People v. Edward

• Decision Date: 31 May 2018
• Docket Number: S057156
• Citation: 418 P.3d 360,233 Cal.Rptr.3d 439,5 Cal.5th 1
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Charles Edward CASE, Defendant and Appellant.

5 Cal.5th 1

418 P.3d 360

233 Cal.Rptr.3d 439

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent,

v.Charles Edward CASE, Defendant and Appellant.

S057156

Supreme Court of California.

Filed May 31, 2018

Michael J. Hersek, State Public Defender, San Francisco, under appointment by the Supreme Court, Maria Morga and Robin Kallman, San Francisco, Deputy State Public Defender, for Defendant and Appellant.

Kamala D. Harris and Xavier Becerra, Attorneys General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Michael P. Farrell, Assistant Attorney General, Eric L. Christoffersen, Jennevee H. De Guzman and Caely E. Fallini, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

KRUGER, J.

Defendant Charles Edward Case was sentenced to death for murdering two people during the commission of a robbery. This appeal is automatic. ( Pen. Code, § 1239, subd. (b).) We conclude the restitution fine must be reduced by the amount defendant was ordered to pay in direct victim restitution, but we affirm the judgment in all other respects.

I. STATEMENT OF THE CASE

Defendant was charged by criminal complaint with robbery and with the first degree murders of Val Lorraine Manuel and Gary Duane Tudor ( Pen. Code, §§ 187, subd. (a), 211 ) with the special circumstances of multiple murder (id. , § 190.2, subd. (a)(3) ) and murder during the commission of a robbery (id. , § 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(A) ). The complaint alleged that defendant personally used a firearm in committing the murders. (Id. , § 12022.5, subd. (a).) Following a preliminary hearing, defendant was held to answer on all charges and allegations and an information was filed. The information later was amended to add an allegation that defendant personally used a firearm in committing the robbery. (Ibid. )

A jury convicted defendant of all charges and found all allegations true. After the penalty phase, defendant was sentenced to death on the murder counts and to a consecutive term of three years in prison on the robbery count as well as two five-year enhancements for personally using a firearm during the commission of the murders. The court stayed a four-year enhancement for personally using a firearm during the commission of the robbery.

The court imposed a restitution fine of $10,000 and ordered direct victim restitution in the amount of $4,000.

II. STATEMENT OF FACTS

A. Guilt Phase

1. The Prosecution’s Case-in-Chief

In June 1993, defendant was living with Jerri Baker, with whom he also worked at McKenry’s Drapery Service in Sacramento. On June 20, the day of the robbery and murders, defendant left their house at about 3:00 or 4:00 in the afternoon. He was wearing a shirt Baker had bought for him and drove Baker’s car, a Ford Probe. He said he was going to play pool.

Defendant picked up Susan Burlingame, an acquaintance with whom he had formerly had a romantic relationship, around 4:00 p.m. He took her to a bar and card room called The Office, where they shot pool. Burlingame lived with her daughter and son-in-law, Stacey and Greg Billingsley, both of whom also worked at McKenry’s. Burlingame told defendant she had heard he had reunited with Jerri Baker and she did not want to come between them. Defendant and Burlingame left The Office. At her request, defendant dropped Burlingame off at a fast-food establishment near her daughter’s house. As he left, defendant remarked that he had "some things to do." Burlingame arrived home about 7:45 or 8:00 p.m.

At about 8:30 p.m. on the same day, Tracy Grimes went to The Office to see Val Manuel, The Office’s bartender. Grimes saw defendant there. Grimes also saw Gary Tudor, a customer who sometimes helped Manuel close the bar. Manuel told Grimes she was going to close the bar in about 15 minutes. Grimes left after a short visit.

Anita Dickinson and her fiancé, Randy Pickens, lived in a trailer behind The Office in exchange for cleaning the bar. Dickinson was outside the trailer sometime between 7:30 and 8:45 p.m. when she heard a gunshot. She ducked behind her car. When she heard two more gunshots, she ran into her trailer and yelled to her fiancé that someone was shooting in the bar. Pickens said it might have been firecrackers, so they did not notify the authorities.

Leslie and Joe Lorman were friends of Manuel and Tudor. Driving past The Office around 9:00 p.m., they noticed Tudor’s truck parked outside and decided to stop and visit Tudor. The lights inside the bar were on, but they were surprised to find that the front door was locked. They entered the bar through the side door, calling Tudor’s name. Leslie went to use the women’s restroom and saw the bodies of Manuel and Tudor when she opened the door. The Lormans ran out of the bar and called the police.

