State v. Dortch

• Citation: 139 Conn. 317,93 A.2d 490
• Court: Supreme Court of Connecticut
• Decision Date: 09 December 1952
• Parties: STATE v. DORTCH. DORTCH v. STATE. Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut

Page 490

93 A.2d 490

139 Conn. 317

STATE v. DORTCH.

DORTCH v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

Dec. 9, 1952.

Francis F. McGuire, New London, with whom was John F. Gallagher, Westerly, R. I., for appellant (defendant in the first case and plaintiff in the second).

Robert P. Anderson, State's Atty., New London, for appellee (state).

Before BROWN, C. J., and JENNINGS, BALDWIN, INGLIS and O'SULLIVAN, JJ.

JENNINGS, Associate Justice.

These two appeals were argued together. In the first Dortch appeals from his conviction of first degree murder. He assigns error in the denial of his motion to set aside the verdict, in the charge and in rulings made upon the trial. In the second he appeals from a judgment entered for the state on the sustaining of a demurrer to his petition for a new trial. The denial of the motion to set aside the verdict will be considered first.

The statement of facts in the state's brief is a fair recital of the facts which the jury reasonably could have found. It is, in substance, as follows: Dortch had known the deceased, Dorothy Sebastian, casually for about ten years, but beginning in November, 1947, he began to see her more frequently. She was married and lived with her husband and three minor children on the third floor of a tenement house on the north side of the Stonington-Westerly Road in Stonington. Dortch himself was divorced. Commencing in February, 1948, he and Mrs. Sebastian adopted an adulterous relationship which resulted in her husband's leaving his home in April, 1948. Dortch then moved into the Sebastian apartment, where he lived until August 26, 1949. Mrs. Sebastian on that date compelled him to move because of his drinking habits and his quarrelsome and argumentative nature. He resented this very much particularly in view of the fact that Mrs. Sebastian continued to permit a sailor named Porter, who was going ground with Mrs. Sebastian's daughter Laura, and another sailor, Jones, who was a friend of both Porter and Dortch, to visit her home.

Dortch lived at the New Park Hotel in Westerly, Rhode Island. At about 4:20 p. m. on September 3, 1949, after listening to the radio broadcast of a ball game, he went into a room across from his and there drank some whiskey and beer with a Mrs. Holmes and a Mrs. Taylor. Together they did not consume over one and one-eighth pints of whiskey from the time he went there until shortly after 7 p. m., when he returned to his own room. He claims that Mrs. Sebastian was to have met him there, and he was angry because she had not come. During the preceding two weeks, he had threatened to do harm to her and to kill her. About 7:10 p. m., September 3, he took his hunting knife and a sheath and placed it in his right-hand trouser-pocket. He went to Fiore's taxicab stand but found no taxi. He then went back to his room, fortified himself with a drink of whiskey, took the knife and sheath from his pocket and put them in his trousers in back of his belt, and went down to Pickering's taxicab stand, where he procured a taxi driven by the witness Shea.

Dortch, although he had shouted loudly for a taxi, was quiet and sober and acted normally during the one-and-one-tenth-mile drive to the Sebastian home. He turned on the radio and appeared to be listening to music from the local station until the taxi reached a point about 270 feet east of the Sebastian place, where he told the driver to turn out the headlights, drive past the Sebastian home and turn around about 1200 feet west of the house. As they drove past the house he looked up at it. After turning the taxi around as instructed by Dortch, the driver, on further instructions, let Dortch out about 100 feet west of the driveway into the house. Dortch gave the driver a dollar out of a handful of bills and took fifty cents in change.

Dortch crossed the street and went up to the Sebastian apartment, where he asked Jones and Porter, who were there, either sleeping or preparing to sleep, where Mrs. Sebastian was. Neither of them could tell him. He told Jones he was going to kill her, but Jones did not take it seriously. Dortch appeared normal and sober. He then ran down two flights of stairs and met Mrs. Sebastian in the back yard. He fell upon her with the hunting knife and stabbed her twenty-three times in the chest, abdomen and back. Jones heard her screams for help, saw Dortch stabbing her and ran to her rescue. In an attempt to pull Dortch away from her, Jones was badly cut in his left arm. Jones ran up the street and Dortch ran after him but discontinued the pursuit.

The stabbing of Mrs. Sebastian by Dortch gave her a large number of mortal wounds. Porter went to her and she said: 'Help me, Porter! Junior [the defendant] has cut me.' She died as a result of the wounds just after saying this, while Porter was still with her. Dortch tried to commit suicide. He concealed himself behind a wall on the south side of the highway for a little over an hour and then went to the house of one Szymanski, where he gave himself up to the police.

When Dortch entered Szymanski's house he said: 'I tried to kill someone and I want to give myself up.' Szymanski further testified: 'Well, he talked very clearly, and he seemed to know what he was talking about, I would say. He seemed sober to me.' Two of the police officers who took him to the police station testified to the same effect. Shortly after his arrival at the station, he gave a circumstantial account of his movements during the day to these officers. In telling about taking his knife before going to the house of the victim, he said that he 'had it on his mind to kill Dot.'

An analysis of Dortch's brief narrows the issue. He not only admits, he insists that he is guilty of second degree murder. He claims, however, that he is not guilty of first degree murder. He bases this on the fact, claimed by him to have been proved, that there is no evidence from which the jury reasonably could have found deliberation, one of the essentials of first degree murder. The motive, the threats, the preparation in arming himself and the execution of his design all supply evidence of this element. In answer to the further claim of the defendant that the crime was committed in full sight of witnesses it might be pointed out that he thereafter attempted to commit suicide, a not unusual situation. Whether he was, as he claims, so intoxicated that he was incapable of deliberation or premeditation was a question of fact which the jury have decided against him. The appeal from the denial of the motion to set aside the verdict is without merit.

The statement of facts sufficiently describes the state's claims of proof. The claims of Dortch were essentially that he made no threats against the victim, that he suspected her of having an affair with a sailor who was present at the time of the killing, and that he suffered complete amnesia from the time he left the hotel until he started for Szymanski's house. He also claimed that he had consumed much more liquor than was testified to by the state's witnesses and was intoxicated both before and after the killing.

Three written requests to charge were duly filed and one oral exception was taken. The exception attacked the following charge: 'That, I think, brings us to the vital question, the really controlling question that you will have to decide. It was not was he drunk. It was not was he intoxicated. It is not whether he was insane to a lesser degree than the standard which I read to you. It is on that day and at the time in question, did he have the legal degree of understanding? On all the evidence, on the whole case, if there is reasonable doubt of the sanity of the accused he should...