Parker v. State
| Decision Date | 15 June 1987 |
| Docket Number | No. CR,CR |
| Citation | 292 Ark. 421,731 S.W.2d 756 |
| Parties | William Frank PARKER, Appellant, v. STATE of Arkansas, Appellee. 86-91. |
| Court | Arkansas Supreme Court |
W.H. Taylor, Fayetteville, James G. Lingle, Rogers, for appellant.
Steve Clark, Atty. Gen. by Jack Gillean, Asst. Atty. Gen., Little Rock, for appellee.
William Frank Parker was convicted of two counts of capital felony murder for which he was sentenced to death; two counts of attempted first degree murder (thirty years imprisonment and $15,000 fine for each); two counts of burglary (twenty years imprisonment and $15,000 fine for each); kidnapping (life imprisonment and $15,000); and attempted capital murder (thirty years imprisonment and $15,000). Parker's capital felony murder convictions were for causing the deaths of James and Sandra Warren in the course of and in furtherance of a burglary. The burglary, as proved by the state, was the entry of the Warrens' home for the purpose of committing therein the murders of the Warrens. The capital felony murder convictions must be reversed because the Warrens' deaths were not caused "in the course of and in furtherance of" a burglary as required by Ark.Stat.Ann. § 41-1501(1)(a) (Repl.1977), and because the trial court erred in submitting evidence under Ark.Stat.Ann. § 41-1303(3) (Repl.1977) regarding previously committed felonies as an aggravating circumstance at the penalty phase of the appellant's trial. Parker's remaining arguments contain no reversible error, thus we affirm each of his other convictions.
The relevant facts are basically undisputed as Parker's primary defenses at trial related to his mental capacity at the time of the events. Parker was divorced from Pam Warren. Pam's father, James Warren and her sister, Cindy Warren, were getting into Mr. Warren's truck in front of their house on November 5, 1984, when they saw Parker approaching the truck with a gun. Cindy got on the floor of the truck, from where she heard shots being fired. Cindy then got out of the truck and attempted to spray mace into Parker's face. Parker fired one or two shots at Cindy, not hitting her, and then chased Mr. Warren into the house. Mr. Warren and his wife Sandra were later found in the house where they had been shot to death by Parker. In the events that followed that same day, Parker kidnapped and shot his ex-wife, Pam Warren, and shot a police officer three times in a shootout at the Rogers Police Department.
Parker maintains the trial court erred in not directing a verdict in his favor on the capital murder charges for killing the Warrens. Parker was charged under Ark.Stat.Ann. § 41-1501(1)(a), which provides:
A person commits capital murder if: ... he attempts to commit rape, kidnapping, arson, vehicular piracy, robbery, burglary, or escape in the first degree, and in the course of and in furtherance of the felony, or in immediate flight therefrom, he or an accomplice causes the death of any person under circumstances manifesting extreme indifference to the value of human life; ... (emphasis added)
An analysis of this statute leads us to the conclusion that it cannot be read to encompass the facts of this case. The state's proof showed that Parker followed Mr. Warren into the house for only one purpose--to commit the murders of the Warrens. The entry was a burglary because Parker unlawfully entered an occupiable structure with the intent to commit those punishable offenses. Ark.Stat.Ann. § 41-2002 (Repl.1977). The killings were obviously a form of criminal homicide of some degree, but they were not "in the course of and in furtherance of" the burglary as required to be capital felony murder. Parker could have been charged under subsection (1)(c) of § 41-1501 for causing the death of two or more persons in the course of the same criminal episode. Instead, the prosecutor elected to proceed under subsection (1)(a), which was wrong. We must reverse.
