Dobbert v. Strickland
| Decision Date | 30 January 1982 |
| Docket Number | No. 82-84-Civ-J-B.,82-84-Civ-J-B. |
| Parties | Ernest John DOBBERT, Jr., Petitioner, v. Charles G. STRICKLAND, Jr., et al., Respondents. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Middle District of Florida |
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Patrick D. Doherty, Raymond Gross, Clearwater, Fla., for petitioner.
Carolyn M. Snurkowski, Raymond Marky, Asst. Attys. Gen., Tallahassee, Fla., for respondents.
This case is before the Court on the Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus by a Person in State Custody, filed herein on January 27, 1982, by petitioner Ernest John Dobbert, Jr. The following thirteen grounds are raised in the petition:
On January 27, 1982, this Court entered an order to show cause giving the respondents until 2:00 o'clock p.m., Friday, January 29, 1982, in which to respond to the petition for writ of habeas corpus and to show cause why the petition should not be granted. On that same date, the Court also entered an order setting a hearing on the petition and directing that the parties be prepared to present evidence at that time if deemed necessary. Finally, the Court issued a Writ of Habeas Corpus Ad Testificandum directing the appearance before the Court of Ernest John Dobbert, Jr., the petitioner, on January 29, 1982, at 2:00 o'clock p.m.
A hearing was held at 2:00 o'clock p.m. on January 29, 1982. Present at the hearing were Patrick D. Doherty and Raymond Gross, attorneys for the petitioner; Ernest John Dobbert, Jr., the petitioner; and Carolyn Snurkowski and Raymond Marky, Assistant Attorneys General, attorneys for the respondents. Shortly before the hearing, the petitioner filed a Motion for Discovery and the respondents filed a Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings and/or Motion for Summary Judgment.
The Court has reviewed the entire record, including Court's Exhibits 1-54.
This Opinion is organized as follows:
I. History
II. Evidence Adduced at Trial
III. Sentencing
IV. Other Grounds
Sections "A" and "K" of the petition will be discussed under Part II; sections "B," "C," "G," "H," "I," and "M" under Part III; and sections "D," "J," "L," "E," and "F" under Part IV.
Petitioner was tried in the Circuit Court, Fourth Judicial Circuit, in and for Duval County, Florida, jury selection commencing March 18, 1974, on an amended four-count indictment charging petitioner with first degree murder (two counts) and child torture (two counts). On March 29, 1974, the jury returned a verdict finding the petitioner guilty of murder in the first degree, murder in the second degree, child abuse and child torture. The jury on March 30, 1974, following the penalty phase of the trial, recommended a life sentence and on April 12, 1974, the trial court sentenced the petitioner to death.
On April 25, 1974, a Notice of Appeal was filed in the Florida Supreme Court, which court on January 14, 1976, affirmed the April 12, 1974, judgment and sentence of the trial court. In this appeal, petitioner raised five (plus a part of six others) of the thirteen grounds he is raising in this petition.
Certiorari was taken to the Supreme Court of the United States and that court affirmed the lower courts on June 17, 1977. An application for relief to the Florida Supreme Court was made by petitioner pursuant to Gardner v. Florida, 430 U.S. 349, 97 S.Ct. 1197, 51 L.Ed.2d 393 (1977), and on March 31, 1978, the Florida Supreme Court directed the trial court to set aside the death sentence and afford the petitioner an opportunity to respond to the Presentence Investigation Report before resentencing.
The sentence was set aside on May 4, 1978, and on May 30, 1978, the petitioner responded to the Presentence Investigation Report, and thereafter requested a plenary sentencing hearing. The trial court granted the motion and a plenary sentencing hearing was held on June 22, 1978.
On June 30, 1978, the trial court sentenced petitioner to death and on June 30, 1978, a Notice of Appeal was filed in the Florida Supreme Court. The Florida Supreme Court affirmed the sentence on July 5, 1979. In this appeal the petitioner raised six of the thirteen grounds raised in this petition. Therefore, by that date eleven of the thirteen grounds presently pending before this Court had been ruled upon by the Florida Supreme Court and the petitioner had exhausted his state remedies as to those eleven grounds.
