People v. Jacobs

• Decision Date: 09 November 1987
• Docket Number: No. B,B
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of California, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Arthur JACOBS and Thomas Owen, Defendants and Appellants. 017565.

Page 550

241 Cal.Rptr. 550

195 Cal.App.3d 1636

The PEOPLE of the State of California, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Arthur JACOBS and Thomas Owen, Defendants and Appellants.

No. B 017565.

Court of Appeal, Second District, Division 5, California.

Nov. 9, 1987.

Review Denied Feb. 24, 1988.

Frank O. Bell, Jr., State Public Defender, James A. Uyeda, Deputy State Public Defender and Daniel Ritkes, Los Angeles, for defendants and appellants

John K. Van de Kamp, Atty. Gen., Steve White, Chief Asst. Atty. Gen., John R. Gorey and William R. Weisman, Supervising Deputy Attys. Gen., for plaintiff and respondent.

EPSTEIN, Associate Justice. ^*

Defendants Arthur Jacobs (Jacobs) and Thomas Owen (Owen) were jointly tried and each convicted of second degree murder (Pen. Code, § 187) ¹ and assault with a firearm (§ 245, subd. (a)(2)). The jury also found that Jacobs had been armed with a shotgun (§ 12022, subd. (a)), and that Owen had personally used a shotgun in the commission of the crime (§ 12022.5). Jacobs was sentenced to an aggregate term of 20 years to life in state prison. (The term was comprised of 15 years for second degree murder, 1 year for the armed enhancement, and 4 years for the assault conviction.) Owen was sentenced to a term of 21 years to life (15 years for second degree murder, 2 years for the firearm use enhancement, and 4 years for the assault). Each defendant has appealed from the judgment against him.

Jacobs argues that the trial court committed reversible error in admitting Owen's pretrial statements in their joint trial. Owen presents three assignments of error: insufficiency of evidence, prejudice from a We conclude that there is harmless error as to Jacobs, and no error as to Owen. We therefore affirm both judgments.

courtroom demonstration, and prosecutorial misconduct.

FACTUAL SUMMARY

In the following summary, we resolve all factual evidentiary disputes in favor of the judgments. (See People v. Johnson (1980) 26 Cal.3d 557, 578, 162 Cal.Rptr. 431, 606 P.2d 738; Jackson v. Virginia (1979) 443 U.S. 307, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560.)

On May 15, 1983, Mrs. Jean Singrin and her 20 year old daughter, Lise, spent the evening together. Following dinner at a local restaurant, they returned to their home in Long Beach. Mrs. Singrin retired to her bedroom, while Lise remained in the den. As Mrs. Singrin began to fall asleep, she heard her daughter yelling in an angry, indignant and strident voice, "Get away from me. Get away from me. Leave me alone. Don't touch me. Get away from me. Get away from me. Leave me alone." Mrs. Singrin rushed from her bed to aid Lise. As she ran past Lise's bedroom door, she was grabbed by a man, who pulled her close to his body. She did not get a good look at the man, but did observe that he had dark hair and a beard, a light face, dark eyes, and was about six feet tall. The man said, "Don't yell. Don't scream. We aren't going to hurt her. Don't yell. Don't scream."

At the felony preliminary hearing, and again at the trial, Mrs. Singrin identified Jacobs as the man who had grabbed her. Her identification was based on his build, the feel of the man, and, most of all, his voice. She said that his voice was "etched" in her memory, and that she would never forget it.

Mrs. Singrin is a teacher of mentally retarded children in the Long Beach public schools. Voice and speaking characteristics are very important to her in her work, and she is conscious of voice at all times. Part of her assignment in the public schools is to teach the retarded children in her charge to speak better. Language development and speech patterns have been the primary emphasis of her teaching for 12 years. She was able to describe, compare and distinguish speech patterns of various persons in the courtroom, including the prosecutor, defense counsel and the judge.

Mrs. Singrin's identification of Jacobs also was aided by a demonstration conducted at the preliminary hearing and repeated at the trial. In this demonstration, Jacobs approached Mrs. Singrin in the manner that she described, and spoke to her. Following this, Mrs. Singrin confirmed her conclusion that Jacobs was her assailant; his voice and tone were the same as the man who had grabbed her.

Mrs. Singrin broke away from her assailant and ran towards the den. When she arrived, she found Lise screaming as another man was beating her with a shotgun. Mrs. Singrin later positively identified this man as Owen. She said that she was "one hundred percent" certain of her identification, and that she will never forget the face of the man who was assaulting her daughter. She saw him from the front, and from both sides.

