Knott v. Howard, Civ. A. No. 5170.

• Decision Date: 22 July 1974
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 5170.
• Citation: 378 F. Supp. 1325
• Parties: Thomas R. KNOTT, Jr. v. Francis A. HOWARD, Warden.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Rhode Island

378 F. Supp. 1325

Thomas R. KNOTT, Jr. v. Francis A. HOWARD, Warden.

Civ. A. No. 5170.

United States District Court, D. Rhode Island.

July 22, 1974.

Thomas R. Knott, pro se.

Richard J. Israel, Atty. Gen., Donald J. Ryan, Asst. Atty. Gen., Providence, R. I., for respondent.

OPINION

DAY, District Judge.

This is a petition for a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to the provisions of 28 U.S.C. § 2241 et seq. The petitioner is now serving a life sentence in the Rhode Island Adult Correctional Institutions, in Cranston, Rhode Island, and is in the custody of Warden James Mullen, successor to the respondent. Said life sentence was imposed on the petitioner by the Superior Court of the State of Rhode Island, on April 15, 1970, following his conviction for murder in the first degree by a jury. He seeks to be released from the alleged unlawful custody to which he was committed after the imposition of said life sentence, or, in the alternative, an order for a new trial. The petitioner has filed his application for the Writ pro se.

In his petition, petitioner alleges that he is now actually imprisoned, restrained of his liberty, and detained under color of the authority of the State of Rhode Island, in the custody of the Warden of the Rhode Island Correctional Institututions; that this imprisonment is under the claim and authority of a judgment of the Superior Court, State of Rhode Island, in Indictment No. 31716, rendered on the 15th day of April, 1970; that this judgment of the Superior Court was entered after a jury returned a verdict of guilty to the charge of first degree murder. The petitioner further alleges that said imprisonment is illegal and in violation of his rights secured by the Constitution of the United States in that confessions obtained from him admitting the murder for which he was tried and convicted were admitted into evidence against him in violation of his Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights against self-incrimination, his Fourteenth Amendment right to due process of law, and his Sixth Amendment right to the assistance of counsel. Still further, the petitioner alleges that the confessions so obtained and admitted in evidence were obtained in a manner contrary to that required by the Constitution as indicated by the United States Supreme Court in Escobedo v. Illinois; that these confessions were obtained as derivative fruits of prior illegal interrogations; and that said confessions were so obtained at a time when he was not mentally competent to volunteer a knowing, intelligent, meaningful and trustworthy statement. Finally, the petitioner alleges that he has raised the claims contained in the instant petition in a bill of exceptions to the Rhode Island Supreme Court following the Superior Court judgment of April 15, 1970, and that these claims were decided unfavorably to petitioner by the Supreme Court in its opinion of March 22, 1973; and that he has made no previous application for the Writ sought in the instant petition.

The petitioner alleges the following facts in support of his legal claims, supra: (A) As to his Escobedo claim, that the confessions were admitted in evidence in April, 1970, after the date on which Escobedo became effective; that he was arrested by Pawtucket, R. I. and Attleboro, Mass. police on January 26, 1963, in connection with said murder as a prime suspect; that during his detention following this arrest, petitioner was questioned by the police concerning said murder, but at no time during this detention was he given the Escobedo warnings; that during his detention he made four confessions; two were made to the police at the Pawtucket, R. I. police headquarters, one was made to an officer of the East Providence, R. I. police at the State Police barracks in Scituate, R. I., and one was made before the petitioner's mother while petitioner was still in police custody at the Rhode Island Family Court, Providence, R. I. Continuing his factual allegations, petitioner asserts that the first two confessions having been found constitutionally inadmissible, the third and fourth confessions were admitted in evidence against the petitioner in the trial which led to his conviction. He claims that these last confessions were not spontaneous, but elicited from him as the result of questioning and prompting, and as such, were made under circumstances requiring the Escobedo warnings.

