People v. Cole

• Decision Date: 05 October 1956
• Docket Number: Cr. 5852
• Citation: 301 P.2d 854,47 Cal.2d 99,56 A.L.R.2d 1435
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: , 56 A.L.R.2d 1435 The PEOPLE of the State of California, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Charles E. COLE, Defendant and Appellant.

Page 854

301 P.2d 854

47 Cal.2d 99, 56 A.L.R.2d 1435

The PEOPLE of the State of California, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Charles E. COLE, Defendant and Appellant.

Cr. 5852.

Supreme Court of California, In Bank.

Oct. 5, 1956.

Rehearing Denied Oct. 31, 1956.

William E. Jensen and Kenneth K. Casper, Vallejo, for appellant.

Edmund G. Brown, Atty. Gen., Doris H. Maier and F. G. Girard, Deputy Atty. Gen., for respondent.

GIBSON, Chief Justice.

A jury found defendant guilty of first degree murder and fixed his punishent at life imprisonment. The principal questions raised on this appeal are whether the trial court erred in ruling upon the admissibility of evidence and whether the evidence is sufficient to support the verdict.

The body of the victim, Mrs. Helen Roberts, was found near a road in Sutter County on the afternoon of November 15, 1954. Dr. Paxton, a pathologist, examined the body and performed an autopsy. He testified that Mrs. Roberts was an obese woman about 50 years of age, that her death was caused by a gunshot wound, and that the fatal bullet, which he removed from the body, had entered below the left armpit and had traveled across the thorax, with a slight deviation backward and upward, penetrating the heart, right lung, and soft tissue beneath the right shoulder and striking the humerus of the right arm three inches below the shoulder joint.

Defendant did not testify at the trial, and there is no substantial conflict in the evidence. In August of 1954 Mrs. Roberts abandoned her husband and began living with defendant in various motels under fictitious names. Late in the afternoon of November 14, defendant and Mrs. Roberts drove away in a station wagon from a Vallejo motel where they were then staying. About 6:30 p. m. they stopped in front of a grocery store which Mrs. Roberts entered. Later defendant got out of the car, and a young man named Shelton made a remark about the damp weather. Defendant drew an automatic pistol from his belt, pointed it at the sky, asked whether he should do something about the weather, replaced the gun under his coat and went into the store. Shelton testified that the gun looked like the weapon identified at the trial as the one which fired the shot killing Mrs. Roberts. When defendant and Mrs. Roberts left the store, they drove across the street to a service station, where, before leaving together, they talked to the attendant for approximately 20 minutes. In the course of this conversation, Mrs. Roberts was in good spirits, and defendant was solemn.

For several months prior to November 14, defendant intermittently occupied a room which he rented in Vallejo at the home of a Mrs. Hill, an elderly widow who had agreed to marry him. Early in the afternoon of that day, he came to visit Mrs. Hill and left after about two hours. He returned at 9:00 p. m. and, when Mrs. Hill opened the door, he exclaimed, 'Helen shot herself, Helen shot herself.' He told Mrs. Hill that Mrs. Roberts, while in the station wagon, took a gun out of the glove compartment, said, 'I ought to shoot you and the dog and myself,' pointed the gun at herself and fired the fatal shot.

Mrs. Hill and defendant went out to the station wagon in front of the house, and the body of Mrs. Roberts, which was still warm, was on the front seat. They drove to a point in Sutter County, where defendant left the body in high grass beside the road. Upon returning to Vallejo, they went to the motel where defendant and Mrs. Roberts had been staying. Defendant awakened the motel owner in order to obtain a key, stating that 'mama' had gone to the movies with another man and that, if she came back and wanted to reach defendant, he would be at Mrs. Hill's residence. After collecting his belongings, he drove with Mrs. Hill to her home.

Defendant cautioned Mrs. Hill not to reveal their activities of that evening and instructed her to say that he had left Mrs. Roberts at a theater, arranging to return for her at 9:00 p. m., but that, when he and Mrs. Hill went to the theater at that hour, Mrs. Roberts entered a car with another man and drove away. He gave Mrs. Hill a gun, requesting that she dispose of it, and she wrapped it up and asked one of her boarders to drop it in the bay. The boarder became suspicious and turned the gun over to the police. When questioned by the authorities, defendant stated that he and Mrs. Roberts left their motel in Vallejo on the afternoon of November 14, that, after stopping at a grocery store, he took her to a theater and that, when he returned for her, he saw her drive away with another man.

The gun which defendant gave Mrs. Hill after the death of Mrs. Roberts was introduced in evidence and was identified by a ballistics expert as the one which fired the bullet removed from Mrs. Roberts' body. Mrs. Hill testified that the gun looked like one which belonged to her. She said that about six weeks before the death of Mrs. Roberts she had given her gun to defendant to be cleaned and that he returned it in about a week. She placed it on the dresser in her bedroom, and later she noticed that it had disappeared. She could not say on what day she first became aware that it was missing but stated that it disappeared sometime during the week preceding Mrs. Roberts' death.

