Com. v. Craver

• Citation: 688 A.2d 691,547 Pa. 17
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Appellee, v. Sherman T. CRAVER, Appellant.
• Decision Date: 14 January 1997
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

Page 691

688 A.2d 691

547 Pa. 17

COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Appellee, v. Sherman T. CRAVER, Appellant.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

Argued April 30, 1996.

Decided Jan. 14, 1997.

[547 Pa. 19] Hugh J. Bracken, Media, for appellant.

Kevin Kelly, Joseph J. Mittleman, Philadelphia, William R. Toal, III, Media, Robert A. Graci, Harrisburg, for appellee.

Before FLAHERTY, ZAPPALA, CAPPY, CASTILLE, NIGRO and NEWMAN, JJ.

OPINION OF THE COURT

FLAHERTY, Chief Justice.

In this appeal from two sentences of death, appellant challenges the Delaware County jury selection process and the limitations on voir dire utilized in his case. Represented by new counsel, he raises his jury-related claims in the context of ineffective assistance of trial counsel. Finding no merit in any of his claims, we affirm the judgment of sentence.

Appellant, Sherman T. Craver, was tried for the murders of his former girlfriend, Marie Bates, and a police officer, Connie Hawkins. The evidence established that on July 1, 1993, appellant was at the home of Marie Bates in the city of Chester, Delaware County, Pennsylvania. The Chester police department received a call reporting a disturbance at the residence, and Officer Hawkins, in uniform, went to the house and knocked on the door. Appellant opened the door, shot the officer, turned and shot Bates while her nine-year-old son watched, then fled to the state of Delaware. He was arrested there three hours later. At the time of his arrest, a gun registered to him was found in his car. Ballistics tests later proved it was the weapon used to kill Marie Bates and Officer Hawkins.

This court is required in capital cases to review the sufficiency of the evidence. Commonwealth v. Zettlemoyer, 500 Pa. 16, 26 n. 3, 454 A.2d 937, 942 n. 3 (1982), cert. denied sub nom. Zettlemoyer v. Pennsylvania, 461 U.S. 970, 103 S.Ct. 2444, 77 L.Ed.2d 1327 (1983) rehearing denied, 463 U.S. 1236, 104 S.Ct. 31, 77 L.Ed.2d 1452 (1983). The applicable standard of review is whether, viewing all the evidence in the light most favorable to the Commonwealth as verdict winner, a jury could find every element of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Commonwealth v Bryant, 524 Pa. 564, 567, 574 A.2d 590, 592 (1990).

The record reveals sufficient evidence upon which the jury could have found appellant guilty of two counts of murder of the first degree. Several witnesses testified that prior to the murders, appellant was angry about criminal charges pending against him for driving under the influence and for his earlier assault on Marie Bates. As a Philadelphia Housing Authority police officer, he was in danger of losing his job as a result of the charges. He was scheduled to appear for a preliminary hearing on these charges on the day after the murders.

Ronald Byrd testified that he lived across the street from Marie Bates and that on the night of the killings he heard shots outside his home. He looked out his doorway and saw appellant standing in front of the Bates home near the body of Officer Hawkins with a weapon in his hand. He then saw appellant walk away from the scene of the killings.

Sheila Morgan, another eyewitness, testified that she saw Officer Hawkins walk to the Bates residence and knock on the door. She then saw the door open and flashes of light accompanied by the sound of gunshots. She heard Officer Hawkins scream and saw her attempting to escape, falling down the steps, and crawling. Then she heard three or four more shots. She immediately approached Officer Hawkins to aid her, and saw someone leave the Bates residence. Though she did not identify appellant, her description of the shooter generally fit the appearance of appellant, and other witnesses placed appellant at or near the scene at the time of the murders.

A third eyewitness, another neighbor, testified that she saw a police officer walk up Marie Bates' front steps, then heard a gunshot. She then saw the officer lying flat on the ground with her arms outstretched. She called 911, then heard three more gunshots followed by the sound of Odell Scott, Marie Bates' nine-year-old son, crying. Finally, she saw appellant leaving the area approximately five minutes after the shootings.

Odell Scott testified that he was inside his house with his mother and saw appellant draw a gun from a holster and shoot the police officer and his mother. A police officer who questioned Odell at the scene of the crime testified that Odell identified appellant as the man who shot the victims.