In regard to his derivative fruits claim, the plaintiff asserts the following facts: that following a jury verdict of guilty and a judgment against the petitioner by the Superior Court of the State of Rhode Island, entered on March 2, 1966, in a previous trial for the instant murder, he prosecuted a bill of exceptions to the Supreme Court of Rhode Island, alleging the unconstitutionality of all four of his confessions which had been admitted in evidence against him; that the Rhode Island Supreme Court sustained his exceptions to the first two confessions (given at Pawtucket), but "did not pass" on the other two (those given in Scituate and at the Family Court); that these latter confessions were obtained during the same detention as the former, without benefit of any Escobedo warnings, under conditions which, from petitioner's point of view as a police detainee, were "even more intimidating" than those under which the first two statements were obtained; and finally, that the "emotional effect" of having given the first two statements carried over and created a situation favorable to the police in its tendency to prompt further statements.

As to his mental competency claim, the petitioner alleges the following facts: that he "had been in a catatonic state" for approximately five hours prior to his alleged confession at the Scituate State Police barracks; that there was testimony at his trial indicating that he was observed hallucinating on the day following his alleged making of the Scituate statement; and that on March 19, 1963, shortly after the time of the confessions at issue, petitioner was "declared mentally ill, classified `schizophrenic' and admitted to the Criminally Insane Ward at the Rhode Island Medical Center in Cranston, R. I.

In addition to his petition, the petitioner also has submitted to the Court an extensive memorandum of law, with an Appendix containing the entire testimony of a psychiatrist called as a witness at an earlier hearing, the opinion of the Rhode Island Supreme Court following petitioner's first trial for the murder involved herein (March 2, 1966), the ruling of the Rhode Island Superior Court on petitioner's motion to suppress prior to the second trial, the opinion of the Rhode Island Supreme Court as to petitioner's bill of exceptions filed following his second trial (March 22, 1973), and an affidavit and articles purported to support petitioner's claim that the confessions admitted into evidence were involuntary and obtained in violation of his constitutional rights.

In his answer the respondent admits that the petitioner is in his custody by virtue of a judgment of conviction in the Superior Court of Rhode Island on Indictment No. 31716, following a jury verdict of guilty to the charge of first degree murder. The respondent denies that the restraint of the petitioner is illegal, and that the admission of the confessions into evidence at the petitioner's trial violated his constitutional rights. The respondent asserts that these constitutional claims were decided adversely to the petitioner in the Rhode Island Superior Court in a motion to suppress hearing, and by the Rhode Island Supreme Court in State of Rhode Island v. Knott, 302 A.2d 64 (1973) hereinafter Knott II. The respondent admits that petitioner has made no previous application for a Writ of Habeas Corpus. Answering petitioner's factual allegations, respondent asserts that the two confessions admitted into evidence were made without interrogation, and were found to be spontaneous by the Rhode Island Superior and Supreme Courts; that the interrogation occurred on January 26, 1963, before the Escobedo opinion had been rendered and therefore no Escobedo warnings were given; and further denies that the conditions under which the last two confessions were obtained were more intimidating than those under which the first were obtained, or that the first two statements carried over and created a situation favorable to the police in their tendency to prompt further statements. Finally, the respondent specifically denies that the petitioner was in a "catatonic" state for the five hours prior to his making the alleged statement at Scituate, and respondent further asserts that he will rely on the proof contained in the trial record as to petitioner's mental competency claim.

The full transcript of the proceedings relating to the said Indictment No. 31716 has been submitted to this Court, which includes the transcript of the hearing on said motion to suppress, and of the retrial itself. The Court has also received and considered the State's brief submitted to the Rhode Island Supreme Court in the matter of petitioner's Bill of Exceptions, Knott II supra.

FACTS

The facts and travel of this case as revealed in the record are as follows: On December 22, 1961, Nancy Ann Frenier, of Pawtucket, Rhode Island, was reported to the police as missing, and the police later located an automobile which she was purported to have been driving, in East Providence, Rhode Island. On March 19, 1962, the mutilated body of Nancy Ann Frenier was found in the waters of the East Providence reservoir adjacent to the location of the car found earlier by the police.

The petitioner was a prime suspect in the Frenier murder from the time of its discovery, and was questioned in connection with the East Providence and Rhode Island State Police investigation into said murder on two occasions prior to the arrest which ultimately culminated in the conviction challenged herein. These prior interrogations of petitioner regarding his...