Slaton v. State

Decision Date26 September 2003
PartiesNathan SLATON v. STATE of Alabama.
CourtAlabama Court of Criminal Appeals

Lajuana Sharonne Davis, Montgomery, for appellant.

William H. Pryor, Jr., atty. gen., and A. Vernon Barnett IV, asst. atty. gen., for appellee.

Alabama Supreme Court 1030312.

SHAW, Judge.

Nathan Slaton appeals the circuit court's denial of his Rule 32, Ala.R.Crim.P., petition for postconviction relief, in which he attacked his capital-murder conviction and his sentence of death.

On April 11, 1990, Slaton was convicted of the murder of 68-year-old Modenia Phillips; the murder was made capital because it was committed during the course of a rape, see § 13A-5-40(a)(3), Ala.Code 1975.1 The jury unanimously recommended that Slaton be sentenced to death for his conviction. The trial court accepted the jury's recommendation and sentenced Slaton to death. Slaton's conviction and sentence were affirmed on direct appeal, see Slaton v. State, 680 So.2d 877 (Ala.Crim.App.1993), on return to remand, 680 So.2d 879 (Ala.Crim.App.1995), aff'd, 680 So.2d 909 (Ala.1996), and the United States Supreme Court denied certiorari review, see Slaton v. Alabama, 519 U.S. 1079, 117 S.Ct. 742, 136 L.Ed.2d 680 (1997). A certificate of judgment was issued on July 30, 1996. In Slaton v. State, 680 So.2d 879 (Ala.Crim.App.1995), this Court summarized the facts of the crime as follows:

"[B]etween 8:30 a.m. and 9:00 a.m. on May 28, 1987, in Albertville, a neighbor saw 17-year-old Slaton in Mrs. Phillips's yard with a BB gun, shooting at birds. Mrs. Phillips was Slaton's next-door neighbor. A short while later, the neighbor saw Slaton standing by Mrs. Phillips's front door, then saw him go into the house. He came out about 30 minutes later, the neighbor testified.
"A friend of Mrs. Phillips's drove up about five minutes after the neighbor saw Slaton leave. The friend testified that he tried the front door, found the door unlocked, and went inside. He said he saw Mrs. Phillips lying on the bathroom floor, and when he tried to use the telephone to call for help, saw that it had been unplugged. The friend then left the house to get Mrs. Phillips's daughter, who worked nearby. When the pair returned to the house and Mrs. Phillips's daughter saw her mother's body, she called police and paramedics. Mrs. Phillips was dead when police arrived.
"The evidence showed that Mrs. Phillips had been raped, beaten about the head, strangled, and shot in the chest. Semen taken from the victim's vagina matched Slaton's blood type. Slaton was arrested the day after the murder. While being interrogated by police, he gave a statement in which he confessed to shooting Mrs. Phillips during a scuffle over a gun."

680 So.2d at 884-85.

Slaton, through counsel, filed his Rule 32 petition on January 29, 1998, raising 15 claims. The State filed a response to the petition and a motion to dismiss those claims in the petition that were subject to the procedural bars in Rule 32.2 and/or insufficiently pleaded pursuant to Rule 32.3 and Rule 32.6(b). The circuit court then dismissed several of the claims in Slaton's petition on the ground that they were barred by various provisions in Rule 32.2; it also dismissed several claims on the ground that they were insufficiently pleaded, but gave Slaton time to amend those claims to comply with Rule 32.3 and Rule 32.6(b). On August 11, 1998, December 16, 1999, and May 5, 2000, the circuit court conducted hearings on Slaton's petition. At the conclusion of the hearings, the circuit court permitted the parties time to file post-hearing briefs. On April 9, 2001, the circuit court issued a thorough 45-page written order denying Slaton's petition.

Initially, we note that "the plain error rule does not apply to Rule 32 proceedings, even if the case involves the death sentence." Cade v. State, 629 So.2d 38, 41 (Ala.Crim.App.1993). In addition, "[i]t is well settled that `the procedural bars of Rule 32 apply with equal force to all cases, including those in which the death penalty has been imposed.'" Nicks v. State, 783 So.2d 895, 901 (Ala.Crim.App.1999), quoting State v. Tarver, 629 So.2d 14, 19 (Ala.Crim.App.1993). When reviewing a circuit court's denial of a Rule 32 petition, this Court applies an abuse-of-discretion standard. See McGahee v. State, 885 So.2d 191 (Ala.Crim.App.2003). "`[I]f the circuit court is correct for any reason, even though it may not be the stated reason, we will not reverse its denial of the petition.'" Scroggins v. State, 827 So.2d 878, 880 (Ala.Crim.App.2001), quoting Reed v. State, 748 So.2d 231, 233 (Ala.Crim.App.1999).

