Rowe v. State
| Decision Date | 07 April 1964 |
| Docket Number | No. 98,98 |
| Citation | 234 Md. 295,199 A.2d 785 |
| Parties | Willis Case ROWE v. STATE of Maryland. |
| Court | Maryland Court of Appeals |
Argued and reargued by Francis D. Murnaghan, Jr., Baltimore, for appellant.
Argued and reargued by Mathias J. DeVito, Asst. Atty. Gen. (Thomas B. Finan, Atty. Gen., of Baltimore; C. Burnam Mace, State's Atty. for Dorchester Co., Cambridge, and Alfred T. Truitt, Jr., State's Atty. for Wicomico Co., Salisbury, on the brief), for appellee.
Argued Nov. 14, 1963, before BRUNE, C. J., and HENDERSON, PRESCOTT, HORNEY and MARBURY, JJ.
Reargued Feb. 3, 1964, before BRUNE, C. J., and HENDERSON, HAMMOND, PRESCOTT, HORNEY, MARBURY and SYBERT, JJ.
The primary questions posed by this appeal arise out of the acceptance by the trial court of the jury verdict of 'not guilty of murder in the first degree but guilty of murder in the second degree' on the issue of guilt or innocence despite the fact that the jury had found on the issues of sanity and insanity that the defendant was insane at the time of trial ('insane now') in addition to also finding that he was sane at the time of the offense ('sane then').
The defendant shot and killed Bronza M. Parks on May 13, 1958. He was indicted for murder within less than a month and pled not guilty. Subsequently, he filed a special plea in writing that he was insane at the time of the commission of the crime. In June 1958, the lower court, pursuant to Code (1957) Art. 59, § 7, required a pretrial mental examination of the defendant. In September 1958, at the suggestion of the defendant, the case was removed from Dorchester County to Wicomico County for trial. In October 1958, as a result of the pretrial mental examination, counsel for the defendant moved to stay the proceedings alleging that the defendant was unable to understand the character of the charge against him and to assist in the preparation of his defense or to testify on his own behalf. In November 1958, the motion to stay was granted and the defendant was committed to Spring Grove State Hospital until his recovery. In January 1960, he was transferred from Spring Grove to Clifton T. Perkins State Hospital and remained there until July 1962.
During his confinement in Perkins, the defendant wrote the lower court a number of letters in which, among other things, he denied his guilt, insisted that he was not insane, informed the court that he was no longer represented by the attorney who had pled him insane, protested his inability to obtain a change of venue from the Eastern Shore to the Western Shore, and, despairing his ability to obtain effective counsel and a fair trial, offered to change his pleas to nolo contendere in order to be transferred to the penitentiary.
At the same time, the defendant continued to assert his sanity to the hospital staff and to seek a certification to that effect from the Department of Mental Hygiene so that he could be tried. In January 1962, the defendant was successful in convincing the staff at Perkins that he was competent to stand trial and that he should be returned to the county jail for that purpose. Accordingly, the superintendent notified the State's Attorney of Dorchester County that the defendant had sufficient mental capacity to advise counsel as to the conduct of his defense and requested that he be transferred from Perkins to the jail at Salisbury to await trial. After some delay in bringing about the transfer (during which habeas corpus was sought in the courts of Anne Arundel and Montgomery counties), the defendant was returned to jail in July 1962.
Upon his return to Salisbury, the trial court appointed new counsel to represent the defendant, but when he became dissatisfied with counsel so appointed and demanded the appointment of other counsel satisfactory to him, the court refused to do so and informed the defendant that any further petitions to the court should be submitted through court-appointed counsel. Subsequently, when the defendant refused to cooperate with such counsel, the court was advised of this fact in a petition for a sanity hearing and therein the court was further informed that counsel believed that the defendant was incapable of assisting in his defense and was insane, and that, for that reason, counsel would decline to present a 'justification defense' as the defendant had demanded, because he (the attorney) was of the opinion that the plea of 'insane then' was the only defense with a prospect of success. The trial began on February 4, 1963, and lasted five days. After the jury had been selected and sworn, the court conducted a hearing (out of the presence of the jury) and determined, on the basis of the testimony of the superintendent of Perkins, that the defendant was capable of standing trial and dismissed the petition of the court-appointed counsel. Thereupon, counsel for defendant filed an additional special plea of 'insane now.'
