People v. Wallace

• Decision Date: 14 August 2008
• Docket Number: No. S033360.,S033360.
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Keone WALLACE, Defendant and Appellant.

189 P.3d 911

81 Cal.Rptr.3d 651

44 Cal.4th 1032

The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Keone WALLACE, Defendant and Appellant.

No. S033360.

Supreme Court of California.

August 14, 2008.

David Joseph Macher, Murrieta, under appointment by the Supreme Court, for Defendant and Appellant.

Bill Lockyer and Edmund G. Brown, Jr., Attorneys General, Robert R. Anderson, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Mary Jo Graves, Assistant Attorney General, Stephen G. Herndon and Alison Elle Alemán, Deputy Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

KENNARD, J.

A Fresno County jury convicted defendant Keone Wallace of the first degree murder (Pen.Code, § 187),¹ attempted rape (§§ 664/261, subd. (a)(2) [formerly subd. (2)]), and attempted robbery (§ 664/211, former § 212.5, subd. (b)) of Hazel Hamilton, and of residential burglary (§§ 459 & 460). It found true special circumstance allegations of murder in the commission or attempted commission of three felonies: robbery (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(A), formerly subd. (a)(17)(i)), rape (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(C), formerly subd. (a)(17)(iii)), and burglary (§ 190.2, subd. (a)(17)(G), formerly subd. (a)(17)(vii)). After a penalty trial, the jury returned a verdict of death. The trial court denied the automatic motion to modify the verdict (§ 190.4, subd. (e)) and sentenced defendant to death.² This appeal is automatic. (§ 1239, subd. (b).) We affirm the judgment in its entirety.

I. FACTS

A. Guilt Phase

1. Prosecution's case

In January 1991, Hazel C. Hamilton, an 83-year-old widow, lived alone in a house on East Madison Avenue in the City of Fresno. She had poor eyesight, wore thick-lensed glasses, and suffered from arthritis causing her to walk with a cane.

Eulalia Gauss lived next door to Hamilton. During the evening of January 21, 1991, Gauss heard loud noises coming from Hamilton's house and went outside to investigate. She noticed that Hamilton's back bedroom window was wide open, and she saw a man wearing dark pants and a light-colored shirt, with something covering his hands. He appeared to be breaking things inside Hamilton's house.

Gauss awakened her husband, who telephoned police. Officers arrived at the scene shortly after 10:00 p.m. Officer Fred Manfredi could hear what sounded like furniture being moved and drawers being emptied inside the house, prompting him to radio his fellow officer, Raymond Sandoval, that the intruder might still be inside. Seeing a bent window screen on the ground outside the open bedroom window, Manfredi went to the front of the house to investigate. The front door was partially open and defendant was standing inside the doorway. Manfredi announced his presence and ordered defendant to show his hands, but defendant turned and ran through the house. After sending a radio warning to officers watching the rear of the house, Manfredi entered through the front with two other officers.

At the rear of the house, Officer Sandoval and Officer Al Hernandez saw defendant dive out the open bedroom window. The officers ordered him to the ground, but he did not comply, so they pushed him down. Defendant struggled until Officer Sandoval subdued him using a flashlight. The officers eventually handcuffed defendant. Defendant said "They made me do it" several times, and he warned the officers that "the other guys" were getting away. He added that he "knew the lady" and "hoped that she didn't die."

A white T-shirt was wrapped around defendant's head, and he wore a beige jacket and a pair of jeans buttoned at the top only. Defendant's belt was unfastened. He had on unlaced blue athletic shoes, and he had covered his hands with dirty, worn socks. What appeared to be bloodstains were visible on defendant's T-shirt, socks, and shoes.

Police found Hazel Hamilton lying on the floor of her home about four feet inside the front door. She was breathing but unresponsive. Her dress was pulled up around her waist, the crotch of her underwear was torn, and her stockings were around her knees. She had several injuries to her head, throat, and shoulders, and her eyes were swollen shut. Blood was on her face and dress. Her eyeglasses and dentures were on the floor near her head. Paramedics took Hamilton to Valley Medical Center.

Dr. Diane Ruschke examined Hamilton and, determining her condition to be life-threatening, had Hamilton connected to a ventilator. A brain scan revealed massive bleeding and swelling in the brain, which Ruschke attributed to trauma. A neurosurgeon performed emergency surgery to alleviate the pressure on the brain.

