People v. Pearson, 85SA275

• Decision Date: 29 September 1986
• Docket Number: No. 85SA275,85SA275
• Citation: 725 P.2d 782
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Nancy Lynn PEARSON, Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: Colorado Supreme Court

Page 782

725 P.2d 782

The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Nancy Lynn PEARSON, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 85SA275.

Supreme Court of Colorado En Banc.

Sept. 29, 1986.

Doyle T. Johns, Jr., Dist. Atty., Mark L. Miner, Deputy Dist. Atty., Fort Morgan, for plaintiff-appellant.

David F. Vela, Public Defender, William Sublette, Deputy Public Defender, Sterling, for defendant-appellee.

KIRSHBAUM, Justice.

In this interlocutory appeal pursuant to C.A.R. 4.1, the People challenge an order of the Morgan County District Court suppressing a custodial statement made by the defendant, Nancy Pearson, to a deputy sheriff in connection with the September 15, 1984, shooting death of her husband, John Pearson, Jr. The trial court concluded that the defendant's statement was involuntary. We vacate the district court's order and remand the case with directions for further proceedings.

The defendant is charged with the offense of manslaughter, in violation of section 18-3-104, 8 C.R.S. (1978). Testimony during the suppression hearing established that in the late evening of September 15, 1984, the defendant went to the home of Wayne Beers, a neighbor, told him her husband had just been shot, and asked for help from Beers and his son. While Beers' son called for assistance, the defendant and Beers went to the defendant's home. They found the defendant's husband lying on the floor. As the defendant lifted her husband's head onto her lap and asked him to talk, Beers told her that he could not find any pulse. The defendant then ran back to the Beers' residence to telephone for more assistance.

Shortly after 11:00 p.m., Morgan County Deputy Sheriff Lorenzo Villarreal arrived at the defendant's home and discovered the victim. Villarreal then went to the Beers' residence and told the defendant that he needed to talk to her. At the suppression hearing Villarreal testified that at that time the defendant was crying, that she smelled of alcohol, that he advised her of her Miranda rights, and that he then placed her in the custody of Deputy Sheriff Don Wood for transportation to a hospital where various tests could be conducted. Wood testified at the hearing that he asked the defendant if she had understood the rights read to her by Villarreal and if she would talk to Wood, that the defendant indicated she understood her rights, and that the defendant said she was willing to discuss that evening's events.

Wood testified that during the trip to the hospital the defendant was at times crying and somewhat hysterical, but that she nevertheless discussed the events surrounding the shooting and asked about her husband's condition. At the hospital the defendant was treated for minor injuries and was given a blood alcohol test. Wood testified that her blood alcohol level was 0.116 percent. Wood also testified that as they were leaving the hospital he told the defendant that her husband was dead, and that the defendant then fainted.

The defendant was revived, and she and Wood drove to the Morgan County Sheriff's Office. The defendant was then interrogated for approximately one hour and twenty minutes. The session was tape-recorded, and the transcript indicates that at times the defendant cried. The trial court concluded that the defendant's statements to Wood en route to the hospital were admissible, but that her statements at the sheriff's office were involuntary and, therefore, inadmissible.

A custodial statement by an accused, if freely and voluntarily made, is admissible as evidence against the accused at trial. Lego v. Twomey, 404 U.S. 477, 92 S.Ct. 619, 30 L.Ed.2d 618 (1972); People v. Fish, 660 P.2d 505 (Colo.1983); see Jackson v. Denno, 378 U.S. 368, 84 S.Ct. 1774, 12 L.Ed.2d 908 (1964). The test of voluntariness generally applied by both federal and state courts is whether the challenged statement was the product of a rational intellect and a free will, unaffected by improper influence, coercion, threats or promises. See, e.g., Townsend v. Sain, 372 U.S. 293, 83 S.Ct. 745, 9 L.Ed.2d 770 (1963); Culombe v. Connecticut, 367 U.S. 568, 81 S.Ct. 1860, 6 L.Ed.2d 1037 (1961); People v. Smith, 716 P.2d 1115 (Colo.1986); People v. Raffaelli, 647 P.2d 230 (Colo.1982); People v. Parada, 188 Colo.230, 533 P.2d 1121 (1975). The prosecution bears the burden of establishing the voluntariness of an accused's custodial statement by a preponderance of the evidence. Lego v. Twomey, 404 U.S. 477, 92 S.Ct. 619, 30 L.Ed.2d 618; People v. Raffaelli, 647 P.2d 230.

