People v. Badgett
| Decision Date | 12 May 1994 |
| Docket Number | No. H008300,H008300 |
| Citation | 30 Cal.Rptr.2d 152,24 Cal.App.4th 1590 |
| Court | California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
| Parties | Previously published at 24 Cal.App.4th 1590, 29 Cal.App.4th 1175, 34 Cal.App.4th 903 24 Cal.App.4th 1590, 29 Cal.App.4th 1175, 34 Cal.App.4th 903 The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Lance Christopher BADGETT, et al., Defendants and Appellants. |
David D. Carico, Carmel (Under Appointment by the Court of Appeal), Lynda A. Romero, San Diego (Under Appointment by the Court of Appeal), for defendants and appellants.
Daniel E. Lungren, Atty. Gen., George Williamson, Chief Asst. Atty. Gen., Ronald A. Bass, Sr. Asst. Atty. Gen., Ronald S. Matthias and Herbert F. Wilkinson, Deputy Attys. Gen., for plaintiff and respondent.
Appellants are brothers who were found guilty of first degree murder (Pen.Code, § 187) and conspiracy to commit murder (Pen.Code, § 182). Both were sentenced to 25 years to life in state prison. On appeal they contend that the trial court committed prejudicial error when it refused to allow a hearing on the question of the voluntariness of the main prosecution witness's statements to the police, and that the confidential marital communications privilege applied to this witness's testimony concerning statements made by appellant Christopher Badgett. They further contend that the court should have granted a motion to strike this witness's testimony due to a coercive immunity agreement; that the court erred in refusing to read an instruction that her testimony must be viewed with caution because she was granted immunity; that the prosecution's intimidating conduct toward this witness violated appellants' right to a fair trial; that the court erred in denying appellants' motion to suppress; that the court committed various instructional errors; that the court erred in admitting "other crimes" evidence; that the court committed Aranda-Bruton error in allowing the admission of out-of-court statements by a non-testifying co-defendant implicating the other; and that the trial court failed to instruct the jury to start deliberations anew when a juror was substituted after deliberations had commenced. We reverse. 1
One afternoon in February 1989, a human head was found on a beach in Santa Cruz County. The head had a bullet wound near the right temple. The following day a foot was found and the next day a second foot and both hands were recovered. A few days later the body was found down a steep incline near a dirt turnout from Highway 9.
In late May of 1989, the dead man was identified from fingerprints. Using his application for a security guard position and Department of Motor Vehicles information, the police learned that the man's driver's license was issued sequentially with three others. One of these people was his reference for the security guard position. All four lived at the same address. Soon, the police identified the dead man as Michael Palmer from Devine, Texas. Palmer's reference was identified as appellant John Badgett and the other two in the household as John's brother, appellant Christopher Badgett, and Henrietta (Retta) Jasik, all also from Devine. All three were arrested. 2
Retta Jasik was fourteen years old when she met appellant Chris Badgett. She was a freshman in high school and he was a sophomore. They dated one another exclusively. When she started dating appellant, she was a cheerleader and a good student. Her parents disapproved of the relationship. Chris had a reputation for getting into trouble and having a bad temper. Despite her parents' disapproval, Jasik continued her relationship with Chris to the detriment of her cheerleading and studies. When Chris moved to California late in 1987, Jasik stole her parents' car and met him. Eventually, the two were arrested and sent back to Texas.
During this time, the Badgett brothers were on probation and required to take blood tests. Chris smoked marijuana before one such test and then told Jasik that they needed to go to California because he would fail his drug test. Chris warned his brother John not to bother taking his test, because he, too, would fail. When they told their friend Michael Palmer they were going to California, he came along. He was having marital and tax problems. Before leaving, they all agreed that once they went to California, nobody could return to Texas. Jasik called her parents and told them she would call them from Sunnyvale.
John, Chris, Jasik and Palmer moved in with Chris and John's sister Theresa Badgett and her boyfriend Joe Albano. They all lived in Albano's small one bedroom, one bath condominium in Santa Clara. The four then selected names from obituary notices, obtained birth certificates in those names, and applied for California driver's licenses. Jasik secured a job cashiering at McDonald's and the three men began work as security guards at American Protective Services.