In an effort to ward of the blows to her daughter, Mrs. Singrin spread her body over Lise. She was struck at least eight or ten times. She next remembers being on the floor, flailing her legs and feet in an effort to keep Owen's gun away from her. At that point, she heard Jacobs say in a calm voice, "let's get out of here," and both men then left the home. Mrs. Singrin stood up and saw blood beginning to pool on the floor. She then lapsed into unconsciousness. Her next recollection is that of looking at a clock on a microwave oven; it showed 9:01. Several policemen were in the home. She later learned that her daughter was dead.

Mrs. Singrin was bruised on her arms and shoulders. She also suffered a laceration in one of her ears, which required sutures.

Mrs. Singrin identified Owen's photograph from a group of 12 in a photographic lineup about a year and a half later. The While only Mrs. Singrin, her daughter and the two assailants were in the Singrin home at the time of the attack, there were other percipient witnesses to the events. A neighbor of the Singrins, James Cook, lived across the street. He had been an officer of the Long Beach Police Department for 21 years. On this particular evening, his daughter and son-in-law, Randy Debois, were visiting. Just before 9:00, Mr. Debois heard screaming; the screaming lasted for several minutes. Mr. Debois could not identify the source of the screams. He then heard a loud, explosive noise, followed by silence. He alerted Mr. Cook, who looked toward the Singrin residence and saw two males walk from the house and around the corner. Mr. Cook and Mr. Debois then ran towards the intersection. Mr. Cook asked Mr. Debois to keep the two men in sight by car.

picture "leaped out" at her. She had carried Owen's image in her mind and had looked for it everywhere she went.

As Mr. Debois followed the two men in his car, he saw them break out of a run and come toward him. His headlights shone fully on the man closest to him; he had dark hair and a long, full beard. Mr. Debois drove past the men, turned around, and drove past them again. He then turned the corner and parked with the lights off. He saw a man run down an alley.

Mr. Debois cooperated with a police sketch artist, who prepared a composite of the man Mr. Debois had seen in his headlights. Some time later, after Mr. Debois had returned to his home state of Washington, he picked out Jacobs' picture from a photographic lineup. At trial, however, he was unable to positively identify Jacobs. By that time, Jacobs had changed his hairstyle and no longer wore a beard.

While Mr. Debois was following the two men, Mr. Cook went over to the Singrin residence. Entering, he found Mrs. Singrin dazed and asking for Long Beach police on the telephone. It was obvious from the massive injuries to Lise Singrin's head, that she was dead.

Long Beach police arrived about one minute later. Officer Thornfield testified that, based on shotgun remnants found at the scene, Lise had been struck by two shotgun shells. A homicide investigator concluded that she had been killed by a shotgun-inflicted injury; the den wall was covered with blood, hair and tissue. Later, after an autopsy, a deputy coroner testified that the massive damage to Lise's head had been caused by two shots; he concluded that a double barreled shotgun had been used.

Lise Singrin's longtime friend, Lynn Kile, testified that she recognized Jacobs as the same person that she had met with Lise at Sal's Bar in 1981. Ms. Kile recalled seeing Jacobs six to eight times at another bar that she and Lise had frequented. Ms. Kile also remembered going with Lise to a house on Coldbrook street which, according to another witness, was the home of Jacobs' mother.

The house on Coldbrook was about one-half block from Lakewood High School. Herbert and Ruby Holmes lived close to that school, but on a nearby street, Marwick. They recalled seeing Jacobs, Owen and Lise at the Sexton residence, a home adjacent to their own on Marwick. Mr. Holmes saw Lise at the Sexton home on two occasions, and saw her car (a blue Volkswagen) parked there "quite a bit." Mrs. Holmes had met and spoken with Lise during one of Lise's visits to the Sexton home. Mrs. Holmes also recalled seeing Lise at the Sexton home when Jacobs was present.

Mr. Holmes identified both defendants in court. He noted that Owen, who had been clean shaven, had grown a beard by the time of trial.

The Sexton house had been occupied by Richie Sexton, his mother, and his step-father. Mr. Holmes had seen Richie Sexton inebriated by alcohol or drugs on several occasions. Mrs. Holmes had seen persons at the Sexton house who appeared to be on drugs. On one occasion, she heard a person who was sitting with Richie Sexton yell that they were getting some "Colombian gold." She was aware that Richie Sexton Jeri Wyckoff had been Jacobs' girlfriend from 1977 until 1980; they remained friends after that. She had gone with Jacobs to Sal's Bar and to the other bar described by Ms. Kile. She said that she, Jacobs, or both of them, also had gone to the Sexton house for drugs. Sometimes Jacobs bought cocaine for her. Ms. Wyckoff also testified that she had been to the home of Jacobs' mother on Coldbrook.

was a drug dealer, and derived his living from selling drugs....