People v. Jones
| Decision Date | 27 June 1991 |
| Docket Number | No. S004664,S004664 |
| Citation | 282 Cal.Rptr. 465,811 P.2d 757,53 Cal.3d 1115 |
| Court | California Supreme Court |
| Parties | , 811 P.2d 757 The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Earl Preston JONES, Defendant and Appellant. Crim. 24382 |
Richard B. Mazer, under appointment by the Supreme Court, and David A. Nickerson, Mazer & Nickerson, San Francisco, for defendant and appellant.
John K. Van de Kamp and Daniel E. Lungren, Attys. Gen., Steve White, Chief Asst. Atty. Gen., John H. Sugiyama, Asst. Atty. Gen., Dane R. Gillette and Frances Marie Dogan, Deputy Attys. Gen., San Francisco, for plaintiff and respondent.
A jury convicted defendant Earl Preston Jones of two counts of first degree murder (Pen.Code, § 187), 1 finding that defendant had used a firearm in the commission of each offense (§ 12022.5) and that two multiple-murder special-circumstance allegations (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(3)) were true. The jury later determined that defendant was sane at the time he committed the offenses, and at the penalty phase returned a verdict of death. Defendant's appeal to this court is automatic. (§ 1239, subd. (b).) We conclude that one of the multiple-murder special circumstances must be set aside; in all other respects we affirm the judgment.
In February 1982, defendant leased to Charles Rambert and Patricia Khan a house he owned in the Sun Valley area of Los Angeles. The landlord-tenant relationship was a stormy one, apparently because of nonpayment of rent. About a week before the murders, defendant angrily told a friend of Rambert and Kahn that unless they moved out by the weekend he would "blow them away."
On June 1, 1982, defendant told Jimmy Lindsay, a prospective renter, that his two tenants would vacate the Sun Valley house by June 4. When Rambert and Khan still had not done so on that day, Lindsay told defendant that if the couple were still in the house the next day, he would have to look for another place to rent. Defendant responded that the house would be available "one way or the other." Showing Lindsay a shotgun, defendant added that if necessary he would take his gun and move the tenants out.
At five o'clock the next morning, Betty Daniels, who lived next to the house in question, was awakened by what sounded like gunshots coming from next door. She ran to a trailer outside her house to get her son, Walter Cantwell.
Cantwell, who was already up, saw defendant come out of the house next door and walk toward the middle of the yard, at which point Daniels also observed defendant. Cantwell and Daniels, who knew defendant from prior meetings, saw defendant get into his car and drive off.
After pounding on the door of the house, Cantwell noticed defendant's car returning to the scene. Defendant got out of his car with a shotgun. When Cantwell told defendant he had heard shots, defendant replied, "Yeah, so did I." As he walked back to his car, defendant turned and said, "Don't get involved." He then left in his car.
Later that morning, defendant told his niece, Shirley Green, that he was going to Oakland to find work. He asked Green to give him the address of her uncle in Oakland and to take him to the bus station. He told Green she could keep his car.
That same morning, the police found the bodies of Rambert and Kahn lying on beds in separate bedrooms. Each had been shot in the head with a shotgun, which was fired from roughly 10 feet away. Rambert had also been shot twice in the chest. His chin, neck and right arm bore bruise marks, indicating he had been hit with a blunt object before he was shot.
A police check of local pawnshops revealed that defendant had pawned a shotgun on the morning of the murders. Ballistics tests established that expended shotgun shells found at the scene of the murders had been fired by the pawned gun, and that buckshot found in the victims' bodies could have been fired by the same gun. A police fingerprint expert determined that a latent fingerprint lifted from the door leading to Rambert's bedroom had been made by defendant's right index finger.
The police detained defendant's bus on the way to Oakland and arrested defendant.
Dr. Alvin Davis, a psychiatrist, and Dr. Shawn Johnston, a psychologist, testified on defendant's behalf. In the opinion of Dr. Davis, defendant was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia at the time of the killings.
