Pfeiffer v. State

• Decision Date: 07 November 1979
• Docket Number: No. 119,119
• Citation: 44 Md.App. 49,407 A.2d 354
• Parties: David Albert PFEIFFER v. STATE of Maryland.
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

Page 49

44 Md.App. 49

407 A.2d 354

David Albert PFEIFFER v. STATE of Maryland.

No. 119.

Court of Special Appeals of Maryland.

Nov. 7, 1979.

Reconsideration Granted Dec. 13, 1979.

George E. Burns, Jr., Asst. Public Defender, with whom was Alan H. Murrell, Public Defender, on brief, for appellant.

Diane G. Goldsmith, Asst. Atty. Gen., with whom were Stephen H. Sachs, Atty. Gen., and Warren Argued before THOMPSON, MOYLAN and MacDANIEL, JJ.

B. Duckett, Jr., State's Atty. for Anne Arundel County, on brief, for appellee.

THOMPSON, Judge.

On the evening of December 12, 1977, shortly after 11:00 p. m. Trooper Greg Presbury of the Maryland State Police stopped David Albert Pfeiffer, the appellant, on Maryland Route 3 in Anne Arundel County. Presbury was shot and later died from his wounds and appellant was also shot. Julianna Snyder and Rita Jones, communications officers with the Maryland State Police, received a transmission from Trooper Presbury on December 12, 1977, at approximately 11:20 p. m. After doing a license check on the name supplied by Trooper Presbury, "Yancey Wesley Vine," Ms. Snyder discovered that there was no record of a driver's license for that name. According to Ms. Jones, when Trooper Presbury supplied the tag number for the vehicle, her check indicated that the tags were registered to an "Anna May Jones" on Falls Road in Cockeysville, who coincidentally was her aunt. When she advised Trooper Presbury that she knew the subject and that the tags were registered to a '73 Gremlin which had been traded, Trooper Presbury informed her that the tags were on a '65 or '66 Chevrolet. The Trooper requested a back-up, stating that "something looked weird." In a few minutes an unknown citizen came on the radio and his only words were, "Send help, your trooper's been hurt."

James Lane was driving on Route 3 when he heard shots and saw a police car on the side of the road behind another car. Lane stated that he heard "four or five rapid fire shots" and saw "somebody started running from the back part of the car that had the flashing blue light on it; and he fell just like somebody hit him from behind with something. I assumed it was a bullet; and he went down on the ground; and he faded right into the ground." Lane stated that he was unable to identify the man who did the shooting but the man was somewhere between the police car and the guardrail. Lane saw the man depart in a dirty blue or dark green Chevrolet at a high rate of speed with the lights out. Another passerby, Gene Fogle, saw the trooper lying on the ground behind the A dark green car was discovered without license plates the day after the shooting near the Edison Electric Company which was owned by John Raap, appellant's former employer. The car contained blood on the driver's side. John Raap testified that he was with appellant during the early evening prior to the shooting and that appellant seemed stable at that time. Later that evening appellant returned wounded and armed, seeking help and threatening Raap. Raap said appellant "was hysterical or out of his mind." Raap then accompanied appellant in search of John Hayslip. After finding Hayslip, appellant let Raap go. Hayslip said that he attempted to console appellant, and tended to his wounds. Appellant repeatedly told Hayslip that he had shot a police officer.

police car and observed another individual running to get to his car parked in front of the police car. Fogle testified that the individual took off in a fast manner. Fogle then went to the police car and radioed for help. Another witness, Joseph Malone, Jr., who lived approximately fifty yards from Route 3, testified that on December 12, 1977, he saw a police car and a dark car on Route 3 and noticed someone raise the hood of the dark car. Presbury's body was found to be forty-two feet from the rear of the police car. Six .45 caliber shell casings and one bullet were recovered at the scene of the crime.

Thomas Mathias, a co-worker of appellant's, said that during the month they had worked together appellant had confided that he disliked driving his car because it had stolen tags and "if he ever got pulled over by an officer that he would have to shoot it out with him because he was in violation of parole and he didn't want to go back to prison."

