People v. Clark
| Decision Date | 12 July 1967 |
| Docket Number | Cr. 11912 |
| Citation | 60 Cal.Rptr. 524,252 Cal.App.2d 524 |
| Court | California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of California, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Raymond Robert CLARK, Defendant and Appellant. |
Maxwell S. Keith, Los Angeles, under appointment by Court of Appeal, for appellant.
Thomas C. Lynch, Atty. Gen., William E. James, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Jerold A. Prod, Deputy Atty. Gen., for respondent.
This is an appeal from a judgment of conviction of murder in the first degree.
In an information filed in Los Angeles County on December 31, 1964, defendant was charged with murdering Marshall Allen Taylor on December 5, 1964. (Pen.Code, § 187.) A jury trial was duly waived and the judge found defendant guilty of murder in the first degree and sentenced defendant to the state prison for the term of his natural life. A motion for new trial was denied. A timely notice of appeal was filed.
A re sume of some of the facts is as follows: In March, 1964, defendant and a friend, Gary Prothero, rented an apartment, which was located over a garage, from Mr. and Mrs. Taylor. The Taylors had two sons. One of the boys, Marshall, aged 14, was engaged by defendant in a homosexual love affair. Defendant and Marshall went to movies on weekends and on occasions Marshall spent the night in the apartment and slept with defendant.
Prothero and defendant were employed at Best Lathing Company. Prior to December 5, 1964, work was slack and they worked only a day or so a week. Prothero told defendant that he (Prothero) was going back into the Navy. On Monday, prior to the killing of Marshall, defendant asked Mrs. Taylor if he could stay in the house after Prothero went into the Navy and she replied in the negative.
On the evening of December 4, 1964, defendant gave Prothero $7 to spend the night elsewhere and, in effect, told Prothero that he did not want him around the apartment that night. Defendant stated that he was going to tell Marshall that he (Clark) was going to leave. Prothero thought that this might generate an argument and perhaps some trouble, and he did not want to be around the apartment. Prothero spent the night in a hotel in Long Beach.
Prothero returned to the apartment at about 9:30 a.m., December 5, 1964. The door to the apartment had two locks on it, one near the door knob and a second one which was activated with a separate key. Ordinarily defendant and Prothero used the door knob lock. However, when Prothero went to enter the apartment the second lock was engaged and he was unable to gain entrance to the apartment. Prothero went downstairs and had a cup of coffee and talked with Mrs. Taylor for about an hour. He went back to the apartment and again tried the door and again found it locked. At this time he smelled gas whereas he had not the first time he had been at the door. He then went downstairs to Mrs. Taylor's house and asked for a key to the second lock on the door. He secured the key and entered the apartment. The smell of gas was much stronger. Prothero noticed defendant lying in the hallway covered with a blanket, his head close to a gas jet. Prothero turned off the gas, moved defendant's head, and knew then that defendant was alive because he could see him breathing.
Prothero went downstairs and told Mrs. Taylor to call an ambulance. Prothero returned to the apartment and discovered the body of Marshall lying on the living room floor next to a couch bed. Marshall was dressed in shorts, which were inside out and backwards. There was a great deal of blood about Marshall's head. Prothero, knowing that Marshall was dead, went downstairs and told Mrs. Taylor.
Defendant has blood type 'A.' Marshall had blood type 'B.' Marshall's blood was in a dried condition, whereas the blood about defendant was fresh when Mr. Klein, a Long Beach criminologist, arrived at the apartment. There were substantial areas of dried blood on the walls and ceiling of the living room. Type 'B' blood was found on a piece of iron pipe which was located underneath the couch bed. A coffee table in the living room was split in several places and had numerous tool marks on it. The table appeared to have been damaged by a force which could have been caused by blows from the iron pipe. Particles of bone and several hairs were present on the iron pipe and in other places in the general area of Marshall's body. Marshall, in addition to having a fractured skull and having suffered a cerebral contusion, suffered two broken fingers.
Prothero had never seen a piece of pipe around the apartment before. Mr. Taylor had seen a similar piece of pipe under the stairway leading up to the garage apartment. A razor blade also was found which had some type 'A' blood on it.
A note was found under the lid of the stereo which read: 'We will always be together now,' and signed 'Marshall Allen Taylor, Raymond Robert Clark.' The body of the note was written by defendant. The signatures were those of Marshall and the defendant. Frequently Marshall had signed his name on blank pieces of paper and Mrs. Taylor had thrown away many such papers.
That defendant had beaten Marshall to death with the piece of iron pipe is not questioned. The defendant had told a Mrs. Joyce Clark (no relation) that Marshall knew that he (defendant) was going to kill him, but Marshall was not to know of when such was to take place. The defendant had homosexual relations with David Clark (no relation), the son of Joyce, a boy of twelve years, about five or six times commencing a few years previously.
Joyce Clark further testified that defendant had stated that
Appellant called as his witness a psychiatrist who testified that he had visited with appellant while appellant was in jail and has asked him some questions and had reviewed some records with reference to appellant. The doctor stated that in his opinion appellant had regressed to a primitive level of functioning on the night of the murder, that he was markedly disturbed in his thinking and behavior, and that he had not premeditated the act of killing Marshall. The doctor stated that in large part his opinion was formed from what appellant told him. Further, the...
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