Hall v. State

Citation614 So.2d 473
Decision Date14 January 1993
Docket NumberNo. 77563,77563
Parties18 Fla. L. Week. S63 Freddie Lee HALL, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
CourtUnited States State Supreme Court of Florida

James B. Gibson, Public Defender, and Larry B. Henderson, Asst. Public Defender, Seventh Judicial Circuit, Daytona Beach, for appellant.

Robert A. Butterworth, Atty. Gen., and Robert J. Landry, Asst. Atty. Gen., Tampa, for appellee.

PER CURIAM.

Freddie Lee Hall appeals the sentence of death imposed on him on resentencing. We have jurisdiction pursuant to article V, section 3(b)(1), Florida Constitution, and affirm Hall's sentence.

In February 1978 Hall and Mack Ruffin decided to steal a car to use in a robbery. Spotting a twenty-one-year-old housewife, who was seven months pregnant, in a grocery store parking lot, Hall forced her into her car and drove that car to a secluded wooded area. Ruffin followed in his car. After reaching their destination, both men raped the victim, after which she was beaten and shot and her body dragged further into the woods. Later that day, they drove the victim's car to a convenience store where they killed a deputy sheriff. The handgun shown to have killed the female victim was found under the deputy's body.

In separate trials their juries convicted both Hall and Ruffin of first-degree murder and recommended that they be sentenced to death, which their trial judges did. 1 This Court affirmed Hall's conviction and sentence. Hall v. State, 403 So.2d 1321 (Fla.1981). Later, however, this Court ordered that Hall be resentenced because of error under Hitchcock v. Dugger, 481 U.S. 393, 107 S.Ct. 1821, 95 L.Ed.2d 347 (1987). Hall v. State, 541 So.2d 1125 (Fla.1989).

At the resentencing the state produced witnesses and prior testimony to make the jury aware of the underlying facts and to prove aggravators. Hall presented numerous witnesses, including, among others, his original trial and appellate attorneys, two sisters, two brothers, three other family members and acquaintances, a professor of special education, a psychiatrist, a psychologist, and a criminologist in his attempt to establish mitigators. The jury, however, recommended that he be sentenced to death, which the trial court did.

Each side started voir dire with ten peremptory challenges, and Hall eventually used his last peremptory to remove a prospective juror that the court refused to remove for cause. Claiming that there was one more person on the panel that he would excuse, Hall asked for more challenges. The court said that the last person Hall challenged was at least arguable as to removal for cause and gave him one more challenge, which Hall used. After the state struck another prospective juror, Hall asked for still more challenges because he did not want Cavanaugh, the last person called to the panel, on the jury. The state objected that granting more challenges in a piecemeal fashion was unfair to the state, and the court refused any more challenges. Hall did not challenge Cavanaugh for cause, but moved for a mistrial because the court refused to give him more challenges. He had no authority to cite for this claim, and the state argued that granting more challenges was within the court's discretion. The court agreed and denied the motion. Now, Hall argues that because Cavanaugh had been exposed to prejudicial publicity and juror misbehavior the court erred in refusing him an additional peremptory challenge. We disagree.

"To show reversible error, a defendant must show that all peremptories had been exhausted and that an objectionable juror had to be accepted." Pentecost v. State, 545 So.2d 861, 863 n. 1 (Fla.1989); Trotter v. State, 576 So.2d 691 (Fla.1990). Although Hall claimed that he would have excused Cavanaugh, the record discloses that, even though Cavanaugh had seen a newspaper headline about Hall's resentencing, he did not read the article and that Cavanaugh did not hear what some jurors were talking about in the hallway. We have previously held that the competency of a challenged juror is a mixed question of law and fact, the resolution of which is within the trial court's discretion. Singer v. State, 109 So.2d 7 (Fla.1959). Hall has shown no abuse of discretion in the trial court's refusal to grant him more peremptory challenges, and there is no merit to this issue.

Hall filed a lengthy proposed instruction to explain why he was being resentenced. The state objected that the explanation was irrelevant and confusing, and the court refused to give the proposed instruction. "Jury instructions must relate to issues concerning evidence received at trial", and confusing, contradictory, or misleading instructions should not be given. Butler v. State, 493 So.2d 451, 452 (Fla.1986). Hall has shown no abuse of discretion in the court's refusal to give the proposed instruction, and this issue has no merit.