Appellant testified stating that he was armed because his life had been threatened by former inmates at the Maryland Penitentiary. He offered the following testimony as to what ensued between him and Presbury:

"I got the car and he asked me for some ID so I give him these two cards. You stipulated and uh, I gave him these two cards and I said officer, listen, I have no I don't have no driver's license. I says I just got out of the joint, that's what I said, not, you "So I approached him and he asked me . . . he said something again. I don't know what he said . . . I says officer, what'd you say? I looks like somebody gettin' maybe he thought I was indignant or somethin', you know, making funny kind of motions and all, I approached him, I says what'd you say officer and heavy traffic was heavy traffic was coming by and I guess he couldn't hear me. Too good. Oh well, at that point he put his, one of his hands real fast down by his side like going for his service revolver . . . I said man, I said what's this. So I got scared, took a couple steps back, then first thing I know I seen a flash and heard a bang, you know what I mean. Like a I went down and I was scared and confused at that time. I don't know what was going on. So trying to on my hands and knees trying to crawl away and I hear another bang. I think that time I got hit in the hip, the buttock, I'm not sure but it felt like it there.

know, not too educated and I just kind of stutter and I said well, I mean I just got out of the Penitentiary. [407 A.2d 356] I didn't want to be disrespectful to him.

Q. You were armed at this time?

A. Yes I was armed but I din't display no weapon.

Q. What were you armed with?

A. A 45 automatic."

Testimony was presented as to appellant's mental capacity by Raap and Hayslip. Both stated that appellant had violent shifts of mood. Medical records were also introduced showing appellant, 40 years of age at the time of the trial, was placed in mental institutions twice when a teenager. The records and reports from the Clifton T. Perkins Hospital, where he had been examined to determine his capacity to stand trial and his sanity at the time of the crime, were also introduced into evidence. All of the reports were admitted subject to exception as was the testimony of two experts, who had examined the appellant at Perkins. Both experts had found Edmond Rozecki, a psychologist, ² diagnosed appellant as being sociopathic, with strong antisocial tendencies. He testified that:

                appellant sane at the time of the crime and able to stand trial.  1 A summary of their other testimony follows
                

"(T)his individual shows poor judgment and failure to learn from experience. He has antisocial behavior without apparent compunction, in other words his behavior is almost feelingless. He possesses a specific loss of insight. He is not capable of looking into the meaning of his behavior, from a viewpoint such as most normal people demonstrate. He mimics human personality, but really is unable to feel he doesn't have the feeling. He definitely is emotionally immature. I mentioned before he his he uses poor judgment and as you study some of the previous history that goes back, not to 1957 but 56 and even further, this type of poor judgments and immaturity existed then.

"His behavior is guided by impulse and current needs. When he does something, he's doing it N-O-W, NOW. He's not thinking, what does it mean five minutes from now or the next day. His whole attitude and thinking is along these lines.

"He's definitely a very aggressive personality. Person. The future if it exists for him is in a very vague and faint way and as a result he has to gratify his needs now. He treats other people as objects, instead of persons as a person, and he has no feeling of guilt about it. It's a he acts on impulse as I mentioned and without forethought. And he achieves his own satisfactions without concern for the effects his actions will have on others.

"This describes he's also a person, I mentioned, he doesn't learn from experience. The more you punish him the punishment is not gonna make him "This kind of a person for instance, when he is involved in a crime, the crimes are senseless. They make no sense."

better. You give him punishment, it just confirms in his mind how horrible the world is on the outside. He's a definitely that type of person and that's when I use the term sociopathic, I'm talking of that kind of a person.

Dr. Michael Spodak, a psychiatrist, testified:

"Q. Well with respect to the capacity of Mr. Pfeiffer to control himself on a day-to-day environment, I wonder if you would explain to His Honor with respect to his personality profile, how that profile might affect his capacity to make judgment, insight, control himself, and to react to threatening situations?

"A. Well first to say that the diagnosis that we made was consistent with diagnoses made from hospital reports we reviewed dating back perhaps twenty years or more, including Taylor Manor and some of the state hospitals. And the reason I mention that is because, again the suggestion that this has gone on for essentially all his life and reviewing some of their reports which describe him as being rebellious, hostile, aggressive and so on, suggests that there are many times in his life when he is unable to control those aggressive feelings; they get him in trouble not only with the law, but also in terms of being committed, two physician commitments to State hospitals and so on. And that he goes through life some of the time being able to control himself, and some of the time he kind of erupts."

Dr. Spodak also testified as to how appellant...