State v. Arnold

• Decision Date: 12 June 1991
• Docket Number: No. 245A90,245A90
• Citation: 404 S.E.2d 822,329 N.C. 128
• Parties: STATE of North Carolina v. Donna Jones ARNOLD.
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court

Page 822

404 S.E.2d 822

329 N.C. 128

STATE of North Carolina v. Donna Jones ARNOLD.

No. 245A90.

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

June 12, 1991.

Appeal by the State pursuant to N.C.G.S. § 7A-30(2) from a decision of a divided panel of the Court of Appeals, 98 N.C.App. 518, 392 S.E.2d 140 (1990), reversing in part the judgment of imprisonment entered by Stevens, J., on 15 February 1988 in Superior Court, Sampson County. Defendant petitioned for, and this Court allowed, discretionary review of additional issues. Heard in the Supreme Court, 14 March 1991.

Lacy H. Thornburg, Atty. Gen. by Ellen B. Scouten, Asst. Atty. Gen., Raleigh, for the State.

Bass and Bryant by Gerald L. Bass and John Walter Bryant, Raleigh, for defendant-appellee/appellant.

MARTIN, Justice.

Defendant was indicted for murder in the first degree and conspiracy to commit murder in the first degree for the stabbing death of her husband, Robert Daniel Arnold, Jr. Trial was held at the 15 February 1988 Criminal Session of Sampson County Superior Court before the Honorable Henry L. Stevens, III. On 16 March 1988, the jury returned guilty verdicts of conspiracy and murder in the second degree. Judge Stevens imposed consecutive sentences of fifteen years imprisonment for murder and ten years for conspiracy. ¹ Defendant appealed to the Court of Appeals, which held that the trial court erred by submitting as a possible verdict murder in the second degree. The Court affirmed the conspiracy conviction. The State appealed with respect to the murder charge, and defendant cross-appealed with respect to the conspiracy conviction. We agree with the decision of the Court of Appeals and therefore affirm.

On Wednesday, 18 July 1984, the lifeless body of Dan Arnold, Minister of Music at Immanuel Baptist Church in Clinton, was discovered by his wife, their children, and friends in the church parking lot. He had been stabbed and beaten about the head, and his wife's purse was found near his body. We note that this case received much publicity through television, radio, and newspaper accounts. Suspicion immediately focused on Carl Stuffel, a twenty-two-year-old barber who had lived with the Arnolds during the spring of 1984. Stuffel had learned his trade while in prison for breaking and entering. Stuffel admitted that he had taken drugs since he was a young boy and had engaged in numerous criminal activities over the years. Dan Arnold, who was commuting from Clinton to Wake Forest, N.C. to attend classes at Southeastern Baptist Seminary, met Stuffel on Valentine's Day of 1984 at the Valley Style Shop in Crabtree Valley Mall in Raleigh. Dan entered the shop with the owner's nephew and Stuffel cut his hair. Dan suggested that they have dinner together, and later that night the pair engaged in a homosexual relationship in a Raleigh motel. Stuffel told Dan about his problems with drugs and that he was currently charged with larceny of a firearm. Believing that he could help Stuffel with his problems, Dan eventually invited him to come live with his family at their home in Clinton, apparently before consulting with defendant. Defendant opposed Dan's decision because of Stuffel's criminal record, his involvement with drugs, and the possible effect his presence would have on the Arnolds' two young daughters. However, Dan persisted and took his family to meet Stuffel and his parents. Sometime after Easter of 1984, Stuffel moved into the Arnold home.

Defendant testified that just before Stuffel moved into their home, Dan asked her to allow Stuffel to impregnate her. Dan had had a vasectomy and he wished for Stuffel to be a substitute father. He also told his wife that Stuffel needed an ego boost and this would solve both problems. Defendant's negative reaction upset Dan and she finally agreed in order to calm him. Later, Dan decided that this idea was inappropriate. Shortly after Stuffel moved to Clinton, defendant found a canceled check to a Raleigh motel. When she confronted Dan about it, he made up an explanation. That evening, he gave her a long letter to read while he and Stuffel took the babysitter home. In the letter, Dan confessed that he had been a homosexual since childhood, had had male lovers in every place they had lived, and had had a one-night affair with Stuffel. Defendant became very upset and left the house, driving around for several hours. Although she considered leaving Dan, she decided that she still loved him and that their relationship and family were worth saving. The next day, however, she and Stuffel began a sexual relationship.