On January 6, 1982, the Governor of the State of Florida signed a death warrant in petitioner's case for February 2, 1982. On the same date the Governor of the State of Florida signed the warrant, petitioner filed a motion to vacate judgment and sentence, pursuant to Rule 3.850 Fla.R.Crim.P., in the Circuit Court, Fourth Judicial Circuit, in and for Duval County, Florida.
An evidentiary hearing on the motion to vacate judgment and sentence was held on January 12, 1982, and the trial court denied the motion to vacate judgment and sentence on January 14, 1982. On January 28, 1982, the Florida Supreme Court affirmed the trial court's order denying the motion to vacate judgment and sentence.
In section A of his petition, petitioner asserts that the evidence adduced at trial was insufficient as a matter of law to prove beyond a reasonable doubt the premeditation necessary to support a conviction for first degree murder. Petitioner has previously raised this issue in his direct appeal to the Florida Supreme Court, filed April 25, 1974. The court resolved the issue unfavorably to petitioner and affirmed the judgment of the trial court. Dobbert v. State, 328 So.2d 433 (Fla.1976), aff'd 432 U.S. 282, 97 S.Ct. 2290, 53 L.Ed.2d 344 (1977). Petitioner now seeks habeas corpus relief pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254.
According to Fla.Stat. § 782.04(1)(a)(1973), "the unlawful killing of a human being, when perpetrated from a premeditated design to effect the death of the person killed or any human being, ... shall be murder in the first degree and shall constitute a capital felony ...."
Petitioner specifically challenges the sufficiency of the evidence establishing his "premeditated design." That term has been defined as follows:
A premeditated design to effect the death of a human being is a fully formed and conscious purpose to take human life, formed upon reflection and deliberation, entertained in the mind before and at the time of the homicide .... If the design to take human life was formed a sufficient length of time before its execution to admit of some reflection and deliberation on the part of the party entertaining it, and the party at the time of the execution of the intent was fully conscious of a settled and fixed purpose to take the life of a human being, and of the consequence of carrying such purpose into execution, the intent or design would be premeditated within the meaning of the law ....
McCutchen v. State, 96 So.2d 152, 153 (Fla. 1957). See also Weaver v. State, 220 So.2d 53, 59 (Fla.2d DCA), cert. denied, 225 So.2d 913 (Fla.1969). No prescribed length of time is necessary over which the element of premeditation must form. Gavin v. State, 259 So.2d 544, 547 (Fla.3d DCA), cert. denied, 265 So.2d 370 (Fla.1972). In fact, the period which must elapse between the formation of and the execution of the intent to take human life in order to render the design a premeditated one may be very short. The intent may exist for only a few moments and yet be premeditated. McCutchen, 96 So.2d at 153.
The standard by which this Court must evaluate the evidence in petitioner's state criminal trial to determine whether petitioner was accorded constitutional due process was recently formulated by the Supreme Court of the United States in Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979). Jackson held that a federal habeas court which is presented with a sufficiency of the evidence claim must grant relief if on the evidence adduced at trial no rational trier of fact could have found proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Id. at 324, 99 S.Ct. at 2791. It has also been established that the Jackson standard should be applied retroactively to cases tried prior to the Supreme Court's decision. Holloway v. McElroy, 632 F.2d 605, 639 (5th Cir. 1980), cert. denied, 451 U.S. 1028, 101 S.Ct. 3019, 69 L.Ed.2d 398 (1981).
The Court begins its analysis by noting that under the Jackson standard it must consider all of the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution. This is appropriate because it gives "full play to the responsibility of the trier of fact fairly to resolve conflicts in the testimony, to weigh the evidence, and to draw reasonable inferences from basic facts to ultimate facts." Jackson, 443 U.S. at 319, 99 S.Ct. at 2789. Furthermore, the Court must look to both direct and circumstantial evidence in resolving the question of the sufficiency of the evidence underlying the jury's finding of premeditation. See Pate v. Wainwright, 607 F.2d 669 (5th Cir. 1979).
In the case at bar, the Court, after reviewing the entire record, finds ample evidence in the trial record to hold as a matter of law that a rational trier of fact could have found beyond a reasonable doubt that petitioner possessed...
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