The state tried Hall and Ruffin together for the deputy's murder. The jury convicted each of first-degree murder and recommended that Ruffin be sentenced to life imprisonment and that Hall be sentenced to death, and the trial court agreed with those recommendations. On appeal the district court affirmed Ruffin's conviction of first-degree murder. Ruffin v. State, 390 So.2d 841 (Fla. 5th DCA1980). In considering Hall's appeal of his conviction and death sentence, however, this Court vacated the sentence and reduced Hall's conviction to second-degree murder because, although both Hall and Ruffin were guilty of murder, premeditated, first-degree murder had not been proved. Hall v. State, 403 So.2d 1319 (Fla.1981).

At resentencing Hall sought to introduce Ruffin's conviction of first-degree murder to contrast with his own second-degree murder conviction. The state objected and argued that if this were allowed it should be allowed to explain the differences in the codefendants' convictions. The judge held that he would allow both sides to argue the significance of Ruffin's conviction, and Hall decided not to introduce that conviction. Now, Hall argues that the court erred in refusing to let him introduce the conviction without the state being able to explain it.

We find no merit to Hall's argument. If Ruffin's conviction for murdering the deputy had come to this Court, no doubt it, as well as Hall's, would have been reduced to second-degree murder. See Moreland v. State, 582 So.2d 618 (Fla.1991). The admitting of evidence is within the trial court's discretion. Blanco v. State, 452 So.2d 520 (Fla.1984), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 1181, 105 S.Ct. 940, 83 L.Ed.2d 953 (1985). Hall has demonstrated no abuse of discretion in the trial court's ruling that the state would be able to explain Ruffin's conviction.

As stated earlier, seven of Hall's relatives and friends testified on his behalf. When he sought to introduce testimony from four other relatives, the state objected to their testimony as being cumulative, repetitious, and redundant. The parties then stipulated that the jury would be told that these witnesses "would have testified to the same factual circumstances that other family witnesses have testified to." It is within the trial court's discretion to exclude cumulative evidence. Muehleman v. State, 503 So.2d 310 (Fla.), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 882, 108 S.Ct. 39, 98 L.Ed.2d 170 (1987). Hall has shown no abuse of discretion, and there is no merit to his argument that the court erred in excluding this testimony.

As noted earlier, Hall's jury recommended that he be sentenced to death. In agreeing with that recommendation the court wrote: "It is only in rare circumstances that this court could impose a sentence other than what is recommended by the jury, although the court obviously has the right, in appropriate circumstances, to exercise its prerogative of judicial override." Hall now argues that the "rare circumstances" language shows that the court used the wrong standard in considering the jury's recommendation. We disagree. As we have stated previously: "Notwithstanding the jury recommendation ... the judge is required to make an independent determination, based on the aggravating and mitigating factors." Grossman v. State, 525 So.2d 833, 840 (Fla.1988), cert. denied, 489 U.S. 1071, 109 S.Ct. 1354, 103 L.Ed.2d 822 (1989). This judge recognized that the final decision as to penalty was his and conscientiously weighed and discussed the aggravating and mitigating evidence and made his decision based on the evidence. We are convinced that he applied the proper standard.

In sentencing Hall to death the court found that seven aggravators had been established: 1) previous conviction of violent felony (assault with intent to commit rape, second-degree murder, shooting at or into an occupied vehicle); 2) under sentence of imprisonment (on parole for the assault conviction); 3) committed during the commission of kidnapping and sexual battery; 4) committed for pecuniary gain (stealing the victim's car); 5) heinous, atrocious, or cruel; 6) cold, calculated, and premeditated; and 7) committed to avoid or prevent arrest. Because his original sentencing judge found only three aggravators, Hall now argues that the resentencing court could not find the additional four. We recently considered this issue and, contrary to Hall's argument, held that, because a resentencing is a totally new proceeding, the resentencing court is not bound by the original court's findings. Preston v. State, 607 So.2d 404 (Fla.1992). Thus, there is no merit to Hall's argument.

Hall also argues that the state did not prove the avoid, prevent arrest and cold, calculated, and premeditated aggravators. 2 We disagree. We have long held that, when the victim is not a law enforcement officer, eliminating a witness must be the dominant motive for the murder to support finding the avoid, prevent arrest aggravator. E.g., Bates v. State, 465 So.2d 490 (Fla.1985). Circumstantial evidence can be used to prove this aggravator, and we have uniformly upheld...

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