The first question is whether the trial court erred in ruling on the admissibility of evidence. Upon being called as a witness, Dr. Paxton, who performed the autopsy, testified that he specialized in pathology and autopsy work to determine causes of death. Defendant stipulated to the qualifications of the witness. When the doctor was asked whether, in his opinion, the wound could have been self-inflicted, defendant objected on the grounds that no foundation had been laid as to the qualifications of the witness to form such an opinion and that the matter was not a proper subject for expert testimony. The objection was overruled, and the doctor testified that 'This would be a very unusual pattern for a self-inflicted wound.' In elaborating, he referred to the location of the wound, the course of the bullet and the obesity of the victim, and he stated that it would be difficult for a person, whether right-handed or left-handed, to hold the muzzle of a gun against himself in the position necessary to produce such a wound. He testified that his opinion was based on his training and experience, as well as the condition of the body, that he had examined suicide victims who had died of gunshot wounds and that he had never seen a self-inflicted wound 'in this position.'

Many cases have set forth the general principles to be applied in considering the admissibility of expert opinion on the question whether a wound was self-inflicted. Although courts have not always used the same language, the decisive consideration in determining the admissibility of expert opinion evidence is whether the subject of inquirty is one of such common knowledge that men of ordinary education could reach a conclusion as intelligently as the witness or whether, on the other hand, the matter is sufficiently beyond common experience that the opinion of an expert would assist the trier of fact. See George v. Bekins Van & Storage Co., 33 Cal.2d 834, 844, 205 P.2d 1037; Vallejo & N. R. Co. v. Reed Orchard Co., 169 Cal. 545, 570-571, 147 P. 238; Howland v. Oakland Consol. St. Ry. Co., 110 Cal. 513, 522, 42 P. 983; Wells Truckways, Ltd. v. Cebrian, 122 Cal.App.2d 666, 677-678, 265 P.2d 557; Eger v. May Department Stores, 120 Cal.App.2d 554, 558, 261 P.2d 281; Manney v. Housing Authority, 79 Cal.App.2d 453, 460, 180 P.2d 69; Code Civ Proc. § 1870, subd. 9; ¹ 7 Wigmore on Evidence (3rd ed. 1940), § 1923, pp. 21, 22.

In two California cases a doctor's opinion that a fatal wound could not have been self-inflicted was relied upon in holding that there was sufficient evidence to establish the corpus delicti. People v. Black, 103 Cal.App.2d 69, 75, 229 P.2d 61; People v. Coker, 78 Cal.App. 151, 161, 248 P. 542. In a number of other jurisdictions it has been held that medical opinion as to whether a wound could have been self-inflicted was admissible. State v. Lee, 65 Conn. 265, 30 A. 1110, 1113-1114, 27 L.R.A. 498; Everett v. State, 62 Ga. 65, 71; State v. Schneck, 85 Kan. 334, 116 P. 823, 824; State v. Sharp, 145 La. 891, 83 So. 181, 182; State v. Knight, 43 Me. 11, 131; Commonwealth v. Spiropoulos, 208 Mass. 71, 94 N,E. 451, 452; Miera v. Territory, 13 N.M. 192, 81 P. 586, 588-589; People v. Wilson, 109 N.Y. 345, 16 N.E. 540, 543; Commonwealth v. Puglise, 276 Pa. 235, 120 A. 401, 402. The reasoning underlying these decisions is that the subject of self-inflicted wounds is not one of such common experience that laymen may not be assisted by the opinion of a doctor, who has special knowledge regarding anatomy and injuries to the human body.

We are aware that cases in some jurisdictions have held that testimony of this type is not admissible. Treat v. Merchants' Life Ass'n, 198 Ill. 431, 64 N.E. 992, 994; Knights Templars & Masons' Life Indemnity Co. v. Crayton, 110 Ill.App. 648, 662-663; Aetna Life Ins. Co. v. Kaiser, 115 Ky. 539, 74 S.W. 203, 205 (overruled on other grounds in Inter-Southern Life Ins. Co. v. Hinkle's Adm'x, 226 Ky. 724, 11 S.W.2d 913, 914); State v. Carr, 196 N.C. 129, 144 S.E. 698, 699-700; State v. Gibson, 69 N.D. 70, 284 N.W. 209, 217-218; State v. Bradley, 34 S.C. 136, 13 S.E. 315, 316-317; State v. McCravy, 133 Tenn. 358, 181 S.W. 165, 168; Maynard v. State, 154 Tex.Cr.R. 521, 229 S.W.2d 65, 67; Metropolitan Life Ins. Co. v. Wagner, 50 Tex.Civ.App. 233, 109 S.W. 1120, 1123-1124; see People v. Curtright, 258 Ill. 430, 101 N.E. 551, 554. In our opinion, however, they do not represent the better view with respect to whether the trier of fact would ordinarily be in a position to determine, as intelligently as a odctor, whether a wound was self-inflicted. Moreover, some of these cases rest, at least in part, upon the ground that the opinion of...