At the trial there was testimony to the effect that the defendant, who had contracted with the victim (a boatbuilder) to rig a skiff as a skipjack, came to the conclusion, after the work was finished and he had been billed therefor, that the boatbuilder had defrauded him. Both parties employed counsel to represent them with respect to the dispute. As the result of a conference between counsel and their respective clients, the defendant with another boatbuilder went to the boathouse of the victim to inspect the skipjack. After inconclusive conversation between the disputants, the defendant left first and was soon joined by the other boatbuilder outside the boathouse, but at the suggestion of the latter, the defendant returned to further negotiate with the victim. It was during this interval that the defendant killed the victim. There were no eyewitnesses to the shooting except the defendant, but the physical facts indicated that a scuffle had taken place and that the victim had struck the defendant with a strick of wood.
Of the nine expert witnesses--eight psychiatrists and one psychologist--five of them testified that the defendant was unable to distinguish right from wrong and to realize the nature and consequences of his act as applied to himself at the time of the offense, but two of them were of the opinion that the defendant was 'sane then.' Five of the experts testified as to the mental condition of the defendant at the time of trial. Three of them were of the opinion that he was either psychotic or did not have capacity to distinguish right from wrong at that time, but one of the three, even though he thought the defendant was still psychotic, was of the opinion that he was competent to understand the charge against him and to participate in his defense. A fourth, who was of the opinion that the defendant was mentally ill but not psychotic, also believed that he was capable of participating in his trial. The fifth stated that the defendant was probably able of participating in his trial. The fifth however, was of the opinion that the defendant was 'sane now.' One of the jailers testified that the defendant appeared normal while in jail awaiting trial. Other non-expert witnesses testified as to the abnormal behavior of the defendant prior to the commission of the crime.
At the close of the State's case, counsel for defendant moved for a judgment of acquittal, which was refused. The motion was renewed and denied at the close of the testimony.
In instructing the jury on the issues respecting the pleas of insane at the time of the offense and at the time of trial, the court advised the jury that the test it should apply in determining the mental condition of the defendant then as well as now was whether or not he had sufficient capacity and reason to enable him to distinguish right from wrong and understand the nature and consequences of his act as applied to himself. The questions as to sanity and insanity were submitted to the jury on two issues: was he 'sane or insane then?' and is he 'sane or insane now?' The jury was also furnished with a list of possible verdicts ranging from guilty of murder in the first degree to 'not guilty,' including an additional possible verdict of 'not guilty by reason of insanity.' Among other exceptions, one was interposed to the instructions because the court failed to inform the jury that it should not return a verdict on the indictment if it should find the defendant sane then and insane now on the issues. No exception was taken to the fact that the court did not point out a difference between tests for determining mental condition as of the time of the offense and as of the time of the trial (and the Legislature had never said there is a difference).
The jury found that the defendant was sane then and insane now on the issues of insanity and returned a verdict on the indictment of 'not guilty of murder in the first degree but guilty of murder in the second degree.' At the presentence conference in chambers (at which the defendant was present), the trial court decided not to strike out the verdict on the indictment and instead of committing the defendant to a mental institution until he recovered his sanity, it sentenced him to the penitentiary for a term of eighteen years, and stated that the sentence 'is to begin as of today,' which was February 27, 1963.
The questions presented by the appellant are: (i) whether the evidence produced at the trial was legally sufficient for the jury to have found beyond a reasonable doubt and to a moral certainty that the defendant was sane at the time of the offense; (ii) whether the defendant was denied a speedy trial; and (iii) whether it was illegal, inconsistent or an abuse of discretion to sentence the defendant to the statutory maximum period to run from the date of sentencing. Although an exception was taken to the instructions on the point, no question is raised on appeal as to the failure of the trial court to advise the jury that it should not return a verdict on the...
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