Jordan v. State, 47917
| Decision Date | 13 March 1974 |
| Docket Number | No. 47917,47917 |
| Citation | 506 S.W.2d 217 |
| Parties | Dale Rupert JORDAN, Appellant, v. The STATE of Texas, Appellee. |
| Court | Texas Court of Criminal Appeals |
Robert B. Maloney, Dallas, for appellant.
Henry Wade, Dist. Atty., William J. Teitelbaum, Dallas, Jim D. Vollers, State's Atty. and Buddy Stevens, Asst. State's Atty., Austin, for the State.
REYNOLDS, Commissioner.
Appellant seeks reversal of his conviction for the offense of murder with malice punishment at life imprisonment. pnishment at life imprisonment.
For reversal, appellant relies on four grounds. The grounds are required to be considered in relation to the recorded events leading to the conviction.
The body of the deceased, Jane Coleen Peyatt, was discovered at the Lancaster city dump in Dallas County at about 10:45 A.M. on Saturday, August 15, 1970, underneath a cardboard box designed to contain, and bearing the stock or model number of, a Sears Roebuck and Company lawnmower. The body was clad in a brassiere and a short floral dress pulled up to expose the breasts. Under the body were a pair of yellow panties and yellow shorts. Near the body was a black Amway sales kit. The cause of death was a gunshot wound through the chest.
Mrs. Peyatt, twenty-one years of age, was last seen alive the previous Friday evening on Farnsworth Street in Dallas. At that time Mrs. Peyatt, with dark shoulder length hair and wearing a short floral dress, was walking from door to door carrying a black Amway sales kit. From information supplied by people who had talked with her, her movements were traced along Farnsworth Street toward Ledbetter Street, where her husband and two small children waited in an automobile, to 6140 Farnsworth Street, the residence of Mrs. Sandra Tilley.
Mrs. Tilley testified that she heard a knock on her door. By the time she disengaged herself from her household chores and reached the door, the caller, a young lady, with dark shoulder length hair and wearing, as Mrs. Tilley recalled, a skirt and blouse, and carrying a black kit similar to the one found with the body of the deceased, was walking away. Mrs. Tilley observed as the woman walked next door and then crossed the street to the house designated as 6139 Farnsworth Street and identified as the home of appellant. Mrs. Tilley watched as the woman knocked on the door, the door opened, and the woman entered. Before she returned to her household duties, Mrs. Tilley stood at her door for a few minutes, during which time she did not see the woman leave appellant's house. Although Mrs. Tilley could not otherwise identify the caller, she was home all day and no other saleslady came by that day.
Shortly thereafter, Mrs. Peyatt's husband instituted an unsuccessful search for his wife. He reported to the police that she was missing. A police canvass of the houses on Farnsworth Street beyond the appellant's house toward Ledbetter Street failed to reveal anyone who had seen Mrs. Peyatt.
Between 2:00 A.M. and 3:00 A.M. on Saturday morning, Richard Crabtree, in visiting the house next to the house of appellant's, looked toward appellant's house. He saw appellant's 1962 Chevrolet automobile with the turtle hull up parked next to the side door steps. A dim light inside appellant's house was showing through the partially open side door. An object was behind the car. Crabtree could not identify the object, but he stated that it could be consistent with being the lawnmower box that was found over the deceased's body.
On Saturday morning prior to discovery of the deceased's body, Patrolman John Thomas Boone of the Dallas Police Department, in response to the missing person complaint, began a door-to-door inquiry on Farnsworth Street. Arriving at 6139 Farnsworth Street and receiving no response to his knock, he started to leave and encountered the appellant walking along the side of the house. Appellant asked if he could help, or what he could do for, the officer. Officer Boone told appellant what he was doing, gave a description of Mrs. Peyatt, stated that she was selling Amway products door to door the previous evening, and asked appellant if he had seen anyone fitting that description.
Appellant, as Officer Boone recalled, '. . . stated that there had been a lady that came to the door and that he didn't know for sure what she was selling, but he had stated to her that he didn't want any and she left.' When appellant's counsel asked Officer Boone to relate the exact conversation, the officer testified that appellant
Following discovery of the body, Dallas Police Sergeant C. N. Dhority went to appellant's house on Saturday afternoon, but he found no one there. He returned on the following Sunday morning with Detective G. A. Thomason, and appellant was home. According to Sergeant Dhority, he identified himself and stated they were investigating a murder. Appellant invited the officers into the house. Sergeant Dhority told appellant of the circumstances of the case. He asked if the officers '. . . could look around the house.' Appellant replied, 'Yes, help yourself.' The officers made a brief survey of the house, observing the sheets on the bed and what appeared to be blood spots on the living room floor. Appellant was then arrested for the murder of the deceased.
Before leaving the house to take appellant to jail, appellant was informed that the officers would like to search the house further, to which appellant replied, 'Well, just leave it unlocked and open.' However, the officers requested appellant to, and upon departure he did, lock the house. Sergeant Dhority informed appellant, and appellant understood, that he did not have to give the officers the right to search and that he could refuse the search; nevertheless, appellant said he did not have anything to hide, 'to go ahead.' Additionally, appellant was told the officers wanted to look in both of appellant's cars. Appellant assented and gave the officers a key to one of the cars.
After appellant was placed in jail, Sergeant Dhority asked appellant if the officers could look into the two automobiles at appellant's house. Appellant replied, 'Yes.'
Early that Sunday afternoon, officers Dhority and Thomason, after obtaining a search warrant, went back to and searched appellant's premises with other officials. As a result of the search numerous items, including bedding, clothing, a damp mop, paint chips, floor scrapings, and a lawnmower for which appellant had exhibited a sales receipt showing its purchase from Sears Roebuck and Company, were seized. During the search, Sergeant Dhority noticed that the bumper of appellant's 1962...
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