Sacramento County Deputy Sheriff Craig Norris received a radio call at 9:43 p.m. directing him to go to The Office. He was the first of several law enforcement officers to arrive. Deputy Norris and another officer entered the bar through the side door and Deputy Norris found the bodies of Manuel and Tudor in the women’s bathroom in a pool of blood. The cash register was open and there were no bills inside, just some pennies. The owner of the bar later determined that $320 had been taken.

A .45 caliber shell casing was discovered on the floor near the cash register and there was a depression in the floor that appeared to have been caused by a bullet. There were several more .45 caliber shell casings, as well as expended bullets, in the women’s bathroom.

An autopsy later revealed that both Manuel and Tudor had been shot in the head twice from close range. Both victims likely were either crouched down or kneeling when they were shot.

Defendant arrived at the home of Mary Webster about 10:00 p.m. that night. Webster testified that she had met defendant about a year earlier through a personal ad she had placed in the newspaper. A few days after they met, they went to The Office together for some drinks. They began dating regularly and defendant moved in with Webster after a few weeks. They lived together from July 1992 until March 1993, when defendant moved in with Baker.

Defendant described himself as a bank robber. He bragged about it and told stories about it "every night." According to Webster, "he loved it." He said that he used a product called Nu-Skin to mask his fingerprints. He owned a .45 caliber automatic pistol that he had purchased with money he borrowed from Webster.

On the night of the murders, defendant arrived at Webster’s home driving Jerri Baker’s car. He "had a big wad of money" and gave Webster $125 in small bills to settle a bet they had made. When defendant entered the bathroom and took off his shirt, Webster saw it "was full of blood." He took off his cowboy boots, which Webster had bought for him, and Webster saw there was blood on the boots as well. She began trying to clean off the blood, but defendant said it would not come off. Defendant washed his arms, which were "saturated with blood, just layers and layers," and asked Webster to "get rid of" his shirt and boots. At defendant’s request, Webster retrieved defendant’s gun from the passenger seat of Baker’s car. Defendant removed the bullets and gave the gun back to Webster; she put the gun in her closet.

Defendant told Webster he had been in a card game in Del Paso Heights and had shot two Black men who had tried to prevent him from collecting his winnings. No double-victim assaults or homicides were reported in Del Paso Heights around that time. Before he left, defendant kissed Webster and whispered in her ear that he probably would get caught because he left fingerprints. After defendant left, Webster threw defendant’s bloody shirt and boots in a dumpster by some nearby apartments.

Defendant returned home after 11:00 p.m. He told Baker he had killed two Black men during a poker game in Del Paso Heights. Baker later checked the pockets of the pants defendant was wearing and found about $40.

Defendant did not go to work the next morning. He asked Baker to tell people at work that his mother was ill and he had gone to Indiana to be with her. He also told Baker she "should clean up the car especially around the driver’s seat, door handles, foot pedals, steering wheel." Baker testified that she did as instructed, using "dry cleaning spotting chemicals, specifically ammonia," to wipe down everything she "could think of to wipe down." Baker testified that "[b]lood turns green in ammonia, so the rag had some green where I was wiping it down." She added: "There was a glop of what appeared to be flesh or I took it to be brain matter or something along those lines. I wiped that off before I could even get in the car."

Sheriff’s department criminalists later detected small amounts of human blood on the gear shift knob and steering wheel of Baker’s car. The amounts were too small for the blood type to be determined.

When Webster woke up the next morning, she telephoned a Sacramento Police Department detective she had met and asked him for advice. At his direction, she retrieved the shirt and cowboy boots from the dumpster. She then waved down a passing sheriff’s department patrol car and told the deputy what had happened. He escorted her to the sheriff’s department and introduced her to Detectives Stan Reed and Darryl Edwards, who were investigating the murders at The Office. The deputy gave the detectives the clothing. Human blood was detected on the shirt and the cowboy boots. The blood type was the same as Val Manuel’s, and also was consistent with blood that came from both victims. The blood on the clothing could not have come from defendant. Webster gave Detective Reed $100 that defendant had given her, consisting of three $10 bills, ten $5 bills, and twenty $1 bills.

Webster described to the detectives her encounter with defendant the previous night. An audiotape of her statement was played for the jury. Webster agreed to accompany the detectives to her house to retrieve defendant’s gun but before leaving, Webster called her home to speak to...