State v. Burkhalter
| Decision Date | 05 September 1975 |
| Docket Number | No. 56099,56099 |
| Citation | 319 So.2d 392 |
| Parties | STATE of Louisiana, Appellee, v. Eddie BURKHALTER, Appellant. |
| Court | Louisiana Supreme Court |
Robert A. Connell, Jackson, Stanley E. Branton, St. Francisville, for defendant-appellant.
William J. Guste, Jr., Atty. Gen., Barbara Rutledge, Asst. Atty. Gen., Leon A. Picou, Jr., Dist. Atty., Cynthia P. Branton, Asst. Dist. Atty., for plaintiff-appellee.
The defendant, an inmate at the state penitentiary, is convicted of murdering McAllister, another inmate, on November 11, 1972. La.R.S. 14:30 (1950). He was sentenced to life imprisonment.
On his appeal, he urgues four principal errors. Although close issues are presented by two of them, we find no clearly erroneous abuse of the trial court's discretion and no other reversible error. We therefore affirm.
The most serious issue arises from the trial court's failure to allow evidence of a heated argument between the accused Burkhalter and the victim McAllister some five to ten minutes before the killing. The trial court held that evidence of prior threats could not be admitted because no overt act had been proved, as required by La.R.S. 15:482 (1952).
This enactment provides: 'In the absence of hostile demonstration or of overt act on the part of the person slain or injured, evidence of his dangerous character or of his threats against the accused is not admissible.'
The context facts are:
Shortly before the killing, McAllister wearing only shorts had gone into a closet washroom. He had a plastic bucket and some dirty clothes, which were found half washed after the killing. He had in fact nothing even resembling a weapon with him.
A guard heard a yell. He saw Burkhalter backing out of the washroom. McAllister was holding Burkhalter's left hand, which held a long dagger made of twisted wire. McAllister had been stabbed. After a short struggle, McAllister fell to the floor, dead (stabbed through the heart).
The defendant then called as his witness another inmate present at the time. Because no overt act had been proved, the trial court sustained the State's objection to testimony of the violent argument five to ten minutes earlier, apparently to show that McAllister had then threatened Burkhalter. On this objection, the defense withdrew the question.
On resumed defense questioning of the inmate, this witness then stated that, seconds before the yell, McAllister had come out of the washroom as Burkhalter was walking in the hall. The inmate testified that McAllister held the wash bucket tilted, his hand inside it. Burkhalter then walked to McAllister and grabbed him, and the tussle started which resulted in McAllister's death.
The defense then once more commenced to introduce evidence of the prior threats by McAllister and of McAllister's violent character.
The trial court held that, under all the circumstances, McAllister's coming out of the closet with his hand in the bucket did not constitute an overt act or hostile demonstration. It therefore refused to permit introduction of evidence of the prior threats and of the prior argument just five-ten minutes previous.
We agree with counsel for the defendant that the issue is not whether, in fact, McAllister had a weapon the bucket but, rather, in the light of threats just previously made by McAllister, Burkhalter was at the time in reasonable apprehension of attack by him. We are also inclined to agree with the defense contention that the argument and threats just a few minutes earlier were relevant evidence by which the jury could evaluate the reasonableness of Burkhalter's belief.
Arguably, under the broad Louisiana interpretations of res gestae, evidence of the argument immediately preceding by some ten minutes the fatal encounter should have been admitted into evidence. See La.R.S. 15:448: 'To constitute res gestae the circumstances and declarations must be necessary incidents of the criminal act, or immediate concomitants of it, or form in conjunction with it one continuous transaction.' Presumably, if the State had sought to introduce this evidence in explanation of Burkhalter's attack on McAllister, the issue would have been resolved in favor of admissibility.
Nevertheless, in the light of the entire record, we are not quite prepared to hold that the trial court's finding that no overt hostile act occurred is so clearly erroneous as to warrant reversal of this conviction.
A man clad only in shorts who walks out of a washroom with his hand in a plastic bucket under usual circumstances does not constitute a hostile attack. Granted that the occurrence could take on a dangerous appearance in the context of a penitentiary corridor, nevertheless the uncontradicted evidence (most favorably to the defendant) is that McAllister simply walked out into the hall with the bucket, that Burkhalter (armed with a dagger) immediately approached him, grabbed him, and entered into a struggle in which the unarmed McAllister was stabbed to death.
Under these facts, we cannot say that the trial court clearly erred in holding that, whether or not the prior threats had in fact been made, Burkhalter could not reasonably have believed that McAllister's entry into the hall from the wash closet, hand in bucket, constituted a hostile act entitling Burkhalter to use violence in self-defense.
Thus, we find no reversible error in this assignment. However, we do so with the caution that normally such evidence so closely connected in time and place may well be admissible as relevantly explaining the...
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State v. Lee
...established before the dangerous-character and threat evidence concerning the decedent may be introduced. La.R.S. 15:482. State v. Burkhalter, 319 So.2d 392 (La.1975); State v. Houston, 316 So.2d 724 (La.1975); State v. Jackson, 308 So.2d 265 (La.1975); State v. Walker, 296 So.2d 310 (La.19......
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State v. King
...4. Nonetheless, as we now view that ruling, in light of State v. Lee, supra and the line of cases it followed, including State v. Burkhalter, 319 So.2d 392 (La.1975), the ruling was incorrect. In Lee, supra at 459, we held that a 1952 amendment to Louisiana Revised Statute 15:482 required t......
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State v. Jackson, 81-KA-0422
...to introduce testimony concerning the victim's dangerous character will not be disturbed absent a finding of clear error. State v. Burkhalter, 319 So.2d 392 (La.1975). In this case, the determination that an overt act had not been shown was clearly erroneous; therefore, all admissible evide......
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State v. Simmons
... ... Lee, 331 So.2d 455 (La. 1975); State v. Groves, 311 So.2d 230 (La. 1975). The inquiry is not whether in fact the decedent was going to inflict great bodily harm on the defendant, but whether the defendant reasonably was in apprehension of an attack by the victim. State v. Burkhalter, 319 So.2d 392 (La. 1975). In the absence of evidence (not proof) of hostile demonstration or of overt act by the victim, evidence of his threats or dangerous character is not admissible. La.Acts 1952, No. 239, § 1 (now enrolled as R.S. 15:482) amending former C.Cr.P. 482. State v. Lee, supra ... ...