The next day, January 22, 1991, Ruschke performed a sexual assault examination on Hamilton, observing in the vaginal area bruising that was consistent with forceful sexual penetration and that appeared to be between 12 and 24 hours old. No semen was detected during the examination, and sexual assault kits for both defendant and Hamilton were negative for the presence of semen or sperm.

On January 23, 1991, Hamilton experienced Cushing's Response, indicating brain herniation at the base of the skull. She was removed from life support and died.

Dr. Jerry Nelson performed an autopsy. He noted substantial blunt force trauma to Hamilton's upper body, with injuries that included two black eyes and multiple bruises on her head, face, neck, and shoulders. The bruises on Hamilton's neck were consistent with blunt force trauma and strangulation. Nelson determined that the cause of death was a combination of strangulation and blunt force trauma to the head, most likely caused by a fist rather than an object because of the absence of skull fractures.

Examination of the crime scene revealed that Hamilton's house had been ransacked. Dresser and cabinet drawers had been pulled out and overturned, their contents strewn about the floor. Mattresses from two beds had been turned over, as was a sofa cushion from a sleeper sofa in the living room. Smaller items also were disturbed: A container of jewelry was overturned; contents of a wicker basket were spilled onto the floor; identification cards and miscellaneous papers from a wallet were spread about the house. An empty wallet was found in front of a love seat in the living room.

The southwest bedroom window had been forced open, as shown by scratches on its latch and locking mechanism and the presence of paint and wood chips underneath. Defendant could have made three of the handprints and fingerprints found on the window and its frame. Police found a mountain bike in the alleyway behind Hamilton's house.

Delia Heredia, a Department of Justice criminalist, compared the athletic shoes defendant was wearing at the time of his arrest with photographs of shoe impressions taken outside murder victim Hamilton's home. Although Heredia could not make a positive match, she stated that defendant's left shoe was consistent in size, sole pattern, and wear with a shoe impression near the open bedroom window by which the intruder had entered Hamilton's house.

Heredia also tested defendant's and Hamilton's clothing for the presence of human blood. Defendant's right shoe, the socks worn on his hands, his jeans, T-shirt, and jacket all tested positive, with a blood type consistent with Hamilton's. According to Heredia, most of the blood on defendant's clothing was transferred or smeared from the source, rather than resulting from blood spatter. Hamilton's dress also tested positive for blood consistent with her blood type, which she shared with 5 percent of the general population.

After defendant's arrest at Hamilton's house, Officer Sandoval transported him to Valley Medical Center and eventually to jail. Sandoval noted that although defendant's breath smelled of alcohol, he did not appear to be intoxicated. At Valley Medical Center, Dr. Thomas Utrecht treated defendant, observing abrasions on his forehead and scalp and bruising to the right side of his chest.

When medical personnel collected defendant's blood samples, he resisted, requiring two officers to restrain him. Defendant also resisted Officer Sandoval's collection of defendant's pubic hair samples, making offensive gestures and using foul language. Defendant's blood sample tested negative for drugs but positive for alcohol, with a concentration of 0.19 percent. Ernest Lykissa, Ph. D., the director of forensic toxicology at Pathological and Clinical Services in Fresno when the samples were tested, estimated that defendant's maximum blood-alcohol level at the time of his arrest was 0.21 percent. According to Lykissa, a person who habitually consumes alcohol can develop a tolerance to it, thereby reducing the impairment resulting from its consumption.

At the time of his arrest, defendant lived with Latasha Rice and her cousin in an apartment about one mile from, and on the same street as, murder victim Hamilton's house. Rice saw defendant between 11:00 a.m. and noon on the day Hamilton's house was burglarized; he did not appear to be intoxicated or under the influence of drugs.

When defendant's mother, Sharon Sperling, visited him in jail, he said he did not harm Hamilton and had been beaten by police officers. Sperling later met with Deputy District Attorney Gary Hoff. At the time of trial, Sperling could not recall what she told Hoff, but she believed she told him that defendant had been drinking beer and watching television at a friend's house on the night Hamilton was attacked.

Hoff testified that Sperling told him defendant had consumed beer at a friend's house, and when defendant was riding his bike home, he was cut off by a police car. A second police car arrived, and defendant was beaten by police officers. Defendant denied being at murder victim Hamilton's house or assaulting her.

2. Defense case

Defendant testified in his own behalf at trial. He said that on January 21, 1991, he awoke around 9:00 a.m. and around noon bought two 40-ounce cans of malt liquor, which he drank at home. Around 2:00 p.m., defendant rode his bicycle...