People v. Jablonski

• Decision Date: 23 January 2006
• Docket Number: No. S041630.,S041630.
• Citation: 37 Cal.4th 774,38 Cal.Rptr.3d 98,126 P.3d 938
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Phillip Carl JABLONSKI, Defendant and Appellant.

38 Cal.Rptr.3d 98

37 Cal.4th 774

126 P.3d 938

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Phillip Carl JABLONSKI, Defendant and Appellant.

No. S041630.

Supreme Court of California.

January 23, 2006.

Mark D. Greenberg, Oakland, under appointment by the Supreme Court, for Defendant and Appellant.

Bill Lockyer, Attorney General, Robert R. Anderson, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Gerald A. Engler, Assistant Attorney General, Bruce Ortega and Christopher W. Grove, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

MORENO, J.

A jury convicted defendant Phillip Carl Jablonski of the first degree murders of Carol Spadoni and Eva Petersen. (Pen.Code, § 187.)¹ The jury also found true the special circumstance allegations that defendant murdered Petersen while engaged in the commission or attempted commission of rape (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(iii)) and sodomy (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(iv)). Additionally, the jury found true prior-murder and multiple-murder special circumstance allegations (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(2), (3)). After a sanity trial at which the jury found that defendant was sane at the time of the commission of the offenses, the jury proceeded to the penalty phase and ultimately returned a death verdict as to each count. The trial court declined to modify the verdict (§ 190.4, subd. (e)), and sentenced defendant to death. This appeal is automatic. (Cal. Const., art. VI, § 11, subd. (a); § 1239, subd. (b).)

We affirm.

I. FACTS

A. Procedural History

On June 14, 1991, defendant was charged by indictment with the murders of Carol Spadoni and Eva Petersen (§ 187) with the special circumstances that the murder of Petersen occurred while defendant was engaged in the commission or attempted commission of rape and sodomy (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17) (iii), (iv)), in addition to prior-murder and multiple-murder special circumstances (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(2), (3)). It was further alleged that defendant had personally used a firearm in the commission of the offenses (§ 12022.5). Defendant was also alleged to have suffered prior serious felony convictions and to have served prior prison terms (§§ 667, subd. (a)(1), 667.5, subd. (b)).²

On September 25, 1991, the trial court entered a plea of not guilty and a denial of all special allegations on defendant's behalf pursuant to section 1024. Subsequently, defendant also pled not guilty by reason of insanity.

On June 3, 1993, criminal proceedings were suspended to determine whether defendant was competent to stand trial (§ 1368). On November 10, 1993, a jury found defendant competent and criminal proceedings were reinstated.

On January 25, 1994, jury selection began for defendant's criminal trial and, on April 25, the jury convicted defendant of both counts of first degree murder and found true all special allegations except the prior-murder special circumstance, which, in a bifurcated proceeding, was found true on April 26. On May 2, the sanity phase commenced and, on May 10, the jury found that defendant was sane at the time of the commission of the murders. On May 17, the penalty phase commenced and, on June 17, the jury returned death verdicts.

On August 12, 1994, the trial court denied defendant's automatic motion for reduction of the death verdict and modification of the verdict. (§ 190.4, subd. (e).) Defendant was sentenced to death on each count of murder. He was also sentenced to five years on each firearm use enhancement, but those sentences were stayed pending execution of the death sentences.

B. Guilt Phase Evidence

1. Events Leading up to the Spadoni-Petersen Murders

In April 1991, Carol Spadoni lived with her mother Eva Petersen on Sanchez Street in Burlingame, in San Mateo County. Spadoni was defendant's wife. Their relationship had begun when Spadoni answered a personal ad defendant had placed in a newspaper. They were married in 1982 at San Quentin where defendant was an inmate. Eventually, Spadoni wanted to end her relationship with defendant whom she described to a friend as "weird." She told the same friend she was afraid of defendant.

In the summer of 1990, Petersen telephoned Richard Muniz in Sacramento. Muniz was a prison friend of defendant and through defendant had met Petersen and Spadoni. After his release from prison, Muniz maintained a friendship with the two women. Petersen asked Muniz to come to her house in Burlingame and pick up some belongings that defendant had sent to the women in anticipation of his release on parole. Petersen told Muniz she did not want defendant on her property because she was afraid of him and afraid that he might harm her. Muniz took the items and stored them in his own garage.