I.

Slaton contends that the circuit court erred in adopting the State's proposed order as its own. Specifically, he argues that by adopting the State's proposed order, the circuit court denied him "a full and fair hearing by a neutral factfinder." (Slaton's brief at p. 64.)

As the State correctly points out in its brief to this Court, this issue was never presented to the circuit court; therefore, it is not properly before this Court for review. See, e.g., Whitehead v. State, 593 So.2d 126, 130 (Ala.Crim.App.1991)(holding that claim that the circuit court's order was deficient because it did not include specific findings of fact regarding each issue was not preserved for review where it was not raised in the circuit court).

However, even assuming that this issue is properly before this Court for review, it has no merit. "Alabama courts have consistently held that even when a trial court adopts verbatim a party's proposed order, the findings of fact and conclusions of law are those of the trial court and they may be reversed only if they are clearly erroneous." McGahee v. State, 885 So.2d 191, 229-30 (Ala.Crim.App.2003). See also Dobyne v. State, 805 So.2d 733 (Ala.Crim.App.2000), aff'd, 805 So.2d 763 (Ala.2001); Jones v. State, 753 So.2d 1174 (Ala.Crim.App.1999); Lawhorn v. State, 756 So.2d 971 (Ala.Crim.App.1999); and Grayson v. State, 675 So.2d 516 (Ala.Crim.App.1995). The findings and conclusions in the circuit court's order, even if initially drafted by the State, present a fair and accurate statement and analysis of the evidence presented to the court. In addition, the judge who presided over the Rule 32 proceedings and issued the order denying Slaton's petition is the same judge who presided over Slaton's trial and, therefore, was thoroughly familiar with the case. After reviewing the record, we have no doubt that the circuit court's order denying Slaton's Rule 32 petition represents the circuit court's independent judgment and its considered conclusions and, as explained more fully below, we conclude that those findings and conclusions are supported by the evidence and are not clearly erroneous. We find no error on the part of the circuit court in adopting the State's proposed order as its own.

II.

As the circuit court correctly noted in its order denying Slaton's petition, several of Slaton's claims are procedurally barred by various provisions of Rule 32.2. Although Slaton argues the merits of these claims in his brief on appeal, we need not address the merits because we conclude, as did the circuit court, that the claims are procedurally barred.

We find that the following claims are procedurally barred by Rule 32.2(a)(3) and (a)(5) because they could have been, but were not, raised and addressed at trial and on appeal:

1. That death by electrocution constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.
2. That the district attorney had a conflict of interest.2
3. That the trial court erred in not instructing the jury on felony murder as a lesser-included offense to the offense of capital murder.
4. That his death sentence is unconstitutional because it was imposed pursuant to a pattern of racial bias in the imposition of the death penalty in Alabama.

The following claims are procedurally barred by Rule 32.2(a)(3) and (a)(4) because they could have been, but were not, raised and addressed at trial, and they were raised and addressed on appeal:

1. That the trial court erred in admitting testimony from a transcript of an unauthenticated tape recording of Slaton's statement to police. See Slaton v. State, 680 So.2d at 888; Ex parte Slaton, 680 So.2d at 915.
2. That the trial court erred in not instructing the jury that it could reject Slaton's statement to police as involuntary. See Slaton v. State, 680 So.2d at 887-88; Ex parte Slaton, 680 So.2d at 914.
3. That the trial court erred in instructing the jury that only a portion of Slaton's statement to police had been admitted into evidence because some portions of the statement were inadmissible. See Slaton v. State, 680 So.2d at 885-86; Ex parte Slaton, 680 So.2d at 913.
4. That Slaton's death sentence is disproportionate to the sentences imposed in other cases because he was 17 years old at the time of the crime. See Slaton v. State, 680 So.2d at 909; Ex parte Slaton, 680 So.2d at 928-29.

Additionally, Slaton's claim that the trial court erred in admitting into evidence his statement to police is procedurally barred by Rule 32.2(a)(2) and (a)(4) because it was raised and addressed both at trial and on appeal. See Slaton v. State, 680 So.2d at 886-87; Ex parte Slaton, 680 So.2d at 913-14.

Because all of the above claims are procedurally barred by various provisions in Rule 32.2, the circuit court's denial of these claims was proper.

We also note that the following claims were raised in Slaton's petition and were addressed by the circuit court in its order, but are not pursued by Slaton on appeal:

1. That the State withheld exculpatory evidence in violation of Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 83 S.Ct. 1194, 10 L.Ed.2d 215 (1963).
2. That one of the prospective jurors on the venire did not answer questions truthfully during voir dire examination.
3. That Alabama's death-penalty statute is unconstitutional.
4. That the trial court erred in
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