Versions of defendant's relationship with Stuffel vary. Several months after the murder, defendant admitted to police that she had been involved with Stuffel briefly. She told them that he had encouraged her by saying that she had an opportunity to get even with her husband. She gave in to Stuffel on three occasions. At trial, defendant testified that Stuffel had raped her and then coerced her by threatening to expose Dan's bisexuality to the community and to harm her children. She did not tell investigators that she had been raped because she continued to feel threatened by Stuffel. Stuffel testified that the relationship was voluntary and had lasted several weeks. He also testified that he loved defendant deeply at that time.

After Dan's revelation, Stuffel began to belittle Dan at every opportunity. He also began to declare openly his love for Donna. On 18 May 1984, Dan went to his doctor for help with his nerves. He was tearful, crying, and suffering from low self-esteem. He told the doctor that he had seen his wife and Stuffel on the bed together; he worried that Carl was younger and better looking. The doctor prescribed a mild tranquilizer.

On 22 May, Stuffel asked Daniel Staten, a friend of Dan's, where he could obtain marijuana. Staten reported the conversation to Dan, who decided to evict Stuffel from his home. The Arnolds packed Stuffel's belongings and found a knife among his things. After telling Stuffel never to return, Dan took his family, along with Staten and his wife, to the beach. At Dan's request, Staten confronted defendant about her affair with Stuffel. Staten testified that she never responded and started crying.

In early June 1984, Stuffel was sick from drug use and called the Arnolds begging for help. They allowed him to come back to Clinton briefly and, at his request, committed him to Dorothea Dix Hospital. The sheriff's deputy who drove Stuffel and the Arnolds to Dix testified that only Donna Arnold could control Stuffel. The Arnolds left for a week in the mountains, but wrote and called Stuffel frequently.

When they returned, the Arnolds visited Stuffel at Dix several times a week and took him out of the hospital on several occasions. Bill Dubrick, Stuffel's therapist, testified that at first he thought the physical contact he observed between Stuffel and the Arnolds was religious, but later realized that it was "a sexual feeling type thing." The staff at Dix had to ask them to stop touching because it was disruptive to the other patients. When discussing options for the future, Stuffel suggested that he could kill Dan. Stuffel brought this up repeatedly and Dan was warned about it. Dan told Dubrick that he would lose his position with his church if he did not end his relationship with Stuffel, but Dan said that he would rather move. Defendant found a resume dated 8 June 1984 in Dan's papers after his death.

On 5 July 1984, Stuffel asked permission to leave Dix on a weekend pass. Dan initially agreed that Stuffel could visit them in Clinton for the weekend, but he later called back to revoke his permission. Dan was hysterical because, he said, defendant had told him about her affair with Stuffel. The next day, Dan called again to give his permission for Stuffel to come for the weekend. However, the Dix staff decided not to allow the visit. That weekend, the Arnolds brought Stuffel's car and belongings to Raleigh and told him never to return to their home. Dubrick testified that Stuffel was depressed after their visit and was sure that defendant still loved him and wanted to be with him.

Jerald Tart testified under a limited grant of immunity. He had known Stuffel since high school, when the pair would burglarize homes and rob businesses together. Both eventually served prison terms for their crimes. Tart testified that while Stuffel was at Dix, he visited him there, but he had to use a false name because the staff feared that Tart might bring Stuffel drugs. On one of the visits, Stuffel asked Tart to kill Dan. Stuffel gave Tart a map and a key to the church, which Stuffel said that Donna had given him. Defendant was to send her husband back to the church to get her purse after choir practice on Wednesday night, 4 July 1984. Tart testified that he decided not to commit the murder and he later returned the key to Stuffel. Tart met Stuffel and the Arnold family on Saturday, 7 July 1984, at the Hayes-Barton swimming pool in Raleigh. Tart testified that defendant asked him if he could help them with their problem. At that time, Dan was playing with the children out of earshot of Tart, Stuffel and defendant. When Tart responded that he did not think he could help them, Stuffel commented that he would like to drown Dan. Dix records indicate that the trip to the swimming pool actually occurred on 30 June 1984.

Stuffel testified that defendant initially approached him about killing Dan when they first took him out of Dix on a pass. He asked her to think about getting a divorce, but she responded that a divorce would be too difficult on the children. Her first suggestion was to have someone attack Dan at night while he was walking the dog. On her next visit, she brought a key to the church. Stuffel testified that Tart actually went to Clinton on 4 July but was unable to carry out the plan because there were police officers in the area. Defendant sent Dan back to the church as...