People v. Boysen
| Decision Date | 03 July 2007 |
| Docket Number | No. D046763.,D046763. |
| Citation | 62 Cal.Rptr.3d 350,152 Cal.App.4th 1409 |
| Court | California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
| Parties | The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. David Andrew BOYSEN, Defendant and Respondent. |
Bonnie M. Dumanis, District Attorney, Kim-Thoa Hoang, Catherine Stephenson, Craig E. Fisher and James E. Atkins, Deputy District Attorneys, for Plaintiff and Appellant.
Daniel G. Davis, Sacramento, Dennis A. Fisher, Santa Monica, and Steven Graff Levine, for Defendant and Respondent.
In 1980 Elsie Boysen (Elsie) and her husband Robert Boysen (Robert) were murdered. In May 2004 their son, defendant David Andrew Boysen (David), was charged with the crimes. David sought and the trial court granted dismissal based on preaccusation delay. The People appeal, arguing the trial court applied an incorrect legal standard. They further contend that in any event there was insufficient evidence to support the trial court's decision, and the court abused its discretion in not reserving a decision on the motion until after trial.
We affirm. We conclude the trial court applied the correct legal standard which required it balance the actual prejudice to David against the prosecution's justification for the delay. We further conclude there was substantial evidence that the nearly 24-year delay in filing this case caused David significant prejudice and there exists no reasonable justification for that delay. Moreover, the court did not abuse its discretion in dismissing the case rather than proceeding with trial.
On Easter Sunday, April 6, 1980, Elsie and Robert left evening church services in La Jolla at approximately 9:30 p.m. to return to their Oceanside home. When Elsie did not appear at work the next morning, her coworkers asked neighbors William Borden and Gene Borden (together, the Bordens) to investigate. The Bordens knocked on Elsie and Robert's door but got no answer. They found all the doors and windows to the house locked except the window to the master bathroom at the rear of the residence. Gene Borden entered through that window and discovered Elsie and Robert's dead bodies in the house. Gene Borden left the house through the master bathroom window and called the police.
Oceanside Police Sergeant Robert Krause entered the victims' home by way of the open master bathroom window. In a hallway off the master bedroom he found the body of Elsie, and about 20 feet farther down the hall he found the body of Robert. Elsie was shot in the head with a 9mm semi-automatic handgun and was bludgeoned. Robert was shot twice in the head with a 9mm handgun.
Officers determined the door locks in the house were double keyed, i.e., a key was required to unlock the door from both the inside and the outside. There were no signs of a forced entry. There were no signs the house was ransacked but the cords for all the telephones were pulled from the walls. Expended and unexpended 9mm cartridges were found around the bodies but no 9mm pistol was found.
David and his wife Linda Boysen (Linda) lived approximately 10 miles from his parents' house. On the morning of the discovery of the victims' bodies, the police contacted David and Linda and asked them to come to David's parents' house. After Linda identified the bodies, the two went to the Bordens' home across the street where the police questioned them. David told the police he and his wife were at their condominium the night of the murder. Linda agreed. David and Linda went through David's parents' house and told the police the only items missing were a 9mm handgun kept in a paper bag on a closet shelf in the master bedroom and their will.
The police contacted neighbors, including Marge Naples. Naples told the officers she believed that on the night of the murders, while she was sitting in her kitchen, she heard one gunshot at about 11:00 p.m. She later stated the time might have been 11:30 p.m. or 12:00 a.m. She then wrote the police a letter stating that after talking to her husband she believed she heard the shot at 11:15 p.m.
Gene Borden told the police she heard a small automobile engine at about 11:30 p.m. the night of the murders.
Six fingerprints were taken from the master bathroom wall below the window, one print was taken from the master bedroom windowsill, and two prints were taken from the doorway of the master bedroom. In April 1980 a police fingerprint examiner compared the fingerprints taken at the crime scene with those of the victims and Sergeant Krause. He concluded that the prints found on the doorway of the master bedroom were those of Robert. He was unable to match any of the remaining prints.
