Hooks v. State, D-98-1231.

• Decision Date: 22 January 2001
• Docket Number: No. D-98-1231.,D-98-1231.
• Citation: 2001 OK CR 1,19 P.3d 294
• Parties: Danny Keith HOOKS, Appellant, v. STATE of Oklahoma, Appellee.
• Court: United States State Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma. Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma

19 P.3d 294

2001 OK CR 1

Danny Keith HOOKS, Appellant, v. STATE of Oklahoma, Appellee.

No. D-98-1231.

Court of Criminal Appeals of Oklahoma.

January 22, 2001.

As Corrected on Denial of Rehearing March 12, 2001.

Irven Box, Box & Box, Oklahoma City, OK, attorney for defendant at trial.

Robert H. Macy, Oklahoma County District Attorney, Brad Miller, Assistant District Attorney, Robert S. Kerr, Oklahoma City, OK, attorneys for the State at trial.

Janet Chesley, Michael D. Morehead, Capital Direct Appeals, Indigent Defense System, Norman, OK, attorneys for appellant on appeal.

W.A. Drew Edmondson, Attorney General of Oklahoma, Robert Whittaker, Assistant Attorney General, Oklahoma City, OK, attorneys for appellee on appeal.

OPINION

CHAPEL, JUDGE:

¶ 1 Danny Keith Hooks was tried by jury and convicted of five counts of Murder in the First Degree in violation of 21 O.S.1991, § 701.7, in the District Court of Oklahoma County, Case No. CF-97-657. The jury found two aggravating circumstances for each count: (1) that Hooks had been previously convicted of a felony involving the use or threat of violence to the person; and (2) that the murder was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel.¹ In accordance with the jury's recommendation the Honorable Daniel L. Owens sentenced Hooks to death on each count.

¶ 2 On May 16, 1992, the bodies of Phyllis Adams, LaShawn Evans, Sandra Thompson, Carolyn Watson, and Francill Roberts were found in a small bedroom in a crack house. Each woman was gagged and had been stabbed several times. The bodies were nude and Thompson, Watson, and Roberts were bound.² The room was in disarray and the victims' purses appeared to have been searched. There were no drugs or money in the house.

¶ 3 Although there were five victims in a confined space, the evidence suggested one person committed the crimes. The women were killed in the bedroom. A trail of blood drops led to the front door, and Luminol testing showed a single set of bloody footprints also leading from the bedroom to the front door. There was a great deal of the victims' blood in the bedroom. However, the blood trail to the door, and some other blood drops found at various places in the bedroom, did not come from any of the victims. A bloody palm print was on the west wall of the bedroom closet, and police found a bloody boot print with "Honchos" embossed on the sole. Despite a thorough investigation police found nobody who matched either the palm print or the blood drops. In 1995 samples of the blood drops were submitted for DNA testing, and those results were distributed nationally in 1996. In 1997, California penal authorities informed the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation (OSBI) that they had a person with that DNA profile. Subsequent tests confirmed that the blood trail, drops in the bedroom, and bloody palm print all belonged to Hooks. DNA from semen found in Roberts's mouth was also consistent with Hooks' DNA.

¶ 4 Hooks admitted he was at the house. He testified he went there during the evening of May 15th, and sometime close to or shortly after midnight on May 16th he was there smoking crack cocaine with all the victims. Hooks said he only knew the woman who rented the house, and could not remember any of the victims' names. He said he had "regular" sex with one woman and oral sex with another. During the night they ran out of crack and Hooks gave two of the women $30 to go buy more. After they returned and finished smoking, he ran out of drugs and money and left. Hooks said he got home—about a mile from the house— around 2:00 a.m. He decided to go back sometime after 4:00 a.m. On the way, he cut his left index finger falling off his bicycle while trying to fix the kick stand. When he got there the house was dark and the door was ajar. He pushed it open and entered cautiously, closing the door behind him, went to the bedroom and saw the bodies, and went back to the front door. He lifted the curtain and looked outside, then decided to go back in and check on the victims in case anyone was alive. He returned to the bedroom and determined each victim was dead. After he checked Evans's body he picked up a shirt and wrapped it around his cut finger. Hooks looked at the contents of the victims' purses on the west bed, then knelt and looked under the clothes in the closet. He then left the house, dropping the shirt by the front door, and closed the door. Hooks did not tell anyone what he had seen because he was afraid the authorities would revoke his California parole for being in a crack house. Two weeks later he left the area. In November he was arrested in Holdenville, Oklahoma, on a domestic complaint and returned to California.

