People v. Waldon
| Decision Date | 23 January 2023 |
| Docket Number | S025520 |
| Citation | 14 Cal.5th 288,522 P.3d 1059,303 Cal.Rptr.3d 652 |
| Parties | The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Billy Ray WALDON, Defendant and Appellant. |
| Court | California Supreme Court |
Michael J. Hersek and Mary K. McComb, State Public Defenders, Karen Hamilton and Hassan Gorguinpour, Deputy State Public Defenders, for Defendant and Appellant.
Kamala D. Harris, Xavier Becerra and Rob Bonta, Attorneys General, Dane R. Gillette, Gerald A. Engler and Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorneys General, Julie L. Garland and James William Bilderback II, Assistant Attorneys General, Holly D. Wilkens, Arlene A. Sevidal, Kristine A. Gutierrez and Collette C. Cavalier, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.
A jury convicted Billy Ray Waldon of three counts of first degree murder ( Pen. Code, § 187 ; all undesignated statutory references are to this code) and several other crimes: attempted murder ( §§ 187, 664 ); arson (§ 451); forcible oral copulation and sexual penetration (former §§ 288a, 289, subd. (a)); rape (§ 261); two counts of burglary (§ 459); vehicle theft ( Veh. Code, § 10851, subd. (a) ); seven counts of robbery (§ 211); carrying a loaded firearm, an illegal switchblade knife, and a concealed dirk or dagger (former §§ 12031, subd. (a), 653k, 12020, subd. (a)); and two counts of animal cruelty (§ 597, subd. (a)). The jury found true the special circumstances of multiple murders (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(3)), murder during the commission of burglary and robbery (former § 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(i), (vii)) and murder to avoid arrest (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(5)), and it returned a verdict of death. Waldon's appeal is automatic. (§ 1239, subd. (b).)
Because of errors in granting Waldon's request to represent himself, we must reverse Waldon's conviction and sentence.
The prosecutor presented evidence that Waldon committed a series of crimes in the San Diego area over a two-week period in December 1985.
Dawn Ellerman and her daughter Erin Ellerman were killed in their home, which had been burned by an intense fire. Autopsies showed that the mother died of a gunshot wound before the fire and the daughter died of smoke inhalation. Investigators concluded the fire was set intentionally, and a relative testified that the Ellerman's computer was missing. A witness testified that she saw a man running out of the Ellerman house as it was burning and identified Waldon as the man she had seen.
Erin Lab testified that a man carrying a gun and wearing a dark ski mask broke into her apartment, ransacked the apartment, and raped her. At a lineup after his arrest the following summer, Lab identified Waldon as her assailant.
Four women testified about being robbed by a man in a dark ski mask: Carol Franklin, Nancy Ross, Diane Thomas, and Julia Meredith each had her purse stolen in the separate incidents. Thomas and Meredith later identified Waldon as the man who robbed them.
Responding to the last of these crimes, the Meredith robbery, police pursued a man in a blue Honda who drove over medians and onto the wrong side of the road as he sped away from them. Stopping with a flat tire, the man ran from his car and evaded the police. One of the officers later identified Waldon in a lineup as the driver who fled. In the Honda, which was registered to Waldon, police found a box of bullets as well as identification and other documents bearing Waldon's name. Police also found the Ellermans’ computer in the car, along with other items belonging to the Ellermans, to Erin Lab, and to Franklin, Ross, Thomas, and Meredith.
Nearby, just after the police chase, a man in a ski mask confronted Gordon Wells as he was working on a car. The man shot and killed Wells, and shot and wounded John Copeland, a neighbor who heard shots and went to assist Wells. At a lineup, Copeland tentatively identified Waldon as the shooter.
A ballistics expert testified that bullet fragments retrieved from Dawn Ellerman and Gordon Wells were fired from the same gun and were consistent with the ammunition found in Waldon's car.
One morning in June of the following year, Daniel Roman discovered that his 1965 Mustang was missing. Later that day, a driver in a car matching the description of Roman's sped away from police and fled on foot when they tried to stop him for a Vehicle Code infraction. Police apprehended and arrested the man, who gave his name as "Stephen Midas" but was later identified as Waldon.
Waldon represented himself at trial. His defense was that federal agents framed him for the charged crimes to thwart his efforts to promote world peace, spread new languages, and advance Cherokee autonomy.
