the Shady Dell for a time and left without re-claiming his stick. From there he proceeded to Adam McKinney's home. When he arrived at Adam's home, [Chambers] now possessed alcohol, marijuana, and money. [Chambers] did not tell his friends where he had been, what he had done, or where he [had] obtained the money to make his purchases, whereas a few hours before he did not have funds to contribute to their kitty.

Over the next few months, the police engaged in an exhaustive investigation. The questioning of witnesses revealed that [Chambers] often carried an axe handle, that he told his friends the police considered him a prime suspect, and that the police stopped [Chambers] as he was attempting to leave town. Debra Phillips, a woman who knew [Chambers], told the police she gave the axe handle to him because of a foot injury he received in an altercation with Debra's nephew some time before the murder. At that time, she suspected he could use the handle as a cane. Intense questioning of [Chambers'] acquaintances confirmed that on the day of the murder [Chambers] was seen carrying this axe handle. Their testimony also revealed that when he entered the fish store on the day of the murder, he had the axe handle with him but the owners requested he leave it outside. When [Chambers'] friends left the fish store after [Chambers] had departed, they noticed that the stick was gone. And finally, they noted that [Chambers] did not have "his stick" when he rejoined them later in the evening at Adam's house.

On December 9, 1986, while [Chambers] was in the York County Prison on charges unrelated to this incident, he confided in two fellow prisoners, Jeffrey Hutchenson and Richard Taylor, and told them that he had killed the victim. [Chambers] said, "that when he asked the victim for her money and she refused, he hit her and took the money." The next day Jeffrey Hutchenson contacted his attorney, who notified the police. An arrest warrant was then issued on December 12, 1986, for [Chambers].

Commonwealth v. Chambers, 528 Pa. 558, 599 A.2d 630, 633-635 (1991) (Chambers I), cert. denied, 504 U.S. 946, 112 S.Ct. 2290, 119 L.Ed.2d 214 (1992).

On June 26, 1987, a jury convicted Chambers of one count of murder of the first degree² and one count of robbery.³ Following a penalty hearing, the same jury found one aggravating circumstance, that the killing occurred during the commission of a robbery,⁴ and one mitigating circumstance, that Chambers had no significant history of prior criminal offenses.⁵ The jury concluded that the aggravating circumstance outweighed the mitigating circumstance and sentenced Chambers to death. On direct appeal, this Court affirmed the convictions for robbery and first-degree murder, but remanded the matter for a new penalty phase hearing because the prosecutor had referred to the Bible during the sentencing hearing. We concluded that "reliance in any manner upon the Bible or any other religious writing in support of the imposition of a penalty of death is reversible error per se." Chambers I at 644.

At the second penalty phase hearing, conducted from May 16, 1994, until June 3, 1994, the jury found the same aggravating circumstance and two mitigating circumstances: (1) that Chambers had no significant history of prior criminal offenses (which the original jury had found); and (2) other evidence of mitigation, including family background, physical and mental abuse, neglect, survival needs, mental age, credibility of witnesses, behavior while in prison, and non-violent behavioral background.⁶ The jury found that the aggravating circumstance outweighed the mitigating circumstances and imposed a sentence of death. On direct appeal, this Court affirmed the sentence of death. Commonwealth v. Chambers, 546 Pa. 370, 685 A.2d 96 (1996) (Chambers II), cert. denied, 522 U.S. 827, 118 S.Ct. 90, 139 L.Ed.2d 46 (1997).⁷

Chambers filed a timely Petition for Post Conviction Relief pursuant to the PCRA on November 10, 1997, and he submitted an amended Petition on April 21, 1998. His amended Petition raised numerous claims of ineffective assistance of trial counsel and contended that he was denied his constitutional right to due process because the Commonwealth failed to disclose material exculpatory evidence. By Opinion and Order dated March 8, 2000, the PCRA court denied Chambers' PCRA Petition, concluding that Chambers had not met the burden of proving, by a preponderance of the evidence, that his constitutional rights were violated or that trial counsel was ineffective.⁸

DISCUSSION

On appeal to this Court, Chambers raises the following fourteen claims attacking his convictions and sentences:⁹

1. Is Chambers entitled to a new sentencing hearing because the community where he was tried was saturated with inflammatory, prejudicial publicity; did the PCRA court err in denying a hearing on this issue?

2. Is Chambers entitled to a new trial because the trial court's admission into evidence of an inflammatory photograph of the decedent's corpse violated Chambers' rights under the Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution and the corresponding provisions of the Pennsylvania Constitution?

3. Is Chambers entitled to a new sentencing hearing because the instructions of the trial court prevented the jury from giving full effect to mitigating evidence?

4. Is Chambers entitled to a new trial and sentencing hearing because evidence of past bad acts and uncharged crimes was injected into his trial and sentencing?

5. Is Chambers entitled to a new trial and sentencing hearing because the jury was exposed to speculative and unreliable testimony about Chambers' "violent" character?

6. Is Chambers entitled to relief because the prosecutor's guilt and penalty phase closing arguments deprived Chambers of a fair and reliable capital sentencing proceeding?

7. Is Chambers entitled to relief from his conviction and sentence because the Commonwealth withheld crucial exculpatory evidence that

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