ISSUES RELATING TO JURY SELECTION

¶ 5 In Proposition IX Hooks claims he was denied his right to a jury composed of a fair cross-section of the community through systematic under-representation of African-Americans from the jury panel. Out of a jury venire of 65 persons called to hear Hooks's case, four or five appeared to be African-American. Trial counsel objected to the racial makeup of the venire, and continued to object to the racial makeup of the panel throughout the case. Counsel made an oral motion to quash the panel at the end of the first day of voir dire. This was denied after some discussion on the record. The trial court noted that it had no control or influence over the racial makeup of the venire, which was summoned on a random selection basis using driver's license rolls.

¶ 6 The State first argues that Hooks waived this claim by failing to file a written motion to quash the panel. Oklahoma law requires a venire challenge to be in writing, specifying the facts which constitute the grounds for the challenge.³ Hooks argues counsel substantially complied with the intent behind the statute, since the trial court was alerted to the exact problem with the venire and a record was made which enables this Court to review the error. We agree both that the claim was waived under the law and that a sufficient record enables us to review Hooks's claim. In keeping with the heightened level of scrutiny required in capital cases, we have reviewed the claim and conclude Hooks has not shown error.

¶ 7 In order to prove he was denied a jury composed of a fair cross-section of the community Hooks must show: (1) the excluded group is distinctive in the community; (2) the group's representation in the jury pool is not fair and reasonable in relation to the number of people in the community; and (3) the under-representation is due to systematic exclusion in the jury selection process.⁴ Hooks presents a meticulous argument, using a variety of statistical models, to show that African-Americans were woefully under-represented on his venire. We need not adopt any of these statistical methods to resolve this issue. Assuming without deciding that Hooks has shown under-representation, he completely fails to show that this was caused by systematic exclusion in the selection process. This Court has found the Oklahoma jury selection method does not per se systematically exclude African-Americans.⁵ To overcome this, Hooks argues first that the degree of under-representation must indicate a systemic defect in either the method of selection or the assignment of jurors to individual courtrooms. We decline this suggestion that we assume systematic bias rather than requiring evidence of it. Hooks next argues systematic exclusion is proved by the Oklahoma County Court Clerk's failure to secure jurors who do not answer the summons to duty. He claims this ensures large identifiable classes of jurors are excluded, but offers nothing to suggest either that this is true or that those persons are African-American. He claims the Oklahoma County practice giving trial courts control of jury selection in individual cases constitutes a factor within the State's control giving rise to systematic exclusion. Again, Hooks offers nothing to prove this actually leads to exclusion beyond his claim that the statistical anomaly itself proves African-Americans must have been systematically excluded. The United States Supreme Court has found systematic exclusion where states explicitly excluded particular groups of people from jury service, or erected a racially non-neutral selection process.⁶ Hooks shows nothing similar. We have already upheld Oklahoma's statutory jury selection method and will not, without some proof, find it systematically excludes minorities on the strength of statistical disparity alone. This proposition is denied.

ISSUES RELATING TO FIRST STAGE PROCEEDINGS

¶ 8 In Proposition I Hooks claims the evidence was insufficient to convict him of first degree murder. The State's case against Hooks was built on strong circumstantial evidence.⁷ Circumstantial evidence must exclude every reasonable hypothesis other than guilt.⁸ We will accept all reasonable inferences and credibility choices which tend to support the jury's verdict.⁹ Taken together, the evidence presented at trial meets this standard. We disagree with Hooks's claim that his story raised a credible reasonable hypothesis of innocence. Circumstantial evidence connecting Hooks to the murders includes:

• Drops of Hooks's blood in the bedroom. Drops were found near some of the victims, on clothing and items under the west bed and underneath other items on that bed, and on the sleeve of a jacket which was underneath Evans's head when the bodies were discovered.

• Hooks's blood formed a trail of drops leading from the bedroom to the front door. Several drops were found in front of the door and on the jamb, and Hooks's blood was smeared on the inside surface of the front door's window curtain. These drops paralleled a single bloody trail of footprints leading from the bedroom out the front door.

• Hooks's palm print in blood was found in the bedroom closet where Adams was attacked.

• Semen consistent with Hooks was found in Roberts's mouth.

• Evidence suggested

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