People v. Andrews

Decision Date29 April 1965
Docket NumberCr. 3591
CourtCalifornia Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
PartiesThe PEOPLE of the State of California, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Charles Allen ANDREWS, Defendant and Appellant.

Willard Weddell, West Sacramento (court-appointed), for appellant.

Stanley Mosk and Thomas C. Lynch, Attys. Gen. by Doris H. Maier, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Raymond M. Momboisse, Deputy Atty. Gen., Sacramento, for respondent.

SPARKS, Justice pro tem.

In appealing from the judgment defendant raises three assignments of error: (1) that the corpus delicti of the offenses charged was not proven to a moral certainty and beyond a reasonable doubt; (2) that the constitutional rights of defendant were infringed by the submission of the case on the transcript of testimony taken at the preliminary examination; and (3) that his constitutional rights were violated when law enforcement officers were permitted to take oral statements from him in the absence of counsel. We have examined each of these specifications and have concluded that number (3) thereof has substantial merit and requires a reversal of the cause by reason of the holdings in People v. Dorado, 62 A.C. 350, 42 Cal.Rptr. 169, 398 P.2d 361, and People v. Stewart, 62 A.C. 597, 43 Cal.Rptr. 201, 400 P.2d 97. Since the case may be retried, we state our views also on assignments (1) and (2). To make clear our conclusions a history of the facts and circumstances surrounding the commission of the crimes leading to defendant's arrest and conviction will be related.

On December 24, 1962, a fire broke out on the rear porch of a two-story hotel and rooming house, frame construction, located at 699 El Camino Avenue, in North Sacramento. The porch contained some laundry trays, toilet, tub and a few articles of furniture and appliances. There was also a 5-gallon tin can used for disposal of papers, packages and other waste.

The fire was discovered by Owen J. McKeel, the owner of the premises. It was his custom at intervals during the night to make routine inspections of his hotel. He had been on the back porch about 2:30 or 3 a. m. and found everything normal. About an hour later, when he reached the doorway leading to the porch, he was driven back by flames. The fire department was called and responded promptly to the alarm. Through its efforts the fire was controlled and extinguished in approximately an hour. Louis Cassaglia, Chief of the North Sacramento Fire Department, attended the fire personally and later investigated its origin. He testified that there was no evidence of storage of inflammable liquids in the area, that the electrical wiring was encased in conduit, that a gas heater was properly vented, and that neither the electrical wiring nor the gas heater had had any bearing on the fire; that the weather on the particular morning was cold, foggy and misty. It was his opinion that the chances of the fire being spontaneously ignited would have been one in a thousand, 'if there was any chance at all.' Guy Donald Chapin, the chief building inspector of the city, also examined the premises after the fire. He testified that there was no indication that the fire was caused by defective wiring or improper gas vents or defective appliances of any sort.

The second fire occurred four days later on the premises of Mr. and Mrs. Heminger, at 591 Redwood Avenue, in North Sacramento, about 1 a. m. Mrs. Heminger had gone into the kitchen for a drink of water. Looking out the rear window she discovered that the garage was on fire. She awakened her husband. When he went outside the whole garage was on fire, and the firemen were already there. The garage was detached from the house. In it were stored miscellaneous articles of household furniture, garden tools, firewood and boxes of paper. There was no gasoline, kerosene, or anything of that nature in the garage. An electric light was operated by a switch. There were no gas appliances. A driveway from the street led to the garage which was located to the rear of the dwelling house. The garage doors were customarily left unlocked and one of them was left ajar.

Fire Chief Cassaglia, who also attended this fire, found the entire roof area and rear wall engulfed in flames when he arrived. He testified that the origin of the fire had to be in the rear of the building, and that there was no wiring in that end. He also testified: '[T] here is a fire I would personally discount as being able to start spontaneously. The materials that I found there and in analyzing the stored materials, nothing would lend itself towards spontaneous ignition.' At that early morning hour the weather was cold, damp and very foggy. The chief building inspector was also called to examine the premises after the fire and could find no indication that the fire was caused by defective wiring or appliances of any sort.