In determining the issue of voluntariness, a trial court must assess the totality of the circumstances under which the statement was given. Haynes v. Washington, 373 U.S. 503, 83 S.Ct. 1336, 10 L.Ed.2d 513 (1963); People v. Freeman, 668 P.2d 1371 (Colo.1983). Relevant circumstances include the atmosphere and events surrounding the elicitation of the statement, such as the use of violence, threats, promises, improper influence or official misconduct, People v. Freeman, 668 P.2d 1371, the conduct of the defendant before and during the interrogation and the defendant's mental condition at the time the statement is made. People v. Raffaelli, 647 P.2d 230. No single factor is necessarily controlling.

The trial court's order suppressing the statements made by the defendant at the sheriff's office was based primarily, if not exclusively, upon its finding that the defendant was quite emotionally upset during that interrogation. ¹ This determination was made prior to the announcement of our decision in People v. Smith, 716 P.2d 1115 (Colo.1986). We there held that an accused's emotional distress after learning of the death of the victim is not in itself a sufficient basis for the conclusion that the accused's statement is involuntary. It appears, therefore, that the trial court applied an erroneous standard in arriving at its ultimate determination.

In some circumstances, we might apply the appropriate legal standard to the findings heretofore made by the trial court and resolve the legal question at this juncture. However, the record contains diverse evidence introduced by both parties concerning events and conditions surrounding the defendant's communications to sheriff officials at various points in time. Indeed, the trial court did not find that the circumstances surrounding the defendant's ride to the hospital required suppression of the statement she made to Wood during that ride. Given this state of the record, we conclude that the case should be remanded to the trial court with directions to enter amended findings of fact in support of whatever conclusion it ultimately reaches in view of our decision in Smith. The trial court may conduct such further proceedings as it deems appropriate to enable it to make such findings and conclusions.

The trial court's order is vacated and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with the views expressed in this opinion.

QUINN, C.J., dissents.

DUBOFSKY and LOHR, JJ., join in the dissent.

QUINN, Chief Justice, dissenting:

I dissent. In suppressing the defendant's confession, the trial court closely scrutinized the evidence before it, made extensive findings of fact supported by adequate evidence, and applied the correct legal standard to the facts. Since the trial court's suppression order is not clearly erroneous, there is no warrant for this court's vacation of that order. Nonetheless, the majority sets aside the suppression ruling on the basis of People v. Smith, 716 P.2d 1115 (Colo.1986), as if that case created a new standard for evaluating the voluntariness of a confession, when in fact Smith involved nothing more than an application of long-standing principles of law to the evidentiary state of the record. In my view, the court today reaches a result that is fundamentally flawed.

I.

The majority ignores many salient facts in its narrative statement of the events leading up to the defendant's custodial statement to Officer Wood. The record shows that the defendant was verbally and physically abused by her husband while at home earlier in the evening and that the shooting occurred when her husband threatened to kill her if she did not give him a pistol which she had previously removed from a cupboard in the home. During the trip to the hospital with Officer Wood, the defendant was continually crying and somewhat hysterical and asked the officer several times whether her husband was all right. Upon arriving at the hospital the defendant was not only administered a blood alcohol test but also received treatment for a bump on the head, a cut with some dried blood, and some black marks which she had received in a fight with her husband that evening. While in the hospital, the defendant was told that her husband was going to be all right. It was not until she was leaving the hospital that Officer Wood told her that her husband was dead. Upon receiving this information the defendant fainted and fell to the floor. Officer Wood revived her and then drove her to the sheriff's office for a tape-recorded interview.

The tape-recorded interview commenced at 12:55 a.m. on September 16, 1984, with Officer Wood stating as follows:

O.K. Nancy, what I want to do is go through this whole thing as to what happened. More or less I need to get some background from you. You've been advised of your rights o.k. You still want to talk to me? I know you're upset, o.k. I know that you're hurting inside. But I need to talk to you if you're willing to talk to me o.k.

The transcript of the interrogation indicates that the defendant was crying at this time and requested three times to make a telephone call to her mother in order to determine what she should do. After stating that he would call the defendant's mother momentarily, Officer Wood then directed a series of questions to the defendant about the events surrounding the shooting and continued the interrogation for one hour and twenty minutes, with the defendant crying throughout...