Waldon testified that his grandfather was part Cherokee. After Waldon's discharge from the Navy in 1984, he founded several organizations: the World Humanitarian Church; the World Esperanto Organization; the World Poliespo Organization; the United Nations of Autonomous People; and the Exiled Government of the Cherokee Nation. Waldon claimed that Poliespo was a "rapid thinking" language that he invented by combining Esperanto, an international language, and Cherokee. Waldon also founded the Cherokee Bicycle Company to market a special bicycle to benefit Cherokee people.
Waldon claimed that he met a man named Mark Williams who kept appearing in various locations in Italy, Germany, and California, where Waldon was pursuing his education and activism. Waldon believed that Williams and another man were CIA agents who were monitoring him. Waldon testified that he tape-recorded some of his conversations with Williams but the tapes and other evidence proving Waldon's innocence had been in a storage unit and were destroyed after he stopped paying the rental fee.
Waldon testified that in late December 1985, he went to Imperial Beach to meet with Williams, who expressed interest in purchasing a bicycle from Waldon. Men wearing ski masks and shirts that said "Federal Agent" joined Williams in beating Waldon; they cursed Poliespo and Waldon's promotion of Indian autonomy. The men bound Waldon, took him away in their van, and kept him chained to a chair with a plastic hood over his head. Waldon managed to escape but learned from a news article that he was wanted for murder. He lived as a fugitive in a crawl space under a house in Imperial Beach, fearing that he would be convicted despite his innocence if he turned himself in.
According to Waldon's testimony, in June 1986, Williams and two other men found Waldon in his crawl space and kidnapped him again. Later, as the men were forcing him into a Mustang, Waldon was able to drive away and escape. When police tried to pull him over, Waldon drove away and then got out of the car and ran. As he ran, he threw down a gun he claimed Williams put in his clothing. Waldon denied any involvement in the charged crimes.
An inmate from the San Diego jail, Erwin Spruth, testified that he met Waldon in December 1985, before either had been arrested. Spruth noticed there was very little in the back of Waldon's Honda; he did not see the computer or suitcase that police later recovered from the car and identified as belonging to the Ellermans. A few days after Christmas, Spruth received a call from Mark Williams, who was looking for Waldon.
Birgitta Holenstein Sequoyah testified that she was Waldon's wife. She met him in San Francisco in July 1985 after overhearing a conversation between Waldon and Williams about American Indian autonomy. She was with Waldon when he went to meet with Williams. Holenstein stayed in the car at first but then followed Waldon and saw him being beaten by Williams and two other men in dark ski masks and shirts indicating they were federal agents. She heard one of the agents curse Waldon's involvement in Cherokee autonomy and Poliespo. She ran away but later saw Williams take Waldon's car and drive away in it. She never saw a computer, suitcase, purses, or a gun in Waldon's car.
Answering similar questions about his honesty and nonviolence, Holenstein and Spruth testified to Waldon's good character, as did Waldon's second wife, aunt, childhood friend, another inmate from the San Diego jail, and several people who knew Waldon from his attendance at Esperanto conferences.
An eyewitness to the police pursuit of Waldon's vehicle testified to the position of officers when the suspect fled, indicating that the suspect may have been out of sight of the officers. A city employee testified about the location of stop signs on the route of the chase, contradicting the description of a pursuing officer. And an expert explained factors that diminished the accuracy of eyewitness identification, including observing a person when he is running, during periods of high stress or danger, and when distinctive features are obscured, for example, by a ski mask.
In rebuttal, the prosecutor presented testimony from additional officers, who described the pursuit of Waldon's vehicle, and from Waldon's first wife, who testified that Waldon stole and lied when it suited him and made a game of trying to get away with it.
The prosecutor presented evidence connecting Waldon to crimes committed in Oklahoma between November 15 and 23, 1985: a man in a dark ski mask stole Cynthia Tankersley's purse and shot her in the head; a male assailant shot Anna Richman, whose purse was missing from the scene; and a man in a ski mask accosted Tammy Tvedt and Frank Hensley as they exited their car and shot them when they did not comply with his demand for money. Richman died from her wounds, but the other victims survived. Three ballistics experts testified that shell casings and bullets recovered from each of the Oklahoma crimes were fired from the same gun used to kill Ellerman and Wells in San Diego.
Waldon presented several witnesses who testified about his good character and humanitarian work promoting Poliespo, Esperanto, and Native...
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