In September 1981 the same examiner compared the prints taken at the crime scene to those of Elsie, Robert, David and Linda. He was unable to match any of the prints.
The police were aware of and investigated several possible suspects to the murder, including David Hobbs. David and Linda told the police that Hobbs was a possible suspect because he was involved in an altercation with Elaine Jarvis, an employee of Robert's Christian bookstore, and he was bitter. The police apparently concluded in 1980 that Hobbs was not involved in the killing but there is no indication why they so concluded.
In April 1980 the police received a tip from Melodie Rousseau that Richard Hagarman, a friend of her sister, had bragged about being involved in or knew who committed the murders of Elsie and Robert. Rousseau stated that Hagarman might have made the statement to appear important. A detective talked to Rousseau and her sister. They told the officers that Hagarman stated he had spoken with a man who claimed to have killed Elsie and Robert. The police tried to find Hagarman without success.
Friends of the victims believed they might have been killed by Mexican drug traffickers. Elsie and Robert were involved in Christian missionary work in Mexico and went there frequently in their truck to deliver supplies. It was speculated that drugs might have been placed in the truck by traffickers without the victims' knowledge. The truck was in for repair and was not at the victims' home the night of the murders, and some believed traffickers might have killed Elsie and Robert when they refused to tell them its location.
The drug traffickers theory was investigated by the police. Border crossing records showed several crossings by the victims' truck in 1979 but no crossings in 1980. There was evidence, however, that the victims were in Mexico in January 1980.
At the time of the investigation in 1980 and 1981, the police were aware that David was having serious financial problems.
By the end of 1981 David was the focus of the investigation into his parents' murders.
In 1982, after items linked to the victims were found in a dumpster in Rancho Bernardo, the police contacted Linda, who was now separated from but still married to David. In August 1982 the police conducted a lengthy interview of Linda. Contrary to her earlier statement that she and David were home together the night of the murders, she told officers she last saw David at about 6:00 p.m. that evening. At that time David was wearing his favorite clothes, overalls, a particular T-shirt and brown tennis shoes. She did not see him again that evening until he arrived home at 10:30 p.m. When he arrived home, he was no longer wearing the clothes he had left in but was wearing a bathing suit. Linda never saw the overalls, T-shirt or shoes again. She additionally related a series of observations of and communications with David that tended to incriminate him in the murder of his parents.
Linda explained to the officers that about two weeks before the murders David learned that his parents had changed their will to leave their estate not to David and his sister but to their church. This made David very angry. The will was never found. At the time of the murders, Linda and David were experiencing serious financial problems.
Linda also told the officer that on March 2, 1980, she and David went to his parents' house while they were at church. David entered the house and told Linda to stay in the car. When David did not return, Linda went into the house. It appeared to her David was stealing money from a briefcase his parents carried to and from the bookstore. David was angry with her for coming in. To distract David and keep him from beating her, Linda suggested they make it look like the house had been burgled. They did so.
As had been the case from the beginning of the investigation, David refused to cooperate with the police.
While there was circumstantial evidence suggesting David killed his parents, the police did not believe they had a solid case against him until their interview of Linda in 1982. The case was submitted to the district attorney. After thoroughly reviewing the matter, the district attorney's office declined to prosecute David. At the time of the hearing on the motion to dismiss in 2005, no copy of the form rejecting the police request for prosecution could be located. A police detective recalled that the basis for the rejection was that much of the evidence linking David to the murders consisted of privileged marital communications. There were other reasons for the rejection, but the detective could not recall what they were.
In 2003 the San Diego District Attorney's Office created, a Cold Case Homicide Unit and solicited cases that police departments believed were suitable for reinvestigation. In early 2004 the Oceanside Police Department suggested reinvestigation of the then 24-year-old murders of Elsie and Robert.
Linda, who divorced David in 1984, was reinterviewed and repeated and confirmed statements made in her 1982 interview incriminating David. However, she also reiterated that David was home at 10:30 p.m....
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