Around the same time, Spadoni talked to Robert Paredes, who became defendant's parole officer. Paredes was assigned to the Indio office in Riverside County. Defendant had asked to be allowed to live with Spadoni in Burlingame, but when Paredes informed Spadoni of this, she told Paredes she did not want defendant living with her because she was afraid of him.

When defendant was released from the state prison at Vacaville in September 1990, Muniz picked him up. Muniz told him that Petersen had given Muniz the items defendant had sent to her and related Petersen's statements. Defendant spent the weekend with Muniz in Sacramento and then Muniz put him on a bus to Southern California to meet Paredes in Indio. When Paredes met with defendant, he informed defendant of various parole conditions, among them that defendant was forbidden to travel more than 50 miles from his residence without Paredes's permission and was forbidden to go to Burlingame. Defendant was displeased about this latter condition.

Paredes also required defendant to participate in a counseling program because of his history of psychiatric problems. Defendant was eventually able to get into a program at the Loma Linda Veterans Administration (hereafter VA) hospital.

At Christmas, defendant asked Paredes for permission to go to Sacramento to visit Muniz and obtain a driver's license. Paredes gave him permission but only after he called Spadoni and informed her of defendant's request. She had no objection. Paredes told defendant not to go near San Mateo County. Defendant spent a week in Sacramento with Muniz. He complained to Muniz that Spadoni was listening to her mother and that Petersen was interfering with his plans to move to Sacramento where he felt there were more employment opportunities. Defendant seemed very upset about this situation. Muniz advised him to appeal his parole situation through the Department of Corrections.

Defendant returned from Sacramento with a driver's license and a 1965 Ford Fairlane. In January 1991, defendant enrolled in automotive classes at a local community college. While taking these classes, defendant befriended another student, Jim Lawrentz. Lawrentz testified that defendant tape-recorded class sessions. He described defendant as "very intelligent." Sometime around April 18, defendant ascertained from Lawrentz that he owned a small gun and offered to buy it from him. Initially, Lawrentz declined, but two days later he changed his mind and sold defendant his R.G. 14 revolver and bullets. Defendant was aware that he was not permitted to possess a gun because he was a convicted felon.

On April 22, defendant told his instructor, John Tamulonis, that he would not be in class the next day because he had a doctor's appointment, but would be in class the following evening. Tamulonis saw defendant again on the evening of April 22 with another student, Fathyma Vann. Defendant did not return for his evening class on April 23, nor did Tamulonis ever see him again.

2. The Spadoni-Petersen Murders

Robert Galindau was a friend of Carol Spadoni and Eva Petersen. He and the two women met for coffee and doughnuts three times a week at a doughnut shop. On April 24, 1991, after not having heard from the women for several days, Galindau telephoned them. Two days later, on April 26, he drove to their house on Sanchez Street. He noticed there were three or four days' of newspapers in the yard and a couple of packages on the hood of one of the two cars parked in the driveway. He went around back and saw a cage containing cats. The cats had no food or water and did not look well. Believing something was wrong, Galindau notified police.

Burlingame Police Officer Frank Pickens arrived at the house around 7:20 a.m. There were newspapers and packages piled outside the house and he heard dogs barking inside. He received no response when he knocked at the front door. He searched the house for signs of forced entry, but found none. He did, however, discover that a side door to the garage was unlocked. He entered the garage and saw that the door from the garage into the kitchen was open. The body of an elderly woman was lying on her back on the floor of the garage with her feet facing toward the kitchen. There was a gag in her mouth with what appeared to be a gunshot through it. Pickens and another officer entered the house together and found the body of a second woman who, like the first woman, had been gagged.

The first body found was that of Eva Petersen. A towel had been folded over and pushed into her mouth and a bullet had been shot through the towel. Petersen was naked from her waist down; her sweat shirt and brassiere had been pulled up above her breasts and around her neck. There was another bullet hole above her right breast and a stab wound in her neck. There were also cuts around one of her nipples and around her right eye; the cut to her nipple could have been made with a knife, and the cut to her eye may also have been made by a knife. Blood smears on the kitchen floor indicated that she had been dragged across the kitchen. The stab wound to her throat had been made while she was still alive. The cause of death was the gunshot wounds to her head and chest.

The second victim was Carol Spadoni. Her body was found in the living room, dressed in a...