People v. Hendricks

• Decision Date: 06 July 1987
• Citation: 43 Cal.3d 584,238 Cal.Rptr. 66,737 P.2d 1350
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: , 737 P.2d 1350 The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Edgar M. HENDRICKS, Defendant and Appellant. Crim. 23420.

Page 66

238 Cal.Rptr. 66

43 Cal.3d 584, 737 P.2d 1350

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Edgar M. HENDRICKS, Defendant and Appellant.

Crim. 23420.

Supreme Court of California In Bank.

July 6, 1987.

Rehearing Denied Aug. 19, 1987.

Marcus S. Topel, under appointment by the Supreme Court, William M. Goodman, Deborah A. deLambert, Anne E. Thorkelson and Lynne S. Coffin, San Francisco, for defendant and appellant.

John K. Van de Kamp, Atty. Gen., Steve White, Chief Asst. Atty. Gen., Norman H. Sokolow, William R. Weisman, Gary R. Hahn, Robert F. Katz and Robert R Anderson, Deputy Attys. Gen., for plaintiff and respondent.

MOSK, Justice.

This is an automatic appeal (Pen.Code, § 1239, subd. (b)) from a judgment of death under the 1978 death penalty law (id., § 190.1 et seq.).

As will appear, we conclude that the judgment must be affirmed as to guilt and the special circumstance findings must be upheld. We further conclude that a gross error in connection with the sanity hearing compels us to vacate that verdict and to set aside the judgment as to penalty. The trial judge discharged the jury, empaneled another jury to determine the issue of sanity, and when the latter was unable to reach a verdict, committed the utterly incomprehensible act of recalling the original jurors--more than five months after their discharge and return to the community--to consider the question of sanity. This action was wholly beyond the jurisdiction of the court.

The basic facts relevant to this appeal are undisputed and are in fact supported by two confessions, introduced below, which defendant made in a similar but unrelated case: one to police officers investigating the murders of James Parmer and Charleston Haynes in San Francisco, the other in his trial for those murders.

In the summer of 1980 defendant was without money and was working in Los Angeles and San Francisco as a hustler--a male prostitute for men. In the course of his trade, he would also rob his customers. He met Harry Carter in Los Angeles and had sex with him for money. A week or two later he saw Carter again, and again engaged in an act of prostitution. He lived with Carter for two or three weeks. At the end of that time Carter told him to get out and called him a "low life"; defendant picked up a knife lying on the kitchen table and fatally stabbed him; defendant took various items belonging to the victim and left.

About a month later defendant met James Burchell while he was hustling in Hollywood and went home with him. Once there, Burchell agreed to pay him for sex. During intercourse Burchell expressed dissatisfaction with defendant's performance, a fight ensued, and defendant shot him fatally in the neck. After taking various items belonging to Burchell, he left.

With regard to each victim defendant was charged with murder (Pen.Code, § 187) and robbery (id., § 211). As to each murder four special circumstances were alleged: (1) defendant's prior conviction for the murder of Parmer (id., § 190.2, subd. (a)(2)); (2) his prior conviction for the murder of Haynes (ibid.); (3) multiple murder in the present proceeding (id., subd. a)(3)); and (4) felony murder-robbery (id., subd. (a)(17)(i)). Defendant pleaded not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity.

At the guilt phase the jury found defendant guilty as charged and found all the special circumstance allegations to be true. At the penalty phase, they fixed the penalty at death and were subsequently discharged.

On the day set for sentencing, the parties reminded the court that a sanity hearing had not been conducted immediately after the guilt phase, as required by Penal Code section 190.1, subdivision (c). Over defendant's objection that the same jury must determine all the issues in a capital trial, the court empaneled a new jury to decide the issue of sanity alone. After deliberations that spanned 11 days the jurors reported they were hopelessly deadlocked, and a mistrial was declared. Over defendant's further objection, the court then called back the original jurors--who had been discharged more than five months earlier--and reempaneled them without examining them itself or allowing voir dire by the parties. This jury returned a verdict that defendant was sane at the time of the crimes charged. Thereupon the court imposed the sentence of death.

I.

Defendant makes several contentions relating to the question of guilt. None, as we shall explain, establishes reversible error.

Defendant contends his confession to the police was involuntary and should not have been admitted. Prior to trial he moved under Evidence Code section 402 to suppress the confession, claiming inter alia that it had been improperly procured. After an evidentiary hearing the court ruled the confession was voluntary.