After giving defendant a battery of tests, Dr. Johnston concluded that defendant had been suffering from a schizophrenic disorder, probably for most of his life, and that he was subject to delusions, hallucinations, and paranoia, causing on occasion irrational anger.
Neither doctor attempted to expressly link defendant's illness to his mental state at the time of the killings.
Also testifying for the defense was defendant's ex-wife, Marcia Fuller. She said that defendant was a person of goodwill and integrity, but that he would get irrationally angry and suspicious. In one instance, defendant insisted that the two of them go for a ride, after which he put a gun to her head and threatened to kill her. When Fuller told him to "go ahead," defendant calmed down and acted as if nothing had happened.
Drs. Davis and Johnston again testified for the defense at the sanity phase of the trial. Both were of the view that defendant was insane when he committed the two murders. In the opinion of Dr. Davis, defendant was unable to appreciate the criminality of his actions and to conform his behavior to legal requirements. Dr. Johnston was unsure whether defendant could appreciate the criminality of his actions but was convinced that defendant could not conform his behavior to societal requirements. 2
In response, the prosecution called Dr. George Abe and Dr. Lee Coleman, both psychiatrists. Dr. Abe was of the opinion that defendant was paranoid but not schizophrenic and was sane when he committed the murders. Dr. Coleman testified that psychiatrists and psychologists in general are no more qualified than lay persons to determine whether a person is schizophrenic or whether a criminal defendant was sane when the offense was committed.
In rebuttal, the defense called Dr. Richard Huemer, a specialist in orthomolecular medicine. In Dr. Huemer's opinion, schizophrenia could be determined by the presence of certain chemicals in the patient's body; the high quantity of one such chemical, cryptopyrrole, in defendant's urine indicated he was schizophrenic.
At the penalty phase of the trial, the prosecution presented evidence of two previous episodes of assaultive behavior by defendant. In 1975, four women were living at defendant's Sun Valley rental property. One day defendant came to the house and demanded an additional $10 a month in rent from each woman. He accused the women of using the house for prostitution and presenting him with a "fake bill" for a $25 pool filter that they had deducted from the rent. He then struck one of the women, Angela H., on the head with his fist. When another tenant, Jamie J., attempted to call the police, defendant brandished a knife and pulled the telephone out of the wall. The women ran next door and called the police.
The second incident involved Harold Willis, who occasionally gave defendant's wife a ride to work. In October 1978, defendant came to Willis's house and accused him of "socializing" with his wife. Defendant grabbed Willis by the neck and bounced him off a brick wall outside the house, causing lacerations to his face, head, and neck. Willis told defendant to leave, but defendant refused to do so until Willis told neighbors to call the police.
The chief defense witness at the penalty phase was Dr. William Vicary, a psychiatrist. He testified that defendant was paranoid but not schizophrenic. Defendant had a traumatic early childhood, to which he initially made a successful adjustment; a chronic psychotic illness led to increasingly erratic behavior. In the opinion of Dr. Vicary, there was a direct causal connection between the illness and the killings. He noted that during the trial defendant had shown a willingness to take antipsychotic medication, and that defendant had behaved well in custody. Dr. Vicary concluded that, given defendant's high intelligence, he probably would lead a productive life in prison and not be a danger to other inmates.
Defense witness Dr. Gerry McCormack, a psychologist, discussed defendant's various accomplishments in life. 3 He, too, believed that defendant would function well in a prison setting.
Other defense witnesses were defendant's ex-wife, one of his brothers, a former work partner, and a friend, all of whom said that defendant could lead a useful life in prison and that they wanted him to live.
On August 25, 1983, the master calendar court ordered defendant's case assigned to Department F. At defendant's first appearance in Department F, the judge suspended proceedings to determine whether defendant was competent to stand trial (§ 1368). After the judge found defendant competent, he rejected several arguments that defendant himself presented, primarily relating to actions by his attorney. This conversation followed:
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