The third fire charged against defendant was on the front porch of a dwelling occupied by Thomas J. McCallister, at 545 Eleanor Street, in North Sacramento. Like the preceding ones, this fire occurred in the early morning hours, around 3 or 3:30 a. m. The date was January 7, 1963, and the weather was cold, damp and foggy. When Mr. McCallister discovered the fire at one end of the front porch, the flames were shooting up the front wall of his home. He called the fire department and then attempted to halt the spread of flame by using a garden hose. At the time he smelled something like paraffin burning. The firemen arrived in about 10 minutes and proceeded to extinguish the blaze. There had been a couch on the porch with two folded rugs on top and a polyethylene cover to keep off the rain. The couch had been pretty badly consumed by the fire, and the rugs were also burned on one end. The porch light and wiring were on the other end of the porch and were not involved in the fire. There was no gasoline, kerosene or other fuel on the porch. Warren Jones, the assistant fire chief, who investigated the fire and damage caused by it, found that it had originated at the extreme end of the porch where there was the greater charring or 'alligatoring' of the wall. The porch floor had been completely burned through at that point. He testified that there was no gas line or electric wiring involved, and that there was no chance of the fire having been caused by spontaneous combustion. Again, the chief building inspector was called to examine the premises and could find no cause of fire attributable to defective wiring or appliances.

Two days subsequent to the last fire, that is, on January 9, 1963, the defendant, at the Sacramento County Jail, in an interview with Bill Deasy, an investigator employed by the Sacramento District Attorney's office, and John Riggs, a state parole agent, admitted that he had set all three of the fires. When asked for his reason, he said that 'he builds up a lot of animosity towards people and that to relieve this animosity, it would be the same as somebody punching somebody in the face or kicking a dog.' A second confession, substantially the same as the first, although in somewhat more detail, was taken from the defendant on January 14, 1963, in the statement room of the district attorney's office.

From this background of undisputed fact, we will consider first the challenged insufficiency of the evidence to establish the corpus delicti of the crimes charged. Appellant argues that in order to prove the corpus delicti of arson, the burden was on the prosecution to negate all possible ways in which the fires could have been started other than by incendiary means. Although appellant concedes that the evidence did rule out three types of nonincendiary blazes, that is, spontaneous fires, electrical fires and those resulting from defective gas appliances, he nevertheless contends that there could have been other possible causes of the fires in question, such as mice igniting matches, a carelessly dropped cigarette, sparks from automobiles (exhaust), etc.

The proposition that it was incumbent on the prosecution to rule out all possible or imaginary causes of the fires cannot be upheld. It is well established that the corpus delicti of a crime is sufficiently proved if the elements of the offense as defined by statute are shown to exist. (People v. Clagg, 197 Cal.App.2d 209, 212, 17 Cal.Rptr. 60; People v. Sherman, 97 Cal.App.2d 245, 249, 217 P.2d 715; People v. Hays, 101 Cal.App.2d 305, 311, 225 P.2d 600.) When the requisite elements of the crime are established with sufficiently convincing proof, the corpus delicti is complete although the perpetrator may be unnamed. (People v. Cullen, 37 Cal.2d 614, 624, 234 P.2d 1; People v. Amaya, 40 Cal.2d 70, 76, 251 P.2d 324.) In California the corpus delicti of a crime may be proved by circumstantial evidence and by the reasonable inferences which may be drawn therefrom. (People v. Ives, 17 Cal.2d 459, 463, 110 P.2d 408; People v. DuBois, 16 Cal.App.2d 81, 86, 60 P.2d 190; People v. Black, 103 Cal.App.2d 69, 74, 229 P.2d 61; People v. Mercer, 103 Cal.App.2d 462, 465, 229 P.2d 411; People v. Westfall, 198 Cal.App.2d 598, 601, 18 Cal.Rptr. 356.) This rule applies to arson cases (People v. Cape, 79 Cal.App.2d 284, 289, 179 P.2d 426; People v. Andrews, 222 Cal.App.2d 242, 35 Cal.Rptr. 118; People v. Clagg, supra), and there is, of course, no distinction in the quantum of proof required between direct and circumstantial evidence, so long as the reasonable doubt requirement is satisfied. (People v. Kennedy, 101 Cal.App.2d 709, 226 P.2d 359; People v. Hubler, 102 Cal.App.2d 689, 228 P.2d 37.)

It is true that the statutory definition of arson (Pen.Code, sec. 447a) 1 requires that the act of setting fire to or burning be done maliciously. The word 'malice' imports 'a wish to vex, annoy, or injure another person, or an intent to do a wrongful act, * * *.' (Pen.Code, sec. 7, subd. 4.) When related to the crime of arson, the...

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