Another police witness testified that, after the shootings, Officer Hawkins' firearm was in its holster and had not been fired. A gun registered to appellant, together with ammunition, was found in appellant's car when he was arrested three hours after the murders. A forensic firearms expert testified that cartridge casings found at the scene of the murders, as well as the bullets taken from the bodies of both victims, were fired from the gun seized from appellant when he was arrested.

Finally, appellant made several incriminating statements to law enforcement officers following his arrest, including his spontaneous question of a Delaware state police lieutenant, "How many people did I kill last night?"

This abundant evidence is sufficient to establish beyond a reasonable doubt all the elements of two counts of first degree murder.

Appellant raises three additional issues for our review. He claims that trial counsel were ineffective in failing to challenge: (1) a jury which was not selected in accordance with law; (2) jury venire summoning procedures which systematically produced panels of prospective jurors on which African-Americans were underrepresented; and (3) limitations on voir dire of prospective jurors which prevented full exploration of jurors' attitudes about racial prejudice and stereotyping, domestic violence, and violence against police officers.

Appellant argues that trial counsel were ineffective as to all the claims related to jury selection. According to Commonwealth v. Pierce, 515 Pa. 153, 158-59, 527 A.2d 973, 975 (1987) and its progeny, the defendant must demonstrate that: (1) the underlying claim is of arguable merit; (2) counsel's performance was unreasonable; and (3) counsel's ineffectiveness prejudiced him. It is presumed that counsel's assistance was effective, and the burden of proving ineffectiveness falls upon the party alleging it. Commonwealth v. Miller, 494 Pa. 229, 233, 431 A.2d 233, 235 (1981). Prejudice, in the context of ineffective assistance of counsel, means that there must be a reasonable possibility that but for counsel's unprofessional errors, the result of the trial would have been different. Commonwealth v. Johnson, 516 Pa. 407, 413, 532 A.2d 796, 799 (1987). While an evidentiary hearing is not mandated in every case where ineffectiveness is raised, an evidentiary hearing was held on appellant's claim that counsel were ineffective and all of appellant's claims were deemed meritless.

Appellant's first claim is that the pool of potential jurors in Delaware County was not selected in accordance with law, and that trial counsel's failure to investigate and challenge this defect constitutes ineffective assistance of counsel, requiring a new trial. At the evidentiary hearing on appellant's post-trial motions, he presented evidence that the Delaware County jury commissioners failed to prepare an annual master list of prospective jurors. ¹ Instead, a master list was last prepared in 1989, and was approximately four years old at the time of his trial. The county failed to conduct an annual random selection of names for jury service from such a master list. ² Instead, the last random selection of jurors from the master list took place in 1989, and was approximately four years old at the time of trial. The failure to update the lists resulted in the exclusion of all residents who reached the age of eighteen and those who changed addresses after the list was prepared in 1989, in direct violation of 42 Pa.C.S. §§ 4501 and 4502. ³ The jury commission failed to maintain current, accurate, and adequate lists of qualified and disqualified jurors and to publish or post the list of names of people to serve as jurors. ⁴ Appellant argues that these defects produced a trial jury not selected at random from a representative cross-section of the eligible population of the county, as required by 42 Pa.C.S. § 4501(1).

The Commonwealth responds that appellant has failed to satisfy the test for ineffectiveness since there is no merit to the underlying claim and because there was no prejudice as a result of the technical violations of the jury selection statutes. The argument is that failure to comply fully with the statutory procedure did not substantially impair appellant's constitutional right to jury trial and that the statutory defects in selection of the jury array in no way denied appellant a fair trial.

The constitution of this commonwealth guarantees: "Trial by jury shall be as heretofore, and the right thereof remain inviolate." Pa. Const. Art. I, § 6. This court has interpreted the inviolability of the right to mean "freedom from substantial impairment. It does not import rigidity of regulation in the manner of impanelling a jury. The cardinal principle is that the essential features of trial by jury as known at the common law shall be preserved." Commonwealth v. Eckhart, 430 Pa. 311, 314-15, 242 A.2d 271, 273 (1968), citing Commonwealth v. Fugmann, 330 Pa. 4, 28, 198 A. 99, 111 (1938) (emphasis in original). The legislature likewise has recognized that a technical violation of the statutes regulating the summoning of jurors does not entitle a defendant to a new trial:

§ 4527. Effect of verdict on jury selection errors

Except as otherwise prescribed by general rule, errors and omissions in the selection of jurors under this subchapter shall not constitute grounds to set aside any jury verdict in any civil or criminal matter or to...