One Saturday night in February, Jasik went out on the balcony of the condominium with Chris and had the first in a series of conversations which were to become the subject of substantial litigation during this prosecution. Chris brought up the subject of Palmer wanting to return home. Palmer had not said anything that evening about wanting to go home but had mentioned a few times before that he missed his wife and wanted to return to Texas. Chris told Jasik that he wasn't sure if he "should off him or not" or "if his brother would go along with it." Jasik thought Chris was just in one of his moods.
About half an hour later, Jasik, John, Theresa Badgett and Joe Albano went out on the balcony together. John said that, since Palmer had talked so much about returning to Texas, they were going to send him back there on a bus. Theresa called for bus departure times and gave John a Versateller card so he could borrow money for the ticket. Chris told everyone not to tell Palmer so they could surprise him. Someone told Palmer they were going to a party. Palmer called his job to get the night off. Jasik told Palmer, at Chris's request, that because she had to work the next day, she would not be going along. Chris, John and Palmer left around 11 p.m. Chris and John returned around 4 a.m. Chris told Jasik that Palmer was on a bus back to Texas and would call in three days.
A day or so later, Chris told Jasik that he and John had driven Palmer up into the mountains and then stopped to smoke cigarettes. Palmer made some remarks about Retta and said he was glad she hadn't come with them. Chris didn't care for these comments. When Palmer bent over to pick up the lighter he dropped, Chris shot him. Palmer rolled down the hillside and stopped at the base of a tree. There, while Chris held a flashlight, John dismembered Palmer and put the parts in a plastic bag Chris had placed in the car before they left. They took the bag down the road and threw the parts into the ocean.
Soon afterwards, Jasik, Chris and John moved out of the condominium into a motel. Chris said they had to get rid of the gun used to shoot Palmer so John and Jasik drove to San Francisco and John threw it off the Golden Gate Bridge.
By May of 1989, the three were living in an apartment in Sunnyvale. One day, when Chris failed to pick Jasik up from work, she called the apartment and was told by a police officer to return home. When she got to the apartment, Jasik was arrested for having a false ID (a charge which later formed the basis of a juvenile court petition). She told the investigator from the Santa Cruz District Attorney's Office that she did not believe Palmer was dead because he had been sent back to Texas on a bus. The circumstances and admissibility of her subsequent statements to the police, and her testimony consistent with them, give rise to several issues in this appeal.
Appellants contend the trial court committed prejudicial error when it refused to allow a hearing on the question of the voluntariness of Retta Jasik's statements to the police. Appellants also contend that the "prosecution's repeated threats and intimidation directed toward witness Retta Jasik so tainted her testimony as to deprive appellant[s] of [their] fundamental constitutional rights to due process and a fair trial." At the preliminary examination, the defense moved for the exclusion of statements made by Jasik to the police and investigators on the basis the statements were involuntarily made. The defense also argued that her testimony should be excluded as the fruit of the coerced statements.
The court denied a defense request for a hearing on this issue and, during cross-examination of Jasik, ruled that the defense did not have standing to challenge the voluntariness of her statements to the police. The defense complained about the court's denial of a hearing on the voluntariness issue in a Penal Code section 995 motion. At a hearing on the motion, the defense again asked for a hearing on the issue. The court again stated that the defense lacked standing on the voluntariness issue and denied the motion. A Petition for a Writ of Mandate before this court and a Petition for Review in the California Supreme Court were summarily denied.
In superior court, appellants made a motion to exclude as involuntary the statements made to the police and Jasik's testimony. The court responded, "I've already ruled on that in regard to the motions brought pursuant to Penal Code section 995, and I do not at this time intend to rule otherwise, that is, that your clients do not have standing to challenge the voluntariness of those statements in the sense of an exclusionary rule."
The court allowed the defense to make an offer of proof. Although counsel's response is lengthy, it is compelling as presented and we will quote it almost in its entirety rather than diluting it by paraphrasing. To support his request for a hearing on...
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People v. Badgett
...to exclude the assertedly coerced testimony of the prime prosecution witness. We reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal. 34 Cal.App.4th 903, 30 Cal.Rptr.2d 152. Although defendants had standing under due process principles to complain of the admission of coerced trial testimony of a th......
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People v. Badgett
...v. Lance Christopher BADGETT et al., Appellants. S040500. Supreme Court of California, In Bank. Aug. 11, 1994. Prior report: Cal.App., 30 Cal.Rptr.2d 152. Respondent's petition for review LUCAS, C.J., and BAXTER, GEORGE and WERDEGAR, JJ., concur. ...