To be admissible at trial the confession of a criminal defendant must have been made voluntarily. (See, e.g., Payne v. Arkansas (1958) 356 U.S. 560, 561, 78 S.Ct. 844, 846, 2 L.Ed.2d 975; People v. Jimenez (1978) 21 Cal.3d 595, 602, 147 Cal.Rptr. 172, 580 P.2d 672.) When a defendant claims that he confessed involuntarily, the prosecution is required under California law to prove voluntariness beyond a reasonable doubt. (E.g., People v. Jimenez, supra, at pp. 606-608, 147 Cal.Rptr. 172, 580 P.2d 672.) As a reviewing court we independently examine the uncontradicted facts to determine whether the trial court's finding of voluntariness was supported. (People v. Jimenez, supra, at p. 609, 147 Cal.Rptr. 172, 580 P.2d 672.) We uphold "the trial court's resolution of conflicts in the evidence ... unless it is 'palpably erroneous' " (People v. Kane (1984) 150 Cal.App.3d 523, 530, 198 Cal.Rptr. 73; accord, People v. Midkiff (1968) 262 Cal.App.2d 734, 739, 68 Cal.Rptr. 866), and "accept that version of events which is most favorable to the People, to the extent that it is supported by the record" (People v. Jimenez, supra, 21 Cal.3d at p. 609, 147 Cal.Rptr. 172, 580 P.2d 672).

The following facts were undisputed at the evidentiary hearing. On March 27, 1981, Officers Brosch and Klotz of the San Francisco Police Department, who were assigned to investigate the Parmer and Haynes murders, received defendant into their custody in Dallas and accompanied him to San Francisco. The next day, they interviewed him about the Parmer and Haynes killings. During the interview defendant confessed to having murdered the two men. Later that day he offered to tell the officers about some other murders if they gave him an alcoholic beverage and a Bible. They accepted his offer and provided him with a Bible, a fifth of whiskey, a can of Coca Cola, and a cup. In the approximately 90-minute interview that followed, defendant confessed to the Carter and Burchell murders. During the interview he mixed and drank two or three whiskey-and-cokes, but was able to comprehend and answer all the questions the officers asked. Neither officer harmed him or threatened him in any way. Prior to the interview he had never disclosed to anyone--including Federal Bureau of Investigation agents who had questioned him in Dallas--any belief or fear on his part that the police would cause him harm.

Two points were in dispute at the evidentiary hearing: first, whether Officer Brosch and his partner, Officer Erdaletz, had told one Agnes Benjamin, a cousin of defendant, that they intended to kill him; and second, how much whiskey defendant drank as he made his confession and whether it affected him to any significant extent.

Defendant testified that Benjamin informed him the officers said they would kill him if he did not turn himself in--and would kill him even if he did; he said this information frightened him and caused him to confess against his will. Defendant also said he consumed all but about four inches of the whiskey, felt "dizzy," and was "talking kind of crazy." By contrast, Officer Brosch testified that neither he nor Officer Erdaletz told Benjamin they intended to kill defendant. He added that defendant drank only about two ounces of whiskey over the course of the entire interview.

Defendant unpersuasively argues that the court erred in impliedly finding that the officers did not indirectly threaten him to secure his confession. The record does not allow us to set aside the court's finding and to accept defendant's claim that the officers told Benjamin they intended to kill him and that she communicated that intent to him. In his testimony, which showed no significant weaknesses, Officer Brosch categorically denied that either he or Officer Erdaletz expressed such an intent to Benjamin. And defendant's claim to the contrary appears incredible. He admitted that before confessing he never told anyone of the officers' alleged intent or his consequent fear. He conceded that it was only the day before the suppression hearing that he disclosed to his counsel Benjamin's alleged communication. Finally, Benjamin, whom he had asked to testify on his behalf, failed to appear to substantiate his claim.

Our conclusion is supported by the words defendant used and the manner in which he spoke them, which were recorded during the interview and played at the hearing: defendant appears to have been motivated not by fear but rather by a desire to ease his conscience. Thus, "It seems inescapable that [defendant's] claim of coercion based on [the alleged] threat was a sham." (People v. Brown (1981) 119 Cal.App.3d 116, 130, 173 Cal.Rptr. 877.)

Defendant also argues the court erred in impliedly finding that by providing him with whiskey and a Bible the officers improperly induced him to confess. There is no merit to the argument. The officers did not offer him these items in order to secure his confession; rather, he offered to confess if they would provide him with the items and they did so only in response to his request.

Finally, defendant argues in substance that the court erred in finding that his consumption of two or three whiskey-and-cokes did...