Relying on Blango v. United States, 373 A.2d 885 (D.C.1977), the state argues that the societal interests served by the burglary statute justify its use to support capital felony murder. In that case, Blango committed burglary by entering an "occupied dwelling" with the intent to commit assault on the victim. The court reasoned that the burglary violated the "societal interest in protecting occupied dwellings due not only to the inherent danger to occupants during the commission of such an offense, but also to the value society places on the home." The D.C. court stated that the crime was complete upon entry, "and is a separate and distinct act from the succeeding killing, yet may be deemed to be a continuing offense for purposes of the felony murder statute." Blango reasoned that the felony murder statute has the distinct societal interest of protecting the security of the person and the value of human life by punishing nonpurposeful killings by implying premeditation and deliberation from the commission of the burglary. Blango quoted People v. Miller, 32 N.Y.2d 157, 297 N.E.2d 85, 344 N.Y.S.2d 342 (1973) in support of its rationale:
It should be apparent that the Legislature, in including burglary as one of the enumerated felonies as a basis for felony murder, recognized that persons within domiciles are in greater peril from those entering the domicile with criminal intent, than persons on the street who are being subjected to the same criminal intent. Thus, the burglary statutes prescribe greater punishment for a criminal act committed within the domicile than for the same act committed on the street. Where, as here, the criminal act underlying the burglary is an assault with a dangerous weapon, the likelihood that the assault will culminate in a homicide is significantly increased by the situs of the assault.
Unlike the case before us, in Miller the defendant was convicted of murdering a person who came to the aid of the first victim, whose home the defendant had entered to commit the assault. Blango and Miller's distinction between whether a murder is committed in an occupied dwelling as opposed to outdoors may or may not be a valid reason for making it unnecessary to prove the intent ordinarily required for a capital or first degree murder conviction under the applicable statutes in those cases. However, when viewing the language of our own statutes such a distinction does not exist. For the phrase "in the course of and in furtherance of the felony" to have any meaning, the burglary must have an independent objective which the murder facilitates. In this instance, the burglary and murder have the same objective. That objective, the intent to kill, is what makes the underlying act of entry into the home a burglary. The burglary was actually no more than one step toward the commission of the murder and was not to facilitate the murder.
Simply put, the state has not advanced any convincing argument as to how the murder committed after the burglary could be in the course of and in furtherance of the burglary, both of which are elements required by our statutes. "If we can, we give legislation a construction to affect legislative intent ... However, this is a criminal statute which must be strictly construed with doubt being resolved in favor of the accused." Knapp v. State, 283 Ark. 346, 676 S.W.2d 729 (1984). In strictly construing our statutes, as we must do, it is apparent that in order to constitute capital felony murder, the murder must be in the course of, and in furtherance of the burglary, which is not the case before us.
Appellant argues that the trial court erred in submitting an instruction on previously committed felonies under § 41-1303(3) as an aggravating circumstance at the penalty phase of his trial. His argument is that there was no evidence that Parker "previously" committed another felony, other than shooting at Cindy Warren, which was contemporaneous with the killings of James and Sandra Warren. We must agree.
Section 41-1303(3) provides as follows:
Aggravating Circumstances--Aggravating circumstances shall be limited to the following:
* * *
(3) the person previously committed another felony, an element of which was the use or threat of violence to another person or created a substantial risk of death or serious physical injury to another person.
In Hill v. State, 289 Ark. 387, 713 S.W.2d 233 (1986), this court addressed the question of what is meant by a previously committed offense under this statute. In Hill we explained that the reason for section (3) is to allow the state to show that the defendant has a character for violent crimes or a history of committing such crimes. Since there are other avenues by which the state can prove crimes immediately connected with the principal crime, our conclusion was that this section applies to crimes not connected in time or place to the killing for which the defendant has just been convicted. In this instance, the shooting at Cindy Warren was so closely connected in both time and place that it did not present a portrait of the defendant as having previously demonstrated a character for violent crimes or a history for committing such crimes.
Because the trial court erred in submitting this case under our felony murder statute, and in instructing the jury on previously committed felonies, we reverse.
We find no merit in the issues raised by Parker for reversal of the other convictions. In addition to those issues, we will address the questions which may arise on retrial of the capital murder charges.
Parker argues that the trial court should have granted his motion for a continuance so that he could be reevaluated by the state hospital in support of his insanity defense. The trial court granted Parker's first request for a thirty-day commitment to the state hospital for a mental examination on November 15, 1984. The report from the state hospital,...
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